What Motherhood is Teaching Me

Do you remember being little?

Do you remember wondering what your life would be when you grew up?

Did you ever think you’d be a mom? I can vaguely remember picturing that I would have a boy and a girl (ha!) and I LOVED the name Elizabeth, so I would say I wanted a daughter named that. (Ha again; we have a Reese EliSabeth!) But much beyond that, I don’t remember too much I suppose… I didn’t really know how to dream for my adulthood I don’t think, other than hoping horses were in my future.

There are SOME things I remember though about being a KID, and one is that I thought my mom had all the answers. And then I remember being annoyed and frustrated when she was ‘right’ or if she knew ‘too much.’ I can remember being angry with her (sorry, Mom) and having way too many hormonal emotions throughout the years; but I also remember always NEEDING her. I wanted her back tickles, no matter how old I got. I wanted her to listen, even if I’d get annoyed at times when she would weigh in. I wanted her approval, even though I didn’t. I wanted her appraisal, even when it looked more like tough love.

As we have come full circle, and I have that boy and girl God knew I would have…there are a lot of things that I am feeling. I feel as if the little years painfully went too quickly. I went from pregnant to delivering healthy, beautiful babies, to chasing toddlers, to now raising a seven and eight year old. Sometimes I forget that I used to be a child. I used to poo poo my mother. I used to brush her off. I used to roll my eyes and give her the side eye. I loved her so dearly, but I know there were moments I didn’t show it. (Sorry again, Mom).

My own kids are at interesting stages and seasons of life. I feel in a way as if my little boy has left me…he was a babbling toddler and such a chatter box, and I remember his tiny voice so clearly. Now he plays basketball around the clock and geeks out over Minecraft. He can be so QUIET. Quiet isn’t bad, but I feel how much less he needs me. He’s too big for me to hold and carry (I remember blog posts I wrote dreading that…..) and more times than not I can feel his annoyance. I see the heavy sighs and eye rolls when asked to clean his room or if I ask to walk the dogs. I often feel like the ‘annoying mom,’ and then I remember…I went through that too.

And I still need and love my mom.

He still wants me to lie with him every single night. He lifts his shirt so I can gently tickle his back and belly. He still loves ‘Magic Sleepy Glasses,’ and he still wraps his arms around me to give me sweet hugs. (No more kisses on the lips though…I’m sad to type that I think those days may be gone.) He’s still my little boy, my forever first baby, and I just PRAY—when he grows up, he will remember how very much I have always loved him.

My daughter too, loves me differently these days. PS: I know all of this is very normal. It’s part of ‘growing up,’ right? But I don’t know that I have sat to intentionally process it in a very long time. Reese is the extrovert; the chatter box, the girl who talks a mile a minute and will tell you any and every thing. For her, it’s a little different. She has always clung to me (sometimes too much) so I can still stay that 90% of the time, she just wants Mama. She wants time with me—to walk and talk and laugh and be silly. And I can see a lot of myself in her (as I can see SO much of Asa in Pierson’s disposition.) Reese is feisty and sassy and sometimes equally as salty as sweet. She can be the BEST at eye rolling, at moaning and groaning when asked to do something she may not want to do, and I sometimes wonder how in the world will I survive teenage years with this girl?!

So right now, in this phase and season of life, I am working harder to embrace when she does cling to me. When she asks, “Can we cuddle and watch Heartland?” or when she wants “one more minute” as I tuck her in. I remember teenage me quite well, and I was NOT an easy teen…

Becoming a mom has taught me so much about sacrifice. About selfless love. About doing your best, even when life is hard. About showing up for your kids, even when you are tired. About harnessing anger (especially when those eye rolls and fussiness comes) and biting my tongue. It has taught me that MY mom, did the best SHE could. She was tired (as all moms are), but that didn’t stop her from being selfless. She was sacrificial. She was patient. And even on little to no sleep, she’d crawl in bed with me to tickle my back and I remember always knowing when she was drifting off to sleep as her hand would slow and then completely stop mid-back. It’s exactly what happens with me and my kids. MANY nights, I am so tired, and mid back tickle I doze and fall asleep. (I wonder if my kids think the same thing I did those nights, “Noooo, just a little longer!” Ha!)

Being a mom, has given me a new love for my mom. I can see her better. I understand better. I can FEEL her emotions deeper. She taught me how to be a mother, and if my kids ever get married and have their own kids, I pray I am also teaching THEM to parent well.

Mother’s Day is a few days away. I know that not every woman WANTS to be a mom, and that is okay! I know that many women who want to be a mom, cannot be. I know that this weekend may be painful to so many women, so I also want to take the space to say remember ALL women, everywhere. Be kind. Be careful what you say. Love the women in your circles well. Check on them. Pray for them. And never, ever take the role of being Mom, if you are one, for granted.

