Becoming a parent was like stepping forward and realizing the floor was missing. Being a mother was not what I had expected, and I was ill-prepared. But now, when I step into the unknown, I have a secret weapon.
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Maybe a commencement address isn’t meant to be more than a pep talk, but at such a significant moment in those young lives, wouldn’t it be great if it were?
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After watching a pair of ferns build a nest for days, a strong wind knocked it down. Seeing their little home in shambles made me feel sad that my last child was leaving home.
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Parenting can feel like being stuck in a swamp with no way out but to keep slogging. And no wonder it's tough to raise tiny humans – we struggle to be mature and do the right things ourselves.
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It is hard to part with physical objects that carry emotional content. Many items I have chosen to hang onto feel like threads connecting me to seasons and people I don't want to release.
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When you see adoption or foster stories in movies, the parents seem to have it all together and know just the right things to say. That wasn’t me. But, after a disastrous trip to Disney with our daughter-to-be, I was somehow hopeful.
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While dog-sledding in northern Sweden once, my light went out, leaving my son and me in total darkness. It would have been comforting to have known that, even when I didn’t know what to do or where I was going, they knew.
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Watching my sweet child’s frustration rise over missing socks that October school morning, I experienced an epiphany that changed my view of tedious tasks forever: clean socks have power.
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One night after I brought my first baby home from the hospital, my husband returned from work to find me crying on the bed in the dark. I was holding the baby, who was also wailing, and I was in near-total shutdown mode. I had tried everything in the books to soothe him, but nothing worked. I felt like giving up.
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Keeping our emotions in check, responding in godly ways, and not being overly swayed by the acted-out feelings of others is critical to a life of peace. But it’s easier said than done.
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Although it was easy for me to show parental love to my kids when they were infants and toddlers through constant care, frequent cuddling, and sweet words, demonstrating my love as they grew was sometimes more of a challenge. Check out THIS RESOURCE for a printable graphic of these ideas!
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Parenting is the BEST. It’s also exhausting! This is a short essay I wrote for the Richmond Times Dispatch after my 3rd child (of 4) left for college. Can you relate?
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