How many mothers go into motherhood, expecting themselves and their children to be perfect, wanting the perfect motherhood experience?  According to recent news reports, when motherhood proves to be less than perfect, moms turn to drugs and alcohol to numb the disappointment of failed expectations.

I had a long talk last week with a young mother who talked about the pressure to live her life as a “Disney-perfect Mom.”  And how critical other mothers can be when your life doesn’t turn out to be “Disney perfect.”  So many mothers want to believe that if they just “do the right things” with their children, their lives will be Disney-perfect and their children will all “say no to drugs,” graduate from high school as valedictorian and gain entrance into Harvard.

Then life happens and we as mothers, and our children, as, well . . .  children, turns out to be less than Disney-perfect.  And your other mother friends look at your life and try to decide where you went wrong.  Hoping that if they can figure that out, and avoid your mistakes, they can continue to live Disney-perfect lives, with Disney-perfect children.

According to the reports on drug and alcohol abuse among supermoms, mothers often turn to “uppers” to avoid postpartum depression and then fall into the pattern of taking  prescription drugs. They even call them “mother’s little helpers” -  uppers in the morning to energize yourself and downers in the evenings to calm yourself down.

We all know how important our roles as mothers are.  And we don’t want our children messed up by our mistakes.  We want to do this motherhood thing perfectly, because we love our children and want the very best for them.  And the best is perfection, right?

How many of us mothers keep up the illusion that our lives and our children are perfect?  So we don’t have to face the criticism of our friends or neighbors or family, when we fail.

When the best for our children is NOT perfection, but honesty and