Faith & Encouragement

My Kids are Jerks
July 19, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Home & Family No Comment

For the month of July, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Family Culture & Connection, Simplicity, and Infertility/Secondary Infertility as well as some of our Core Themes. 

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast and please leave us a review on iTunes! Also, read about our Summer Connection Groups and think about how you might reach out to mamas near you for intentional time together this summer!

Sometimes my kids are jerks.

There. I said it.

I’m certainly not the first to say it out loud, but as a mom who is always trying to convince myself of my okay-ness, it’s the first time I’ve ever come out and said it to anybody, really. I’m not sure if it bothers my pride more that I called them jerks, or that sometimes it’s true.

I mean, they’re also wonderful. They’re full of curiosity, determination, light, and humor. They bring joy to my life and will be my legacy when I’m gone…but then there are those times when they’re full of sass and spite and defiance. You know. Jerks.

My oldest (six) gets argumentative…often. The other day, I corrected her for it (again). “Darling, when I give you direction, you keep coming back with disrespect and arguments that imply you know what’s best and Mama doesn’t know what she’s talking about. That has to stop.”  

She responded, “No I don’t. You just think that.” Sigh…

The five-year-old was messing with the baby, making her holler. I called out from my place in the kitchen, “Katherine, I’m not sure what you’re doing, but I’m pretty sure your sister doesn’t like it.” Her reply?

“I know. That’s why I’m doing it.”

My sweet toddler was cuddling with his baby sister while she nursed in my lap. He adores her and dotes on her in a way that I’ve never seen in a two-year-old boy. Suddenly, I felt him tense up and the baby shrieked. I looked down and he was biting her pointer finger. He broke skin.

Sometimes they’re jerks and I just want to yell at them. Sometimes I’m the jerk and I do.

If I’m the one being a jerk and I lose it on my littles, it’s easy enough–though I prefer not to need to–I go through the drill all the time when they wrong each other.

I’m sorry for…

It was wrong because…

In the future I will…

Will you forgive me?

But what happens when my kids are the jerks and I hate everything and it’s all annoying and just too much? 

I’m learning that my irritation is (counterintuitively) a call to reconnect, and I’m finding a few small, doable ways to do it.

First, I reconnect to God. This is, for me, usually a simple, “Jesus! I need HELP!” Then, I look around quickly and find a few things to thank Him for. Currently, I’m looking at an empty coffee cup. There. I was able to finish a cup of instant coffee. I’m thankful for coffee and the ability to make it quickly and the chance to finish it today. It doesn’t have to be a big thing, just something I’m honestly grateful for.

Next, I reconnect with myself. What physical needs of my own am I neglecting? Am I hungry? Dehydrated? Did I take my medication? Do I need something right now? Do I have to pee? (Am I the only one who gets snippy when I have a full bladder?)

Then, I reconnect with my babies. You know, the ones who were jerks a minute ago. I offer a gentle touch and some eye contact, maybe some gentle words. Since I’ve connected with my God and myself, sometimes this turns into a long, heart-warming moment where I end up on the floor, reading aloud with the four children piled around me like puppies. More frequently, they flit on to the next thing, whatever it is.

Clearly, this doesn’t solve every parenting issue. Little people are complex—they’re made in the image of God, but they’re also born sinners. I’m supposed to help them navigate to adulthood, even though I face this same tension. As complicated as motherhood can be, I haven’t found a situation yet where connection has made anything worse. When we’re just being prickly and irritable, sometimes that connection is all it takes.

Sometimes my kids are jerks, but I have learned by experience that reconnecting helps us all find our way to a little more harmony.. (Until tomorrow, at least…I hope.)

 Robin Chapman is a full-time imperfect Jesus lover, wife, and mama to four babies six and down. When she isn’t buried in children or hiding from them, she enjoys reading, photography, and sharing stories on her blog, where she’d love to connect with you! You can also find her on Facebook or Instagram… or perhaps hiding in her bathroom with some coffee. 

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Invited Into Friendship
June 30, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Soul Care for Moms No Comment

For the month of June, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Combating Loneliness and Nutrition Challenges as well as some of our Core Themes. 

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast and please leave us a review on iTunes! Also, read about our Summer Connection Groups and think about how you might reach out to mamas near you for intentional time together this summer!

I thought I was fine. I had friends. I was married. We had two little kids. I felt settled living where I was, but incredibly lonesome as well. Our family had been at Bible College in Sydney, Australia for two years already and going into our third year, I was quietly confident that I would get through this year as I had done the last couple of years—gritting my teeth, pushing through, depending on friends a little—but mostly just enduring. My dearest friend had just left the college, leaving a huge void in my life, and as I mourned the loss of our close friendship, I knew the year was sure to be a different one.

At the start of a new school year, I was curious to meet the new families who would be joining us at the school. I recognized the nervousness on their faces. I was nervous too. Nervous that I might not make any new friends from this new crop of people.

On the day of the picnic to welcome incoming families, I scoped the scene. There were some people already chatting with new friends. Kids were running in every direction on the play equipment, and I thought my baby might like the swings. A beautiful mum was pushing her youngest girl on the swing as well. I introduced myself, clicking the little chain across the swing to secure my son. She smiled wide, and her lovely brown eyes sparkled as she told me the names of her kids, pointing out her older daughter who was running around the playground. I don’t remember the details of the conversation, but I do remember feeling like I didn’t want it to end. A little while later, we were pulled by our tired children and weary husbands back to our separate lives, and I remember thinking, ‘This will not be the last time I see her.’

