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JUST a stay at home mom?| | 
"...I feel like I spend my day just going around and around and around." I heard myself say to Robert on the phone yesterday. My voice was tired and somewhat desperate sounding...
"...I change a diaper, than turn around and there's another one to change I do the laundry and then do it again the dishes and then there is more one of the boys didn't close the bathroom door or the toilet lid and then baby got in there and ate it and it was everywhere and the boys have been fighting over who has won that or this and I know Morgan needs me in her life but she is so quiet and she just goes and does her thing and all this feels so mundane and I wonder why I dust this house at all and today it seems like I have no privacy I mean I finally found a moment to use the restroom and I wasn't in there two seconds and they are pounding on the door and someone needs me all the time all day long that I don't eat, drink, even pee because I just can't and there is never a moment that someone isn't needing me and one of the boys slammed the front door and Itty's head was in between so I had to fix her head using the surgical glue and I don't think boys think at all when they do things and sometimes I want to just put them all in front of a video and close my door and lock it and never come out and I feel like a failure..."
And so went my run-on sentence in one steady flow and tone, of well, a plea of sorts for prayer and for comfort, or at least just to get it out of my mouth so that I could acknowledge that I was still alive.
Robert said, "I've had a rough day too, you want me to pray with you?"
I replied, "Yes, pray for me - 'cause I can't right now. I'm sorry you've had a rough work day, but sometimes I want to trade with you..."
He patiently listens and I can tell he understands way more than I give him credit for. He's tender and he knows what I say isn't said out of disrespect for all he does.
It's funny to me that feminists fight for a woman's right to do anything a man does. They've fought long and hard for this. Course women can do it. Except be a sperm donor. Ironically, if they want to prove their strength though and ability to outshine a man, why don't they run to motherhood? (I'm being bit sarcastic here, I think?)
It's no piece of cake, walk in the park, egg over easy... it's been ridiculed, put down, after all you're just a "stay-at-home-mom."
Truth is, being an air traffic controller doesn't light a candle to the work a mom accomplishes all at one time. We've all seen the little write ups about how a mom's job description can be put in professional terms and suddenly look all very important and educated.
I've heard it said that blogging has been an image saver and affirmation gratification to millions of stay at home mom's who were feeling less than noticed in their lives. Finally, for crying out loud, a way for the world and friends and family to know that we are more than just the average stay at home mom! ! ! (Again, I fall to sarcasm. But sadly.)
But truly, we women can't handle the lack of praise that motherhood endures. We can't handle not feeling important. We can handle the mundane of the office job over the mundane of the "stay-at-home-mom" because at least in the work place there is the potential of being noticed for what we do day in and day out!
If work isn't providing the affirmation, just give yourself a good job description to rattle off to complete strangers, and as long as it's not just "stay at home mom" people will perk up and take notice. If not praised at work, at least there is a paycheck to take home to assure yourself someone knew what you did!
(Don't think I'm writing from no experience just because by the number of children that are in the top blog photo one might jest that I started having children before puberty.)
I go out and work photography for clients. More often than not, they are pleased. I work my tail off, I mean hard, and I don't even think about it that much because after all, it's my job and it feels good to have people love what I am doing for them.
It feels good too to love what I am doing. I go around and around for these clients, sometimes my head spins. I love my clients. I love the work. They're good people and I think it's worth all the work I put in, even the work they are completely unaware of - the all night editing, or setting up sitters for the kids, or the email and computer and communication work, the styling of outfits, the driving to and from through traffic, even the removal of tiny zits and or scars if need be. The details...
My point is this - on tough days in motherhood, why can't we seem to have the same attitude about our "career choice?" Motherhood doesn't always throw me the feel-good feelings like maybe another job. It takes a ton more emotional and physical strength than we women really want to put out. It laughs in the face of our competence and confidence we try so hard to feel and have in a society that tells us we can do anything we want and do it good.
Motherhood can make a wimp out of us. Out of me.
In a world where we women are told we can be anything we want and we can do it! are we looking for anything
...except motherhood?
