The Truth About Motherhood

I sent my eleven year old girl off to creative writing class this morning looking cute as a button. And then I remembered that I forgot to comb her hair or remind her to comb it. This is a true story. 

When I picked her up to run her over to art class where I would drop her off while also picking up her brother and sister to take them back to THEIR creative writing class, I noticed that my other daughter, age fourteen, had on dirty jeans.  Her hair was combed, though. 

For just a minute, I felt that feeling creep up on me that says, "You're a bad Mom. Seriously, who doesn't comb their kid's hair or notice that big ole stain on the front of their kid's jeans?! Did you even look at them this morning?!" 

But, I'm getting sassy in my 40's, so I answered myself back and said, "Yes. I did. I looked at them and hugged them and laughed with them on the way to their classes and I told them I loved them to the moon and back when I picked them up AND when I dropped them off. So kiss it, big mouth inside voice!". 

I think it's time Moms start telling the truth and stop pretending like we have it all together. I think we need to stop seeing Facebook posts and Pinterest as reality and start reminding one another that those are just snapshots of our best days, our most successful days. We need to tell each other the truth and have some grace for one another and stop...just STOP...with the Mommy wars.  So, here's my truth:

1.  I do not serve our meals on china. Ever. If we're lucky, I whip out the Corelle ware and feel like a champ. We buy pretty paper plates for holidays because I don't want to do the dishes for a crowd.

2.  I do not know, nor do I care to teach my kids, which fork is the salad fork or which glass is the water glass. Eating with their mouths closed is good enough for me. 

3.  I feed my kids sugar. Sometimes, I eat it with them. I also hide some sugar for myself and eat it after they go to bed because I don't want to share it. 

4.  When my kids were younger, Barney and Veggie Tales acted as the occasional baby sitter and I was grateful. So, to all you Moms of "littles": don't listen to the hype. You aren't going to warp your kids if you aren't sitting by their side reading from the classics or listening to Chopin every minute of every day.  Heck, some days I just needed to jam to Seven Nation Army and my kids loved it.

5.  My discipline isn't always, every time, forever consistent. There are times I tell my kids one thing and the next day I may contradict that completely.  I've learned that every circumstance is different and unique and not all discipline is for all the time. The end. I don't care what "the books" that people are trying to sell for money say. This is the real world.

6. I don't give them a bath or force them to bathe every single day. I try on this one, but I sometimes just flat out fail because the day was B.U.S.Y. and waiting until the next day isn't going to turn them into Pigpen and if it does...well, they can always scrub a little harder. God made dirt and a little dirt never hurt.

7.  Sometimes I raise my voice at my kids.  Really, really loudly. This used to make my heart weep when my kids were small, but then one day I had to realize that screaming is better than them pouring boiling water over their head because I wanted to be politically correct and "perfect calm parent" and not scream when my baby reached for the stove.  So, all you parents of still small kids out there:  Screaming isn't the worst thing you can do. Show yourself some grace. It happens. 

8. Sometimes I use the dryer as my iron. Sometimes, I do this multiple times a day and I'm thankful it works and other times I have to rewash the whole load because I forgot and the clothes got a little stinky.

9. When my kids were little, I LOVED nap time. I was thankful they were asleep because I needed a break. (I did a happy dance sometimes, y'all. For real.) Now that they're older when I need a break I either tell them to go in their room for a bit or I disappear into mine for a while. I also tell them unless someone is on fire or they have a bone poking out they are NOT to knock on my door...even if their sister IS breathing on them!

10. I have not mopped my floors in almost six weeks. (I swept them, though. That'll have to do.) We're busy right now and I'm choosing to look at it as an immune booster. 

11. Fruit salad and goldfish have been lunch before. All of lunch. 

12.  This list is merely the tip of the iceberg.  You should SEE my laundry room!!

Social media has motherhood...maybe parenthood...becoming a competition.  Its turned loving your child into a sport between moms. That doesn't feel like love to me. That feels like insecure women trying to prove themselves by how well they can pretend to be perfect parents and no one is better for the trade off. 