Our firstborns were close in age, as were our second-borns—hers both a little bit older than mine. They seemed like great playdate material. We got together a few times, and it was fun. We talked and drank tea from lovely cups. A friendship was beginning to blossom, and it was beautiful.

This dear lady went on to bravely invite a few of the ladies that she had connected with and drew us into her life in a deep way. She told us how she wanted to intentionally create the community she was longing for herself. She wanted to encourage us to open up and share the raw messy reality of our lives with each other. Having been at a pretty tough place in my motherhood journey— sleepless and breastfeeding, no family nearby and two little people who needed me almost more than I could handle—it felt like this this precious woman was holding out a life preserver to me.

I accepted the invitation wholeheartedly, all the while wondering why I had never done this before. She demonstrated for me how our hearts—that soft emotional bit of us—breathe better amongst friends. Changes start to happen slowly that open us to see the beauty and joy in our world, even on the hard days. We can intentionally make space for that to happen.

There was something in the way that she gave me permission to live my life, with my guard down, that seemed to unlock something deep in me. It was almost as though I’d been marching to the beat of someone else’s drum for a long time. Sitting quietly with this group of ladies, I started to hear my own beat once more. In this new community, I found the freedom to be more fully me again.

Shannon Anderson lives with her husband, who is the love of her life, and their two kids, in Sydney Australia. They are currently at Bible College while they are preparing for full time cross-cultural ministry in a remote Aboriginal Community. But, in the meantime Shannon is hitting up as many amazing Sydney coffee shops as possible and is kid wrangling full time and writing in the margins of life with a young family. You can catch her on Instagram occasionally.

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The Fear of Being Forgotten
June 23, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Soul Care for Moms 3 Comments

For the month of June, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Combating Loneliness and Nutrition Challenges as well as some of our Core Themes. 

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast and please leave us a review on iTunes! Also, read about our Summer Connection Groups and think about how you might reach out to mamas near you for intentional time together this summer!

I was on day nine; nine long days since I had spoken to another adult face-to-face who knew me by name (and one who I’m not married to). We had left our suburban Kansas home and flew 2,000 miles to Vancouver, British Columbia to live in the bustling inner city where I was homeschooling our three daughters in a condo filled with the landlord’s choice IKEA furnishings, surrounded by strangers from all corners of the world. It was during those days when I learned that the well of loneliness runs deep.

Those long, rainy days were filled with hours of first and second grade math, eighth grade writing projects, and ‘recess’ at the city park. I watched my daughters learn close up during writing lessons at our kitchen table, and from a distance while they made new friends on the playground monkey bars. Those days were also filled with a growing loneliness in me. No friends to stop in for a chat at the kitchen table, no late night Target runs and conversations over the ridiculous purchase of yet another seasonal candle (who can resist?), no quick coffee dates, no church family to connect with, no gym buddies, no surface-y catching up in long carpool lines, no bantering with neighbors on the sideline of the kids’ soccer games. The majority of each day was just my girls and me making sense out of a new chapter of life we never anticipated navigating.

(photo by Jena Meyerpeter, “Courage” banner by Jill Dixon)

Raising and homeschooling three chatty daughters means our home is rarely (read: never) quiet. Opinions and ideas are thrown around like confetti on New Year’s Eve. Even with their constant noise all around, my heart began to experience something new and unfamiliar: deep loneliness. It was as if the bucket of loneliness sank deeper and deeper into a well and I couldn’t see the bottom. I was lonely for familiarity and friendships, but more than that I was lonely for belonging. As the loneliness sank deeper into my spirit, my heart grew quiet. Before long this stillness also settled over my thoughts like a blanketing snowfall. It was in the stillness of those lonely days, as the depths of my well dipped farther than I’d ever experienced, I found a treasure waiting at the bottom.

Far removed from anything familiar or comfortable, no friends or family to be our community, stuck in the middle of a big city playing the daily role of mom and teacher, I met Jesus at the bottom of my loneliness. He was there in my stillness, in my quiet, and there in my fear of being forgotten, holding my hand as a steady companion. I’ve known Jesus as my Savior, Redeemer, and Grace-giver for nearly two decades. He was there with me as a tender Father in the darkness of my first born’s bedroom as I rocked her back to sleep for the fifth time. He was there as my Healer as I wept over the loss of pregnancies, and now He’s the Friend I needed most reminding me that my ultimate place of belonging is in His kingdom and presence.

Motherhood has its moments of isolation and loneliness even under the best circumstances. I remember lonely midnight feedings with babies and feeling isolated on long, dark winter evenings with stir-crazy kids and a husband working out of town. Over the past year, I’ve had moments of fear wondering if all this uprooting and sacrificing for our family will leave me alone and forgotten at the bottom of my well, too far down to reach out to anyone and ever regain a sense of belonging. Occupied by these fears, I nearly failed to discover the treasure waiting for me in my well.

Jesus was already there. I didn’t have to reach far or climb high to find His outstretched hands waiting for me. He, my greatest treasure, was right there all along. Jesus transforms my loneliness into opportunities for deeper relationship with Him. I’ve found a friendship in Jesus I hadn’t known before this season. It turns out the bottom of my well wasn’t a scary or forgotten place after all. It was a distraction-free meeting ground where God captured my full, undivided attention. The same is true no matter what season of life and mothering we’re in. Jesus is already there. He’s in our deepest, darkest places speaking loving words of belonging in a family rooted in eternity, giving us the freedom to go anywhere in this world with the assurance that we’re truly never alone.