God doesn't call every woman to be mom. I will never say it's the grandest occupation or the only one worth having. It's not. It's just not. It's evident to me that God has many women do many different things, some completely unable to have children. These women aren't cursed - it's God's plan for their life that they are not able to have children, and it's a good one, in fact, the best plan for them. He has different plans for different people and what I am NOT SAYING here is that if you take on the call to motherhood while the world puts it down, you are a better person because of your choice. Wrong. Don't make motherhood an idol. Or motherhood your identity. If you do, you have failed at the calling you think you have and the fruit you thought you would reap, will devastate you.
...But the truth is, a lot of us are called to be moms. And when you get into it all, you find it just doesn't mix with a self-seeking heart. And other careers, despite that they go round and round too (but less frequently have to deal with poop), do help us in our deeper desires to gratify our self-importance. It's easy to lose our hearts to the glitter of a self-important career and forget that there are hearts under our charge that need our unconditional love and acceptance and training -- AND IT'S WORTH IT.
I want to RISE TO THE CHALLENGE to the hardest career I could have ever chosen. Yep, I will probably have to tell myself this each and everyday. Not because I don't LOVE every single one of my children, and not because I don't love motherhood, but because it's hard. And though I typically love a good challenge, this motherhood stuff goes beyond that. I can't do it without God.
I'll be honest, out of working in a pediatrician's office, being a church secretary, a janitor, teacher, going to college, interior design school, working for different companies with my various forms of art, singing, doing hair and make-up for events and weddings, starting my own greeting card line, photography business, working in the fashion and childrens' clothing industry with photography, etc. I have found that though each had it's difficulties, none brought me to quite the neediness I feel and incapability I feel as a mom.
This may not sound much like an advertisement for motherhood, but hey, I'm not trying to advertise here.
At the same time, though all the different experiences and jobs and opportunities I've had in my life have brought some degree of joy into my life, none have brought the joy that being a mom has bought... in fact, there is no comparison. None w-h-a-t-s-o-e-v-e-r.
Yeah, motherhood it's not as noticed and the payment doesn't come in dollar bills. Emotionally, I may not feel cut out for it. But seriously, I would rather go around and around for something that is eternal than something that won't matter even in a decade, or less. Fact is, I am doing the career I feel less cut out to be doing, and interestingly enough, still feel more drawn to it than all my plenty of other options.
I have learned that being a success outside the home, won't take away the feeling of failure on the inside. I have a feeling this goes for both men and women.
I am very grateful to God for a husband who is by my side, walking hand in hand in this all the way. It wasn't always that way, which makes me never, ever want to take it for granted.
I married a man 13 years ago that was taught a wife should basically "Be plain in dress, and sober in diet;
In short, my deary, kiss me, and be quiet."  Then there was a summer four years back that everything changed. He changed. God changed him. It wasn't me - I didn't do any of the changing of him. It actually happened very much apart from me - other than eight years of prayer.
In short, God answered the cries of my heart and honestly, I find myself still in shock at times at how God has transformed and saved my husband from a patriocentricity upbringing and mindset to one that is not self-seeking but rather so very supportive, humble leading, and loving.
The leadership went from dictatorship and legalism to devotion to God and serving and loving those God had blessed him with, not in regards to what his wife and kids could do for him, but what he could do for them. It wasn't any longer about the image of his family or making sure everyone did as he thought it should be done, but walking by the Holy Spirit and giving of himself. Wow - transformation. (I smile just typing about it. God is good.)
But that's a whole different post I didn't intend on posting. But I want to give a shout out - "Don't give up when the going gets or is or has been tough!" God has a purpose, a plan, and He desires us to pray and to trust and to draw near to HIM. And fight for our marriages. I truly believe there is nothing greater the enemy loves to destroy than a marriage that claims the name of Christ - whether destroyed internally where no one even knows, or public, where Christ's name can be openly mocked.
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So, Robert did pray on the phone with me that afternoon and the whole time I was on the phone with him, about every few seconds someone was calling, "MOOOOM..."
I put my head down in the blanket that lies at the foot of my bed and buried my head. My feet were hanging off the side of the bed and I could feel little fingers touching my toes.
