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Motherhood

 I am currently sitting on our living room couch, with a cold beverage that I opened for myself a few minutes ago, with one eye on the daycare handbook and the other on the monitor. Baby monitor specifically. I am watching as Ike tries to coax this precious 1.5 year old girl, who recently joined our family through foster care, to sleep. She goes to daycare for the first day tomorrow at 7:30am and girlfriend likes to sleep in past 9 and had to be woken up for 8:30 church today so I am unsure how tomorrow will go. 

My Mom and I 

Today - Mother's Day - is an odd holiday for the women who have not lived a cookie cutter life or been dealt an easy hand. My own journey of motherhood isn't typical - often not relatable - and so it feels like a holiday with an asterisk. As I toted a small child around today I was told "Oh! Happy Mother's Day!" like it is a surprise to see me with a kid or "Well Happy Mothers day to you too now" as if I was not very pregnant at Mother's Day last year. Some don't know the history, our story, the hurt, and some just don't realize that what they say cuts a little bit more on a day like today. But also, so so many have reached out to say "Happy Mother's Day" or "Thinking of your sweet boy that made you a mama" and those words make me weapy. What a blessing that we have friends who do remember. Who know that it means so much to me to hear Jack's name and who also remember how cute and tiny and tough he was and how much we loved him. To have friends that realize even though our day today was planned around a tiny human's nap and snack schedule, it looks absolutely nothing like I thought it would if you had asked me last year.  

Motherhood for me looks like back aches because I am not used to carrying around a heavy toddler. It looks like hard nights when I sob to Ike that I just want to be a mom again already. It looks like wondering "what do I wear to go pick up a toddler I've never met at midnight?" and then thinking "why am I thinking that?" For a while, it looked like ultrasound after ultrasound with little encouraging news. And then a while later, many nights of being truly fearful of waking up in the night because of the shear terror of  replaying the agonizing last minutes with Jack. Sometimes motherhood is wrangling the dog out the door away from the toddler all while not breaking the 3 chicken eggs I just gathered from the coop. It is occasionally allowing yourself to peruse the children's clothing section and grab a few things you don't really 'need' right now.  It is often now remembering what it felt like to hold our sweet boy in the NICU. The last 1.5 weeks it has been a whole lot of trial and error with a toddler that is totally new to us. 

Motherhood is a lot of things. And none of them are easy. But the people I find myself desiring to emulate most are often those that don't shy away from tough stuff. And often the ones that walk straight into the crossfire, God refines and shapes and grows them far beyond what they originally imagined or desired. The image of heating up metal to be refined comes to mind - being worked into a new and beautiful creation. That is the pain and joy of motherhood. 

Happy Mother's Day to all those who have mothered babies on this Earth and in heaven, babies they didn't carry in their womb but they physically carry now, and babies they have yet to concieve. 

Plant Shopping - the most mother's day thing to do. 




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