Jena Meyerpeter fell in love with words as a little girl tucked away in the aisles of her father’s used bookstores. Today, Jena’s love of words continue as she writes and speaks on all topics faith and family. You can find more of Jena’s writings at JenaMeyerpeter.com and follow her and her family’s adventures on Instagram. 

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Loneliness: A Catalyst for Building Relationships
June 12, 2017 In Childhood Faith & Encouragement No Comment

For the month of June, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Combating Loneliness and Nutrition Challenges as well as some of our Core Themes. 

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast and please leave us a review on iTunes! Also, read about our Summer Connection Groups and think about how you might reach out to mamas near you for intentional time together this summer!

His face crumpled when he realized he wasn’t going to the birthday party with his brother.

“But I never get invited to birthday parties,” he sniffed. With a start, I realized that he was right. It was April, and he hadn’t been invited to any school birthday parties this year. That old, familiar ache rose up in my chest. It had not bothered me much as a child, as my few friends were always enough for me. But as a mom, that ache grew in my heart for years. The pinching loneliness of not having friends, of not being invited, of being left out.

He wailed in my arms while I tried to hold my own broken pieces together. For his sake.

I often revisit those years, in my memories. After the babies were born, I went back to work at my church, part-time. Never there long enough to become friends with my coworkers, but always feeling the load of the work at home, keeping me tied down even on my free days. Never invited to the women’s group, at least not personally. Always rushing at work to get things done, leaving little time for lunchtime chatter. Never being brave enough to initiate anything of my own. Always feeling like an invisible soul, dutifully doing my work without being noticed. Looking back, it’s obvious to me that I was not as invisible as I felt, but nevertheless, the sense that I was slipping through life unseen was overwhelming.

My son and I moved over to the stairway to talk. Sitting in a shaft of light from the afternoon sun, I shared with him what had changed in my life.

(photo by hill smiley photography)

“When I am feeling lonely, I start looking around for someone else who looks lonely. There is always someone else who feels the same way. I start talking to them and I feel less lonely because I know that I am helping someone else.”

For an introvert, this act goes against everything in my nature. But even introverts get lonely for true connection. The best thing I have ever done was join the women’s Bible study on Wednesday mornings at my church. It has been a stretch for me, and it has been very hard to get out the door some weeks.

The women attending the group were all ones I wanted to get to know, but early on it felt like I had an impossible barrier to hurdle. While I knew most of their children from my work as the Children’s Ministry Director, I didn’t know anything about my peers, the other moms. The thought of getting to know them was daunting, because friendship doesn’t form in a single conversation.

Later, it was hard to go because some weeks parenting and working is overwhelming and I couldn’t even keep up with making dinner, never mind going to Bible study. It was those days that being a group leader was a hidden blessing: I had to go. They expected me.

Three years later, I have developed friendships. It took many conversations and trips to McDonalds after Bible study, but they are there. I am no longer lonely.

“See,” I told my boy, “when we look for others to help, we start to feel better. It’s hard to ask someone if they want to play, but when you are brave enough to do that, you might make a true friend in the process.”

He nodded, then hopped up to go play again. My heart still hurt for him, but I know this will be better for him in the long run. Better to be the one initiating friendships and spreading love, because that is a skill worth cultivating.

Being able to see the beauty in others is a Christ-like quality that brings a little of His healing into our world, a little of His light into the darkness. He created that lonely ache in our hearts because it drives us into communion with others and communion with Him. If we let it, that ache of loneliness can become a catalyst for building relationships, both as moms and as kids.

Christie Thomas is the mom of 3 boys who love stories and wife of an educator (who doubles as her personal key-finder). She is the Director of Children’s Ministry at her church, a family faith blogger, and the author of a devotional book for families with busy little ones. To connect with Christie or to snag her 3 free “Stories to Stir the Soul of Your Kids”, pop over to her website!

Website: www.christiethomaswriter.com, IG:www.instagram.com/christie.thomas.writer,
Facebook:www.facebook.com/christiethomasauthor

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The Secret Places of Mothering
June 5, 2017 In Childhood Faith & Encouragement No Comment

For the month of June, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Combating Loneliness and Nutrition Challenges as well as some of our Core Themes. The deadline to submit essays for the upcoming July Topics (Family Culture & Connection, Simplicity, and Infertility & Secondary Infertility) is less than a week away (June 10th)! 

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast and please leave us a review on iTunes! 

 

I’m in the deepest of sleep when I sense her in my room before I hear her. My four-year-old stands next to my pillow, in tears, explaining that she had a bad dream. She is wondering if she can please sleep in my bed?

We don’t have any hard and fast rules about this scenario- sometimes I say yes and sometimes I scoot them back to bed. This time though, this time maybe I was too tired to really think it through or maybe I just sensed that we needed each other, me as much as her.

Our king size bed is as big as can be, but she snuggles right up next to me and that’s how we fall asleep that night, two in the morning, side by side.

~

We’re playing outside, afternoon sun, the four of us, me pretending the clock isn’t ticking closer and closer to the dinner hour and I still haven’t a clue about what we’ll eat. The air is too perfect, the sun too kind, the breeze so gentle. They’re running around wild and free, neighborhood noises filling our ears, sidewalk chalk staining our fingertips.

My oldest had been playing down at a friends’ house and here she is, running up to me, tears streaming down her face.

I do the quick scan up and down to see if there’s blood anywhere–are you hurt? are you okay? is there blood? no? Okay then–and I begin to assess the true damage, this time to her heart, a much more difficult wound to mend. A friend said an unkind thing and my girl is still young enough to first run to me in her pain. I don’t want her to ever outgrow this instinct.