It began to tickle. I heard Robert's calming words in my left ear as he prayed for me, from the right I could hear the children asking this or that and calling for me to come.
And I started smiling to myself, face down in the blanket. Because my feet are very ticklish.
And because everything was crazy.
And because Baby's little fingers reaching for my feet sticking off the end of the bed was truly - was truly touching my heart and somehow the craziness all around me was just melting in the moment of her tickling my feet and feeling those little fingers reach for me.
I hung up the phone after "I love you Hon, don't give up..." his words kind of echoing in my head as I put the phone down beside my head on the bed. I know we both need to hear it, often. Words about love and perseverance.
Motherhood - it's not for cowards. Feminist, you want a challenge? Something you can do better than men? joking all aside, it may not feel or look glamorous. It may not give me the extra cash I think I need for shopping for those cute new shoes.
It may make me go 'round and 'round, on a ride that seems to have no end.
And I will always believe motherhood is the real proof evolution is the biggest lie that surfaced the planet, because if it were true, we mom's would have evolved way more than two hands over the millions of years to suit our environment... we'd have at least evolved 5 or 6 by now.
But there is something about being a mom that words don't really ever give justice to. I've tried just a bit here and I know these words fall short. The toil mixed with the joys. The pain mixed with the love. The failures mixed with the triumphs. All those mixed feelings that came yesterday amidst the overwhelming afternoon, calling Robert for encouragement, at the same time, smiling because my baby was tickling my toes.
It was my own mom who taught me to stand up to problems, not only in the world, but in myself... and so when I see the problem of me losing the vision, my spinning head that needs to get re-focused, I want to face the problem head on... Mom, don't know if you know you taught me that, but you did.
It was also my own mom who showed me through example where to go in those needy times.
Not just to Robert, but to God.
I hung up with Robert, I kept my head buried in the blanket, and in the midst of my baby tickling my toes and the children needing me to break up a disagreement over whose hot wheel car went the furthest, I found myself calling out to Jesus for strength to just do the next thing. And He met me there, with my face down.
"...I am an object of scorn to my accusers; when they see me, they wag their heads. Help me, O Lord, my God, save me according to Your streadfast love! Let them know that this is Your hand; You, O Lord, have done it!
Let them curse, but You will bless! They arise and are put to shame, but your servant will be glad! ...With my mouth I will give great thanks to the Lord; I will praise Him in the midst of the throng, For He stands at the right hand of the needy..." Ps. 109:25-31
"...But with everlasting love I will have compassion on you, says the Lord, Your Redeemer... for the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but My steadfast love shall not depart from you, says the Lord, who has compassion on you..." Is 54:8
"For the one who sows to his own flesh will from his flesh reap corruption (motherhood can be sewn in flesh too!) but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit (that which is not sewn in the Spirit, is of the flesh) will reap eternal life. And let us not grow weary in well doing, for in due season, we will reap, IF WE DO NOT GIVE UP." Gal. 6:8-9
I pray that I would not get trapped into the world's thinking that motherhood is less than it is, and that I would not get trapped into thinking that it is more than what it should be to me. Finding the balance between the two is where I want to stay and further motivates me to not give up.
There is this song I heard on the radio not long ago - it's called "Lead Me" by Sanctus Real (look it up, neat testimony on video online) It's basically a testimony of a man who had his heart turned back to his family from his other dreams that were consuming him. But it touched me as a mom too. The last verse says:
So Father, give me the strength
To be everything I'm called to be
Oh, Father, show me the way
To lead them
Won't You lead me?
To lead them with strong hands
To stand up when they can't
Don't want to leave them hungry for love,
Chasing things that I could give up
I'll show them I'm willing to fight
And give them the best of my life
So we can call this our home
Lead me, 'cause I can't do this alone
*You can go under "Audio" here on my site and listen to the whole song if you'd like.*
(forgive the perhaps chaos of thoughts throughout this post, as I posted it throughout the day one little bit at a time.)
a. ann~ | | | Posted 7/16/2010 4:51 PM - 2782 Views
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