Kids need to SEE that parenting is tough business. They need to see that sometimes we fail because they learn how to deal with failure based on how well their parents deal with failure.  They learn empathy and sympathy from us, their moms and their dads.  They learn their priorities from US and I want my kid's priorities to be on loving Jesus and loving people, not on whether they have the right phone, the right outfit, the right toys or the Pinterest perfect birthday cake served on the correct platter.  I want them to nail loving themselves and others and the only way to teach them that is if I live that. 

So, here's to just being for real:  I'm an imperfect parent, but I love my kids more than anything in the world. To infinity and beyond. And you know what? I think they know it....even when they don't comb their hair or wear clean jeans to class. Maybe especially then.

And now, maybe I'll go wash a load of clothes (or restart that dryer). Or maybe I'll just let everyone wear dirty jeans because a trip to the library would be more fun.  Or take pictures of my oldest son, now 20, who just got back from his 5am job and is asleep on the couch with our Pug. They are CUTE and this oldest boy of mine is almost ready to fly from my nest and the laundry can just flat wait because very soon he will no longer be coming home to nap on my couch from a long day at work, but instead, his own...

Temptation Triggers

Life is a pendulum. Our spiritual life is a pendulum, too. I have rough times when it feels like God is absent or maybe He's busy with other things and not that into me right now. If you know Christ, you know that's a lie. I KNOW that's a lie. 

Sometimes, I feel as barren as this picture and I can miss the beauty that is still there.

Lots of people blame "the enemy" for all their woes and ills and are often heard saying "They just don't feel close to God right now."  I can relate. I get that. But, God's also been calling me to pay attention. Look closely at what is going on my own life when I feel that way because God is ALWAYS close. He is ALWAYS available and His love, goodness, kindness and mercy don't alter or change or waver. 

If my relationship with Him is off, I'm the one that flipped the switch to that position. Period. As a matter of fact, the more attention I pay to these times in my life, the more God is teaching me about triggers that not only bring those feelings to the forefront but what I'm doing that exacerbates those feelings once they begin. (Note: Feelings are often lies. Everything you "feel" isn't truth and every truth doesn't have to produce a "feeling" to still be absolute truth.)

The last two months have been one of the times in my life that my faith didn't make me feel peaceful or draw me closer to the Lord.  I've been itchy and restless and, truthfully, a little scared about some decisions that my husband and I have made for our family. I didn't sleep well a few nights and I've been more flighty than usual. (that's bad, for y'all that don't know me personally) I prayed and heard nothing. I prayed about specific things, non-specific things and things that have nothing to do with why I feel yucky. Nothing.  Still itchy and restless. 

For me, that feeling is very much like those days when you're hungry for...something...so you eat a little of everything in the pantry. Your belly is totally full but you still want that particular something to eat and your pantry obviously does NOT have it and you have no idea what it is even if your pantry did happen to have it but you know it doesn't because you've sampled EVERYTHING available. Twice. And you STILL want...something.  Know what I mean? 

My spiritual hunger is the same way. Sometimes, I want some fullness in my spirit that I can't find. I'm empty and restless and edgy, but no matter what devotional I do or how much I pray or how much quiet time I have in the morning, I'm still a little (or a lot) empty. Often, I find myself trying to fill that space with other things. Most of the time, it's not bad things or even things that I "shouldn't" be doing as a follower of Christ.  But sometimes, they're things that give me immediate pleasure, but no long term joy or satisfaction.  I call these my temptation triggers. 

Some of my temptation triggers are just basic things that elongate that feeling of emptiness (why do we do that?!). What they REALLY do is make sure that I absolutely do NOT have to wait for the Lord or have my spirit be quiet and let Him come, in HIS time, to bring me quiet and peace and assurance. These triggers make sure I do NOT have to wait for Him to come (and He WILL come) and fill me up.  

Here's a few of my temptation triggers that I've noticed the last few months:

1.  Questionable music.  I LOVE to dance. (and y'all I can bust a move, too)  But, I can dance to LaCrae and TobyMac in these times just like I can listen to other tunes.  Now, I'm not saying ALL secular music is bad (some of it is, but NOT all of it.). I'm saying that when I'm feeling funky, that is NOT a good time to pull out some dance music and go at it. It often leads me to other music that makes my feet move but that also makes my head full of junk that doesn't need to be there. 