I pull her in close and get a little bit of the scenario of what happened. We sit on the couch, our legs wrapped up in each other, her nearly on my lap but not quite, and I begin to whisper into her ear all of the things I know about her that are true. You are brave, my dear one. You are strong. You are loved. You are kind. You are creative. You are adventurous and friendly and silly to boot.

Her heart unwinds, reminded of who she is, and off she scampers to play once again.

~

It’s been a long day, a hard one, and I just need to be done. I need them to put themselves to bed, quietly and kindly without a single whine. This, of course, is not how it goes.

On this day when I am at my end, tired and sad and a little bit scared, they become the very most difficult versions of themselves and I have no love to give.

I kiss them and go downstairs to the living room hardly ten seconds after saying goodnight and I hear them jumping off their beds. They are laughing and bouncing and having a full-on party not ten seconds after they promised me they would go to sleep.

Oh, no way. Not in my house.

Mama’s done.

I march upstairs, fling open their door and the look on my face must have stirred sheer terror because they launch themselves into their bed, covers over their head, trembling. I don’t remember everything I said, but I definitely growled “I’m so serious” about five times.

I close the door but stand by it for a few extra seconds to make sure they don’t start messing around again and hear the sisters whisper.

“Brennan?” calls out the four-year-old, “What just happened?”

The six-year-old responds: “Ellie, that wasn’t our mom. That was the mean mom. I don’t like that one.”

“Me either!”

And as tired as I am, I just cannot end it this way. I go in and crawl into their bed, pull them in close and say “Babies. Mommy is so sorry. Sometimes I’m so stressed and I’m so tired and I take it out on you. That’s not fair. Can we begin again tomorrow?”

They forgive me and hug me, ain’t no thing, because children are expert forgivers and I kiss their foreheads and they fall asleep- peacefully, this time.

~

 So much of mothering feels like it’s done in the secret places where no one else sees. We do it anyway– we gather them up close, whisper love and courage when they need it, love the hardest we know how and apologize when we miss the mark.

For these few stories of mine, I bet you have a thousand that haven’t been captured of you doing what you needed to do in that moment for your babies and whispering love and nailing this mothering thing. For these stories right here, I could tell of twenty others when I failed completely.

But as mamas, we love them always. As mamas, we do what we need to again and again and again even when we’re empty because that’s what love does. It’s easy to remember the ways we feel like we’ve missed the mark, but let’s choose to see the tiny moments of love that add up to build a life. Let’s see what we do well and let me remind you that you, my dear, are nailing this mothering thing.

Even when it doesn’t feel like it and even when you don’t get credit, you are doing a good job and they are so, so loved. I promise.

 Sarah Sandifer is a mama to three darling and rambunctious little girls. She is married to her college sweetheart who now serves as an Army Chaplain and is taking them on quite the grand adventure. Sarah’s great loves are the Colorado mountains, dark chocolate and coffee, though she would be a total mess without the grace of Jesus. You can find her thoughts on life, motherhood, and marriage at SarahSandifer.com  and she’s also on Instagram @SarahSandifer.

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Chasing Rest
May 31, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Home & Family 2 Comments

For the month of May, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Feeling Inadequate, Sleep-Rest-and-Rejuvenation, and Mental Health Awareness Month. We hope you’ll return to read the wonderful essays we have to share with you and cheer on the courageous mamas who have shared them.

If you haven’t listened yet, we’d love for you to check out the new Kindred Mom Podcast! 

 

One of my favorite places to go on a late summer night is Moravia Winery – just a short drive from our home in Fresno, California. Somehow even when it’s scorching outside, it’s a few degrees cooler out at the winery. My kids love to play wild and free with their friends on the pirate ship play structure. Some of the daddies play bocce ball.

We lounge on picnic blankets and share goodies. They often have a live band playing music and a food truck selling burritos or a vendor serving up fancy cupcakes. As the sun lies down for the evening, ribbons of color dance beyond the rows and rows of vines dripping with grapes.

Of course, if you drive out to this winery during the winter months, you will witness a different scene from the flourishing vines of late summer/early fall. Mysterious fog often seeps in late at night and early in the mornings. The vines are pruned back, standing stark against the winter sky. They have traded green leaves and lush grapes for gnarly and naked vines. This season in the vine’s life is called dormancy, the resting period before new growth.

Rest is necessary not just in the cycle of the grape’s life but also in our human lives. Rest refreshes the mind, body and spirit. And yet, our American culture lies to us about rest. We are led to believe: time is money; those who multitask best are the most productive; and there is no time for rest.

The Bible tells us just the opposite. In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus leans in and shares these words with the crowd: “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” Jesus speaks of a different kind of yoke. His yoke is made with grace, love and forgiveness – so different from the yokes we mamas often hoist up on our tired shoulders. Our yokes are too often marked by guilt, striving, and perfectionism.

I grew up in a house where we were constantly on the go. When I was in elementary school, my evenings were filled with piano lessons, soccer games, ballet and jazz classes, church youth group and more. As I entered junior high and high school, I added activities like newspaper, yearbook, Track & Field, and voice lessons. While I enjoyed all these activities, I remember we were always running, always pushing deadlines, always melting into bed exhausted. I am grateful for the many opportunities my parents gave me but sometimes I wonder if it also was an inadvertent training to chase busyness.

