I was the mother of holiday invention ... until my kids went feral and I went to yoga

2 months ago 5

Opinion

December 29, 2025 — 3.30pm

At the start of school holidays, like a good disciple of modern mindfulness, I set my intention: the summer holidays will be fun and relaxing – a chance to reconnect with my kids. After all, I’d be off work as well. I would be the ringleader of fun.

By day three, however, utterly exhausted from how much fun we’d been having, I caved in and booked my four- and six-year-olds into holiday programs so I could take a meditative yoga class.

The first stage of school-holiday acceptance, denial, had swiftly transformed into the second (anger) when relentless demands for snacks were coupled with the frequent, impromptu home remodelling that small children are wont to do when screen time is refused. Plus, there was slime appearing on the walls, like something out of The Exorcist.

It helps to keep the kids – and their parents – occupied.

The third stage, depression, swiftly followed. I needed some me time.

As I lay in a darkened room, limbs contorted in an unnatural position while the meditative yoga instructor struck tiny, expensive cymbals, probably handmade in Tibet, I realised my stamina for hanging out with my kids was the only thing out of shape.

Let’s be honest, it’s easier to be at work than around small children (unless you work with small children, and in that case, I send condolences and a nomination for the Order of Australia).

Could I treat spending time with my kids as a kind of meditative practice, reclaiming my sanity by breathing through the discomfort and chaos, as in yoga? Could I give my kids the gift of my presence and undivided attention, even if my presence is haggard and my attention is tetchy?

There’s a TikTok parenting trend (isn’t there always?) with the hashtag #corememories. It’s filled with clips of people’s kids doing something wholesome, such as jumping in puddles, accompanied by instrumental music from Pixar’s Inside Out. The caption reads, “Letting my children create core memories”. It’s as though the parent has curated this moment of unbridled childhood, and is glowing with the positive feedback from packaging it for mass consumption.

As Kathryn Jezer-Morton wrote in The Cut – under the headline “Why are parents fixated on core memories”: “Presuming to know what experiences will be most formative for your children, and then taking the next step and boasting about that presumption to everyone you know, is a new level of buy-in to the charade of happy-family cosplay on social media.”

But as it turns out, I need core memories of my children more than they need me to “curate” them, which almost always means putting my phone away. I set myself a challenge: a whole day with my kids, being utterly present. We walked to the park, and I watched them climbing, playing pirates, investigating slater bugs and tiny flowers. I realised that my kids’ ability to transform boredom into imaginative play is something I have utterly lost the capacity for when my phone, or even my job, is infinitely more stimulating.

I hit the fifth stage of school holiday acceptance: the upward swing.

Towards the end of the day, I caved in and put a movie on. Hey, I’m not Montessori Wonder Woman. My initial school holiday anger and depression had been transformed into acceptance and hope. My daughter climbed into my lap as we watched The Grinch, and I pulled her into my arms.

I’m sick of being busy: rushing around all year, seeing my kids as another item on my to-do list, between drop-offs, pick-ups, dinner, bath and bed. Like meditation, being present with small kids, no matter how chaotic, takes practice. I need it more than lying in an overpriced yoga studio. I need it all: the inevitable tears, the demands for snacks and the orders: “Watch me, Mummy, watch me!”

When the world feels wildly out of control, made worse by doom-scrolling, the best remedy is to be around those you love. If I lose the ability to be present with my children, when it’s infinitely easier to park them in front of a screen, I miss the opportunity to create my own core memories of their precious childhood, which is dripping away like a melting glacier, one day at a time. The days are long but the years are short. It’s time to go clean up some slime and reset the house for another day of beautiful chaos. Yoga is for wimps.

Cherie Gilmour is a freelance writer.

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