This Mama's Walk Down Memory Lane: Are the Best and Most Magical Years Behind Us?

Well I just drastically found myself walking down the rabbit hole of memory lane… I’ve been here before. In a quiet house. Nothing but the sounds of wind blowing outside, the heater kicking on, the animals snoring, and in the midst of twinkly Christmas lights. The fire is crackling and my eyes are fuzzy from the long (but blessed) day I’ve had. I remember being here because the feelings of just wanting to write have graced me once more. Those days don’t come often…I just don’t make time for it like I used to. But before I crawl into bed beside my snoozing husband, I just want to write so that I don’t forget. Or so that when I do forget…I can come back and relive some of this life.

I launched this blog in 2015. Somehow five years have come and gone, and tonight as I sat in the silence I scrolled all the way down to my very first blog posts. In the middle I paused and read about our Humphrey and Elsa passing, and my heart hurts as I now write. One of the posts I also re-read was when our kids were two and three years old…in that post I described that season as magical and beautiful and how hard it was for me that the days were so fleeting. I was convinced that THOSE would be the best years I would experience….You may judge me just a little that right now, I kind of wonder if that I was right?

I’m not saying that I don’t love the stages that my kids are in NOW. They are seven and eight years old (HOW?!?) and oh my, you KNOW I love them each so dearly. But the last couple of years I will have these moments of aching for the days now behind us. New mamas reading this or expectant mamas…I used to want to punch people in the face when they told me to embrace the chaos that existed in those little years. How dare them tell me to EMBRACE the screaming and crying that often occurred when going out to eat or when pushing a shopping cart with each of them in it. Yet here I am…32-years old, wishing I had embraced those moments just a little bit tighter.

I did the best that I could have. You don’t know what you don’t know, especially when it comes to marriage and motherhood. You just DON’T! You excel, you succeed, you kick ass, and then often you also fail. Each day, you do the best you can with what you have, and you go to bed exhausted and you wake up wondering if you’re doing a good job. As I sit here, half way on my couch looking around our home…I miss the newborn days. I miss the toddler years. Heavens to Betsy, I actually MISS when they were each a threenager. Lately, their relationship with each other has been just plain tough. They fight. A lot. They bicker, they tattle, and I know I sound like I’m painting them into this awful corner of horrid children; that’s not my goal. And that’s not what I mean. But life lately is just different. They are so much bigger and maybe because they are only fifteen months apart, they simply struggle to merely get ALONG.

My relationship as their MOM, is different. I have noticed with Pierson especially, my sweet baby boy; he loves me now SO differently. His dad is his everything—his role model, his super hero, his biggest inspiration! And that is GREAT!! What a blessing that my kids have such a present and magnificent father! My big kid third grader sees me, his mama, a lot differently now compared to when he was tiny. Not to mention he’s more than half my height, and I can remember writing about being scared of the day when they’d each no longer fit in my arms. Well guess what? I can pick them up if I really need to, but y’all, they don’t FIT.

One of my sister in laws once told me she has loved every single stage of motherhood. I think I must have asked how she has handled them getting bigger and turning into the mini big kids that they are? And while I agree, I love every stage because I’m their MOM. I will always love them and celebrate them and I will forever cheer them on. But at the moment, I think I more so feel that this stage of motherhood kind of hurts? If I could turn back even a morsel of time, I wish we were in our old house, Jackson street near downtown Louisville—and that they would be tiny once again. Tiny enough to curl into my lap, that they needed to be rocked to sleep, that they needed ME because they didn’t yet have video games or Netflix or neighbor friends or other busy plans. Sounding selfish? Perhaps.

I want to make sure that I say this: my kids are amazing. They are beautiful and strong; they are intelligent and they love Jesus. And I KNOW they love each other…at the end of the day, they are generally asking if they can stay up late together and have sleepovers on each other’s floors. They are obedient and funny and their personalities are exploding as they figure out WHO they are. They still want ME to lie with them every single night, to tickle their backs and bellies and to sing a song or listen to one on Spotify…they hug me daily and tell me that they love me. They cheer ME on and support me on my many creative endeavors. They are GOOD kids.

Maybe it’s the twinkly lights and the silent house? Christmas is near and I often reminisce about those first few, where they were crawling or toddling around the tree. When life was crazy and chaotic, but at the same time…it felt a little simpler? It could also be the pandemic fatigue spurring on these feelings too, y’all know we can’t discount that we are TIRED people as a whole right now. I write all of this to say, no matter where your kids are in this season of life, no matter how big or small they are, no matter what YOU personally are feeling; let’s take a second (or some hours!!) and try to embrace their stages right NOW a little more. Are you up all night nursing and burping and wondering if you’ll ever sleep again? (You will.) Are you wondering how in the world your threenager is wearing you out SO damn much and anxiously awaiting for them to turn FOUR? (They will…and then they’ll turn five. And six. And seven. And eight…) See, this is a reminder for ME too…as I wonder if my seven and eight year old will ever need me again or if they’ll ever be the very best of friends. (Ashley…they will.)