When I left home, I continued on this trajectory – filling my schedule with a myriad of activities and too often shunning rest. The Bible warns in Psalm 127:2 against this kind of pace:  “It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.” We are not built to burn the candle at both ends. When we are sleep-deprived, we lash out at our littles; we make rash decisions; we allow negative self-talk to creep into our mind minds and root deeply in our souls.

As mamas, we need to give ourselves permission to rest. Rest is the way we detox from the busyness and rejuvenate our souls. Rest is the place we connect with our Creator, who modeled for us what it means to rest. God didn’t need to create a day for rest. After all, He is the all-powerful God of the universe. He rested on the seventh day to show us the importance of a rhythm of rest.

There was a time when I felt like punching someone if they said the word “nap.” I was a mother of three kids under age 5 and getting them to sleep was my number one mom challenge.

I would find myself in these circles of women, and inevitably someone would offer up her perfect kid sleeping plan. She would talk about this one method, or this one routine, or this special music that would magically make her children nap. I would lower my eyes and exit the conversation, feeling like a failure again.

My husband and I tried all sorts of tricks to get our girls to nap. Just about the only thing that worked was putting them in the jogging stroller or car seat and driving them around town. I was grateful but that didn’t involve mama resting. I endured almost a decade when rest felt like this elusive dream, this thing people talked about that just wasn’t for me. If you’re a mama in that stage of life, hold on. Redemption is coming.

Now that my baby is 5 and my oldest is 10, we are creating new rhythms of rest in our home. This requires intentionality because rest is counter-cultural. We try to say no to more than we say yes to. We try to choose activities we can do as a family instead of driving in different directions every night of the week. We are taking back Sundays for naps, reading and playing outside.

Choosing to rest is challenging with three growing girls who are creative and ambitious.  They are wired like their mama, who loves to fill the calendar squares and jump into new opportunities too. Whenever I see our schedule is squeezed too tight or we are running from one activity to the next, I try to remind myself of the grape vines out at the winery in winter. A season of rest is important for growth. It’s a time when God does special work underground. Once the vines have rested, tiny buds of green appear in spring. And eventually, the vines are lush and heavy with fruit once again.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore lives in Fresno, California with her new husband Shawn and three daughters. She is a published children’s author, poet, journalist and blogs about chasing God’s glory through every day at www.DorinaGilmore.com. When she isn’t writing, you can find Dorina running marathons or in the kitchen creating a new recipe. Connect with her on Instagram.

 

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To the Woman Trying to Measure Her Worth
May 18, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Soul Care for Moms 3 Comments

For the month of May, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Feeling Inadequate, Sleep-Rest-and-Rejuvenation, and Mental Health Awareness Month. We hope you’ll return to read the wonderful essays we have to share with you and cheer on the courageous mamas who have shared them.

***This week we are doing a fun giveaway in celebration of the Kindred Mom Podcast release (quick links to subscribe to the podcast are on the sidebar, and we have a podcast page in the navigation with show notes for each episode). From May 17-May 24, you can enter to win one of two Hospitality Bundles full of goodies that might help you head up a Summer Connection Group in your local area. There are some beautiful things from Magnolia Market included. Not to be missed! Enter on Instagram (beginning May 17) for the Backyard Coffee Hour Bundle or subscribe to our email newsletter to win the Evening Moms Gathering Bundle. Winners for both giveaways will be chosen on May 24th.***

The pressure is overwhelming, isn’t it? The pressure to perform, to fit in, to measure up. The pressure to do it all, be it all, experience it all. The pressure to be the first, the best, to do the most.

The pressure to be enough.

I know how you feel, because I am one of you. I am a woman whose worth is too often tied up in the external. I am a woman trying to measure my worth, and this is the conclusion I’ve reached:

We’re using the wrong measurements to determine our success.

We look far and wide, high and low, and into places with no validity to validate ourselves. We ask the world what it thinks and blindly accept what it offers. We listen to our culture instead of our Creator.

Our culture loudly proclaims the measure of the moment, and when it changes, we’re left reeling and reinventing ourselves. We’re left wondering if the next measure will find us lacking or if we’ll finally see our worth. We keep evaluating ourselves with an ever-changing ideal, and then we wonder why we can’t find peace in who we are.

We’re using the wrong standards.

Ladies, the length of your eyelashes isn’t a measure of your worth.

The label on your shoes can’t give or take away your merit.

The circumference of your waist doesn’t make you more valuable or detract from your inherent importance.

The grades on your kids’ report cards don’t validate your mothering, and the messes in their rooms don’t mean you’re failing.

The likes you get on Facebook mean nothing about who you are, and the followers you have on Instagram don’t make you a woman of significance.

The number of times you worked out this week doesn’t mean anything about the woman you really are.

The cash you have in your bank account is not a measure of your value, and the debt you’re fighting to pay down doesn’t mean you’re worth any less.

The square footage of your home and the design of your den are far from indicators of your stature.

The looks that others give you are not the measure of how you matter.

We want to quantify our worth based on what we can measure. If we can calculate it, we think we can count on it.

I’d love to remind you of a truth we forget: our worth is immeasurable.

We internally develop complex formulas to figure out our value.

Weight + job title x social media following = my worth.

Credit card bill – clothing expense + comments about my outfit = my value.

Job promotion + quarterly bonus + vacation destination = my importance.

The hardest thing for us to realize is that nothing we can see or quantify can accurately measure who we are. Only one thing matters, and it’s a position given and never earned.

We have worth because we belong to God. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.

We have incalculable worth because our only-loving God lifted us from death to life, calling us daughters and “the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). We are made enough because we belong to the Almighty. We matter because God gave up his Son in order to bring us into his presence.