2.  Questionable reading material.  I love to read. If it's in writing, I'll read it. You ready? One time, I was out of books and it was too late to go to the library, so I read the dictionary.  I read it and read it and read it and I was happy.  But, when I'm in a spiritual funk, and my devotionals aren't cutting it, why not pick up a good Dean Koontz book?  Here again, don't get me wrong. When I'm in peaceful place, I don't think there's a thing wrong with Dean Koontz and I like his work, especially his later work.  BUT, when I'm in a place where I KNOW something is going on spiritually, it's a bad time to move from the Word, even if I'm being too stubborn to let it sink into my heart. I've learned that it's better to find some quiet time and do the writing MYSELF than pick up a book that causes me to drown out that still small voice (I'm not saying that's EVER good, but I tend to actively do this when I'm restless). It's easier to escape with a sensational brain dead book, but it's not easier to find my peace with that book in my hand and my spirit tends to be in turmoil longer if I do this.

3.  Pinterest   Yes, THAT Pinterest.  Here again, there's zero wrong with Pinterest. I love it. I love scrapbooking and a virtual scrapbook that I can just click on is fabulous, people. BUT! When I'm spiritually restless, something about Pinterest in particular prolongs that feeling and makes it last and last and last.  I know one reason for that, but not all of them.  That one reason is this:  I look at all those photoshopped homes and rooms and professionally shot clothing pins and I WANT THAT.  I want that RIGHT NOW.  And then...my little inside voice who is not all that nice to begin with says to me (say this in a voice like nails on a chalkboard if you want to know what my inside voice sounds like): "And your house will look like that sometime around the year 2486 A.D....if you're lucky. And you aren't lucky. Ever. You're the opposite of lucky."

 And when my spirit is in an upheaval, I believe that mean, inner voice that says those things.  And you guessed it:  It prolongs the spiritual dryness that I'm feeling. It makes me feel less than and like I may not be worthy of God's love and affection and that IS A LIE.  Christ made sure that's a lie. Christ covered all that unworthiness and made me worthy. Jesus is enough. Period. (take THAT you screechy, inside voice!!!)

4.  My house   This one is the hardest for me to admit because frankly, it just sounds pathetic. I have a great house. I like my house. It's older and it's not perfect, but it's a wonderful home and I'm blessed to call it mine. But, when I'm feeling spiritually bereft, I walk through my home and every bump, scrape and nick is a massive catastrophe and it's a wonder the place isn't falling down around us (in my head, not for real). This leads me to think about money: How little we have or how much we have or how much we can spend to fix this catastrophic sticks and bricks we live in because for real, that doorjamb with all the pieces of wood missing could be a direct reflection on my soul and IT. MUST. BE. FIXED. Today. Now.  And guess what happens?  I am diverted from having to wait and sit quietly in the loving presence of God because my attention is fully engaged in the very 1st world problem of having a nicked up doorjamb in my 4 bedroom home. (Told you it was pathetic, y'all)  

God is teaching me about my temptation triggers. I think He is very intentionally teaching me about the triggers that I tend to downplay as being unimportant, too. Here's the deal:  ANYTHING that causes you to ignore your spirit and your relationship with the Lord is important. It's not a little thing. It's the things that keep us from pushing through and finding our way through the valley and up the mountain to stand in his presence and feel peaceful and loved and I'm beginning to believe that the "little" things are the ones we excuse and ignore most often, even though those are the ones doing the most long term damage as we wait on the Lord. 

Even if your temptation triggers don't look a thing like mine, don't ignore them. They keep us from the peace and grace that God longs to give.  Without the love, grace and peace that are ours as children of God, we're often unable to pour into others and love them in a way that pleases God.  Without the peace and assurance of love that feeling close to God brings, we're unable to show kindness and love to others in the way that the world so desperately needs. We're unable to share Christ with others when we ignore these triggers because we're focused on covering up OUR dryness so we miss how many around us are lost in a world of hurt. That's not who I want to be.

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will."  Romans 12:2