Memory lane…it can be a beast to walk down can’t it? Here’s a quote I want to end on, my soul sister Jen Hatmaker said it in her book ‘Of Mess and Moxie:”

“Of course, in a hundred years, no one will remember any of us and our story will be lost in obscurity, but for us, for all these years when we were kids and then grown-ups, when you were young parents and then grandparents, this is the only story that ever mattered, and it was such a marvelous one. The best story I ever imagined.”

While I sit and remember, and as I remember the hardships and the blessings…I am incredibly thankful that this IS my story—and that I am their Mom.

Mom, What Are You Scared Of?

In our house, we rotate bedtimes. Honest to goodness since the time they were no longer breastfeeding, my husband and I have switched on and off. If he puts Reese down, I put Pierson down. Sometimes there's the nights where that can't happen; I'll be shooting a wedding or have photography sessions for instance and Asa will do them both--or we'll flip flop because one kiddo has requested the other parent. But 95% of the time I think it's pretty routine that we just switch. 

Recently it was my turn with Pierson. Tis' the season for all things Halloween, so he set out ALL the books that he had related to this holiday. We decided on Happy Halloween Little Critter, and before we began he rolled closer to me and asked, "Mom, what are YOU scared of?" 

I could have told him that I used to be deathly afraid of praying mantis, (ahem, still am) or how I still fear pretty much ALL living creatures besides dolphins in the ocean...but I kind of froze. I decided to just matter of factly say, "Well, Buddy--most adults aren't really scared of things such as the dark, or monsters, or spooky things like that; we're more afraid of other things. I guess what I'm scared of is being a bad mom." 

He straight up laughed, y'all!

"MOM!" he giggled. "You're not a BAD mom! That's just silly!" 

And in that moment, I believed him. Five years of his life have come and went. His babyhood is a blur. I remember finding out I was pregnant with him, being excited that we would have a summer baby. I remember his first birthday, and trick or treating indoors when he was two because it was pouring out; he knocked on all the doors with his cousins and screamed "trick or treat!" I remember being terrified that I would break him. Surely my lack of knowledge in the motherhood department would at some point just utterly FAIL, and he wouldn't turn out okay. 

Except that he did... and he has. And while his babyhood is a blur, his childhood is becoming a raw and vivid memory because that's the season we are in. I sit here and I wonder, in their short amount of time--their four and five years of living on this Earth, will they remember the wrongs? 

I doubt any child remembers their youth as being perfect (because parents are human, and WE, are human). But lately I've wondered, how will they remember me? Pierson is my sensitive soul. If I raise my voice even a smidge, he winces and closes his eyes. I didn't lay a finger ON him, yet somehow his heart is shattered and his feelings are in disarray all over the ground. And then there's his sister, who I for the life of me and honest to God, cannot figure out. She can be so head strong and so TOUGH, and most days it doesn't feel as if anything I say or do affects her whatsoever. Can you guess what that translates to for me...? 

Anger. 

A LOT of anger. I often feel that my life is a permanent profession of redirecting and saying phrases like, "Please stop. DON'T do that. You NEED to listen. You need to go to time out. Okay, I'm done. NO!" And then I remind myself--I am currently teaching kindergarten through fifth grades AND I have a four and a five year old at home. Oh, hello! 

But this really isn't about her--or him. It's about moms. And the fact that I think there are a LOT of you who are scared of being bad at your job. But the truth is, you aren't. I just bought Jen Hatmaker's newest book, "Of Mess and Moxie," and it arrived at THE perfect time. She said this, which I just loved: 

"Friends...I believe we can take a handful of things quite seriously as parents and take the rest less seriously, and it is all going to be okay. You are doing an amazing job. Your children know that they are loved and have felt it all these years deeply, intrinsically. If we get seven out of ten things mostly right as moms, we are winning the majority, and the majority wins the race." (Pg 17). 

It's actually taken me over a month to finish this post, because guess what, today we just set up our CHRISTMAS TREE. No, Thanksgiving hasn't even passed, but I'm a blogger and our family LOVES Christmas so yeah, we're way early. But the truth is, this fear of mine hasn't changed. I think it was ingrained in me before my son ever entered this world and I'm not certain that it will ever go away. But maybe it's okay to be a little scared. Maybe it's okay that we STRIVE for goodness--that we don't give up, that we keep going, that we keep praying, and disciplining, and hugging, and crying. 

Maybe it's okay that we want to be good moms. And maybe it's okay that sometimes we are scared.