There is nothing we can do to make ourselves more or less worthy, even though the world begs us to believe otherwise.

Almost daily, I fall into the enemy’s trap of measuring who I am. I look at what I do, how I perform, how I look, and what others think. I fall back into my old ways of working for my worth and calculating how I did based on what people say.

I know what it’s like to work relentlessly for the approval of others and end up devastated when they don’t give their praise.

It is impossible to receive everyone’s approval, and I’ve learned that I’ll always fall short in someone’s eyes. Evaluating my worth apart from God’s truth is maddening. It’s maddening, and it always skews my perception of who I really am.

I am God’s masterpiece (Eph. 2:10).

I am a child of God (1 John 3:1).

I am God’s chosen one (Col. 3:12).

I am His treasured possession (Deut. 7:6).

Whenever we forget the reality of who we are in Christ, we let the world dictate who we should be. We let it tell us what we should do, and we let it control the view of ourselves we hold. We begin to strive and hustle and work and compromise, and then we begin to judge and criticize and condemn and control. We enter into a cycle of doing more things instead of being God’s children, and we judge ourselves based on our output instead of our standing.

We can never work our way into our worth. We can never achieve enough to feel worthy or earn enough to believe we have value.

We can only embrace our worth. We can’t earn it.

Jesus told his disciples, “No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (John 15:15). We are no longer slaves – we are not under bondage to behavior and performance. We are free, and we are friends with the One who gives us worth. He has made both Himself and His love known, and His measure of us is the only one that will stand.

 Jennie Scott is a divorced and remarried mom of two whose life has been far from perfect and completely different from what she planned. What she has found, though, is that God has provided exactly what she needed through it all. He is teaching her to enjoy the journey even when the path is winding and difficult. She blogs at jenniegscott.com.

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Prevailing Strength
May 10, 2017 In Childhood Faith & Encouragement No Comment

For the month of May, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Feeling Inadequate, Sleep-Rest-and-Rejuvenation, and Mental Health Awareness Month. We hope you’ll return to read the wonderful essays we have to share with you and cheer on the courageous mamas who have shared them. Join us on the Kindred Mom Facebook Group to connect with our community. 

The sweat is streaming down my back but the sun is welcoming, not angry. My backpack is chafing a bit due to the sunburn I have achieved throughout the day. There is a satisfaction that comes with the hard work of exercising, of putting to use muscles which haven’t seen action for a while. I plod along, one foot in front of the other longing for the rest that lay ahead. My husband’s pocket spits out hip hop lyrics from Hamilton; his phone broadcasting the soundtrack. This keeps a rhythm, helps me move forward. We have already hiked two and a half miles up to a hidden waterfall, a wonderful reward for the hard work of going up. Now we have a mile and half remaining and my spirit is refreshed from the vigor of the excursion.

On this particular day, we purposed to do a family hike. Sitting at the kitchen table, five miles round trip seemed a bit more doable. Presently, one child lags as she looks for lizards, one is red-faced and forlorn and another is quickly losing the pep in his step. I’m seriously re-thinking our kitchen-table confidence.

I look at my 5 year old son and realize, he’s not going to make it.

“You’ve got this buddy!”

“You’ve done so well today! I’m so proud of you!”

I assess the unfolding events and realize that no amount of encouragement will get him to continue step, step, stepping down to the bottom of the canyon where we’ve parked our car. He’s done. The last thing I want to do is carry another human for the remaining mile, but with our littlest baby in the ergo on daddy, it’s my back that’s available. I hand daddy the backpack I’ve been carrying and take my son by the arms. “Jump!” I say as I swing him up on my back. My hands find each other behind me, under his little bottom. I tell myself to settle in because this little one won’t be hiking again today.

At first, it’s easy. Heading downhill and already sweaty, there isn’t much I need to worry about. But even the easy 50 pounds of a 5 year old will test a mother’s back. He and I sway and bob as we head down the mountain, and I feel his muscles grow slack; a sure sign he’s fallen asleep. My commitment must remain strong. With a sleeping child on my back, I cannot give up. He has no thought of my strength or ability to endure; only his own exhaustion. I smile a bit as I consider his total dependence on the strength of my back.

~

My back. It aches sometimes. It’s usually tense in one spot or another, from nursing, scrubbing, holding, dish-doing, or bending over to pick up errant toys. I usually don’t think about the aches. They seem a package deal with motherhood. But now, as I bear the weight of my boy, I think about my back and the strength it wields.

Strength to hold me up.
Strength to give good, strong hugs.
Strength to bring laundry upstairs or down.
Strength to bend and scoop up a crying baby in the night.
Strength to walk for miles and miles in a marathon.
Strength to labor and deliver 4 babies.
Strength to weep for the babies I miscarried.
Strength to let go and lean into my husband for his strength.
Strength to sit next to a sick child and make sure they fall asleep.
Strength to walk for miles through London, baby in the Ergo, blisters forming, persevering because it’s so worth it.
Strength to piggy back my children up to their beds because it’s fun.

We are nearing the parking area and I realize I’ve walked for nearly a mile and my little guy is still asleep on my back. My husband yells back to me, “Wow, Supermom, how are you doing?” I chuckle and say “I’m fine” because I really I am. Am I tired? YES! Am I sweatier than before? Also, yes! Do I regret that we took this hike, or that it was ultimately up to me to help my son reach the destination? Not for one second.

This is what motherhood comes down to. When we reach the travailing parts of the hike, we don’t sit in the dusty dirt and the hot sun and give up. We find a grit and resolve within us to draw up the feeble ones and carry them along with us, and we keep going. My back is accustomed to this task. My back is strong, like my love. I am strong; stronger than I ever imagined I would be. Motherhood can do that.

Mama, you are strong too.

You have been tested through pregnancy and birth. You have survived sleepless nights. You have surfaced after nursing through growth spurts. You have endured the gauntlet of toddler taming. You have been scoffed at and criticized and undermined and proselytized with every bit of “helpful” advice under the sun, and you have been found capable. With every burden you’ve borne on your back, you have prevailed.

You are strong. Resilient. Trust that strength. And while you’re at it, swing one of your kiddos onto your strong back today and laugh together at the fun of it.

 Lynne lives in Los Angeles with her family. She pursues excellence in letting it go, letting messy happen, and letting motherhood be fun. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter.

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Motherhood: Ready or Not
April 7, 2017 In Babies & Toddlers Faith & Encouragement 1 Comment

For the month of April, Kindred Mom is covering the following topics: Postpartum Recovery, Encouragement for the New Mom, Autism Awareness Month, and Screen Time Conversations. We hope you’ll return to read the incredible essays we have to share with you and cheer on the courageous mamas who have shared them. We are receiving submissions on the upcoming May topics through April 10th, and if you might be interested to contribute something, please visit the “Write for Us” page for details. 

 

Motherhood ambushed me. The day I took a pregnancy test and confirmed my suspicions about those suspicious, frequent waves of nausea, I had also hung the last picture on the wall of our splurge: a small one-bedroom apartment in downtown Portland – with a gorgeous view of Mt. Hood. When my husband and I married five years before that first pregnancy, the plan was ours alone: no kids, no pets, just adventure. Africa had imprinted a deep love on my husband’s heart when he taught secondary school in Tanzania just a year before we met, and while I’d wrestled over it when we first began dating, I had made my peace with the path of adventure I assumed awaited me when I joined my life with this man. While we love making lofty plans, we ultimately love following the Lord’s adventures, and so had found ourselves on a winding, albeit more traditional than anticipated, path that led to me standing in a brand-new apartment with a great view, but no room for a baby.

After that positive pregnancy test, I passed the afternoon aimlessly wandering the city, astonished a life was growing inside me, and muttering a muddled, accusatory prayer of “What were You thinking?” as I shuffled along leaf-strewn streets. This was not my plan. Still a far cry from peaceful, I set out that evening to pick my husband up from work. I greeted him with a brusque announcement: “Well, I’m pregnant.” In what I imagine will be lauded as one of his best moments in our marriage, my husband graciously responded to my curt announcement with a smile and asked, “Now what?”

Aside from family and a few local friends, I kept the news quiet until exactly 14 weeks, partially because I am a rule follower, and partially because I simply wasn’t ready for all the talk of baby gear, mom life, and pregnancy. My guilt was palpable. Women I cherish have struggled painfully with infertility issues, experiencing the monthly heartache that comes with yet another negative test. Other women I also cherish – including my own stellar mother – are excellent stay-at-home, work-at-home, and working mothers. Nonetheless, I simply couldn’t picture myself as a mother. Without having dreamt of this role, ever, how could I possibly fill it well?

Over the course of my pregnancy, the ultra sounds, onesies waiting on pink hangers, and elated family and friends shifted me from singularly terrified to terrified – but also excited.

When my chubby pink bundle (affectionally dubbed “chunk”) arrived that July, she transformed me into a mother, ready or not. Even in those early, exhausted days, the sheer joy of this role washed over me, yet I found myself worrying my sweet daughter would somehow suspect my initial resistance. In response, I started to speak over her: you are safe, you are wanted, you are so loved. It became a chant whispered in habit, one that I proclaimed to her hair when she fought sleep, or spoke to her cheek when she screamed in my ear, unconsolable, as tiny people sometimes are. As she passed her second birthday, we dealt with night terrors, and I waddled downstairs, pregnant again, and hoisted her into my arms. For nearly every night those last months of that pregnancy, I rested her on my baby bump, and whispered to her again: you are safe, you are wanted, you are so loved. A silly little chant from mommy to baby, it become a calming routine, lulling me into familiar, soothing, rhythm when I didn’t think I could bear one more sleep-deprived night.

As with all phases, the poor sleeping eased to good sleeping. Her baby brother joined us. We settled into a new family pattern, entering a season where she simply seemed to need less soothing. Now two and a half, she was pretending to put me to bed recently before dinner, tucking me in on the living room floor in that painful but sweet way toddlers have, half suffocating me with her stinky blanket and clumsily mimicking the way I pat her tummy as I tuck her in.

“Mommy, safe.”

“Mommy,” pause….

“Mommy, loved.”

I asked if she was trying to say wanted.

“Yes! Mommy, wanted.”

So she had heard those whispers after all, those moments I thought she was sleeping or beyond reason or otherwise unaware. The realization leveled me: those words mattered to her. My mothering matters to her. I am the right mom for my little girl; for my children. My words, spurred by fear and guilt, have left a beautiful impression upon my little girl. This is the grace, and gift, of motherhood: God lays out this hard and good work, and He gives the position of mother to the specific, right person for the role. And what I may otherwise have remembered with a twinge of guilt, He will instead reframe through my daughter’s loving, chubby arms and imaginative play, leaving the sweet gift of knowing that I am exactly where I should be: mothering the children He has always had planned for me, and giving me the words they need.

Kelsi Roberts lives in Seattle, Washington, where she and her husband are raising their two kids (36 and 6 months). Kelsi works full time from a home office, and recently launched a copywriting and marketing services company. She strives to make space for the important things and model what it looks like to love Jesus, raise babies, and work full time for her observant little people. She has learned this requires a lot of grace and a lot of Pinterest fails. You can find her navigating this on Instagram. 

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A Chicken Pot Pie Story
March 22, 2017 In Faith & Encouragement Tender Topics 2 Comments

**Please consider joining the Kindred Mom Facebook Group to join in the conversation about this and other essays on Kindred Mom. We have a lovely community that is waiting to connect with you!

I walked into my family’s Mother’s Day dinner and tried not to shatter the fragile calm I’d requested. “Please, let’s pretend some part of Mother’s Day is still okay,” I begged my husband to convey to everyone. Feigned smiles and furtive, syrupy cheerfulness abounded, and as I sank into my seat at the table, I could tell my throbbing emptiness had permeated the room and filled their hearts anyway.

It was over. Hours earlier, after five interminable years of secondary infertility and thirteen incredulous weeks of pregnancy, I’d left the hospital emergency room after hearing the words every mother dreads: “I’m sorry. There’s no heartbeat.”

Our baby—a daughter, Mara Shirin—was gone. On Mother’s Day.

At some point in the haze of the next few days, my mother told me that someone was arranging a schedule so we’d have meals provided for us for two weeks. I was flooded with appreciation, relief, and curiosity. What would these sweet friends bring? The quintessential joke about meals like this is that you’ll eat every incarnation of chicken casserole known to man.

For years, I’ve been mostly vegetarian. I wish I could say it had to do with the ethics of animal consumption or the health benefits of vegetarianism, but that wasn’t what prompted my dietary choices. I just didn’t like it as much as I liked other things. As I’ve gotten older and I’ve learned more about both animal treatment and health, my preference has only intensified. I still eat eggs and use chicken and beef bouillon in broth, and I have to be completely honest and say I eat cheese with Abandon. Yes, “Abandon” with a capital “A.” But aside from that, chicken, beef, pork, fish, and their neighbors comprise a very small portion of my diet.

My mother asked if I wanted her to convey any dietary restrictions, but I declined. I wasn’t very hungry to begin with and figured I could eat around any meat if I found myself in the mood for dinner. My husband and son like meat so I figured it would be quite a treat for them.

The meals started coming—quiche, chicken and vegetables, spicy beef soup, chicken salad. It has been seven years since our loss and I still remember those meals. My servings were small, but with almost every dish I went back for seconds or leftovers. I couldn’t help myself. Something about the meat, the chicken in particular, felt good in my belly and nourished my broken heart.

Several months later, I found myself craving a chicken pot pie, a dish I’ve made for years, but usually without the actual chicken. A veggie pot pie, I guess? But this time, it was all about the chicken. The recipe is a simple one, comprised of a pie crust topping over a bed of vegetables mixed with bites of chicken and and a cream-based sauce. Ooey, gooey, and delicious.

I’d made great progress on the initial steps of the recipe until it was time for the frozen vegetables. They’d been hiding in my freezer for so long they looked more like an iceberg laced with peas, carrots, corn, and lima beans than they did individual, edible vegetables.

Have you ever tried to “declump” a brick of frozen vegetables? It’s…entertaining? I hoped they were frozen loosely enough that I could break them apart with my hands, but when that wasn’t happening, I tried microwaving them.

I’m sure I could have persisted in this method and eventually won the battle, but I was looking for instant gratification, not patient defrosting. Hence, I tried my next best (and possibly most therapeutic) option: beating. I beat that block of vegetables with nearly everything I could find – spatulas, wooden spoons, and whatever else I happened to have handy. A few individual peas insulted me by falling off the larger block, but it remained mostly intact.

Low on options but still high on a craving for chicken, I reached for the only other thing I could think of: my giant chef’s knife. With vigor, I plunged it into the solid block, fully expecting some ensuing chaos since my history with knives has involved occasional ER trips and stitches. However, I was surprised by a knife that slipped back and forth with ease, deftly separating the vegetables. The sharpest tool did the most efficient job.

Constantly reflective in this tender stage of grief, I couldn’t help but draw parallels between our heartache and that knife. I’d thought it would be easier to break, heat, or pound the vegetables apart, but I was wrong. Sometimes it’s gentler and easier to use a knife. Sometimes a sharp, clean cut yields faster and more preferable results.

Suddenly, a picture washed over me, an image of God as a gentle surgeon, skillfully using Mara’s loss as a tool to refashion my heart into one that beat more like his. Where I’d been mired in discouragement, he was pouring in oil of joy. Where I’d absorbed false beliefs about my unworthiness of grace and goodness, he was wringing me out. Where there’d been pain, God was opening a deep cavity for hope.

It was such a beautiful vision, all over a chicken pot pie.

In the seven years since then, my life has been transformed. Mara’s presence is marked on every fiber of my being—onto the persistence with which I fight to make joy a conscious lifestyle, onto the patience I have when my children (yes, I had two more babies after her loss) push my every button, onto the grace I’m learning to give myself when I fail.

Every single day of my life, I’d rather have her here in my arms than gone, but I’ve become unspeakably thankful that when she couldn’t stay, God used her to perform a complete renovation of my heart.

Heidi McGinnis lives with hope and a mended broken heart in southeastern Wisconsin alongside her husband and 3 children (12, 5, and 3). She’s an INFJ/Enneagram 9 who believes that women who are fully engaged, deeply joyful, and committed to loving well can change the world. She’d love to connect with you at her blog or on Instagram.
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