Dear readers, I hope that Spring is beginning to spring in your part of the world and that you have found time to get outside and connect with nature recently. Being outdoors always makes me feel a bit closer to God. Perhaps its because it is His creation with which I am connecting or perhaps it is the removal of the physical barrier of the walls and doors that create just one more layer of separation between me and Him. Whatever it is, I best like being outdoors on a 70 degree day wearing a long-sleeved shirt and pants with no coat.
This weekend our dear friends generously allowed us to stay at their lakehouse in TN. Packing up a carload of clothing, linens, food, babygear and other items for a 36 hour trip would perhaps be a deterrent to some to even making the trip. The "professional bag-lady" that I am (my father has always referred to me as this due to both my constant shifting of homes with a dysfunctional divorced family as well as my love of travel that has only grown in adulthood) takes on this challenge fairly confidently. So off we went, arriving just in time for dinner on Friday. Saturday we awoke early to a chilly, but beautiful day. We took a hike and then headed back to the house for some time on the lake.
This part of the story gets a little personal and some of you who don't know me may wonder why I am willing to share such an intimate conversation and circumstance with the public. In short, I feel that God has called me to minister to others and I hope that my experiences through PPMD, motherhood, and other trials will offer some hope, insight, or simply empathy to another.Our Mom's Bible Study is currently reading a book entitled Calm My Anxious Heart. This book aims at helping women become content with their lives, themselves as humans, and their faith. On Friday we were focused in discussion of contentment with one's self. We began talking about "getting good," as my friend C. calls it, with who we are and how God made us. C. describes this as accepting and loving yourself as how you are, but not as using that as an excuse not to act.
Over these 17 months of motherhood I have struggled with the
real me as a mom vs. the ideal me Mom. This struggle has included guilt, shame, sadness, anger, and many other emotions. I feel like I have recently come out of this struggle and have gotten good with who I am. Getting good has meant accepting that my highly assertive, bold, CEO-type personality is more comfortable in a conference room than a playroom. It means I know what to do with a room of 150 people at an event better than one on one with my son at times. It doesn't mean I am a bad mom. BUT, it does mean that I need to work really hard at being a good mom. Regardless of how much interest I have in playing cars on the floor or practicing going up and down stairs with my kid, I need to do it. It is my responsibility to do it. Here's where it gets tough...God wants it to be my JOY to do it.
That's where a new struggle has begun. As I shared with my Bible Study, I am not finding the joy easily. I find myself easily distracted by household tasks, by websites and blogs, by email, by social networking, by cooking, really by anything. I never thought that laundry would seem less monotonous or more interesting that playing with a toddler, but if I am honest sometimes I find myself enjoying that boring task more. It makes me sad. This weekend I found out who it makes sadder...
As we sat on the dock while L. napped inside the lakehouse M. and I had a moment of absolute candor. M. had observed me becoming frustrated earlier when L. wanted to climb up and down the porch steps repeatedly rather than doing all the things at the lakehouse that I thought he would want to do. Instead of fishing with his Dad, swinging in the hammock, playing with the sticks and rocks in the yard, or running around the property, he just wanted to go up and down. U.p.a.n.d.d.o.w.n. again and again. When I had finally had enough I took L. inside where he was contained, sat him down with a pile of blocks, and made us some lunch. It was clear that I was frustrated and disappointed. M. could pick up on it the whole way down at the dock.
So later that day as we took a few minutes to talk, M. really called me out on it. He said that he would LOVE to spend all day every day with L. and that he can't imagine that I don't want to. He said that he doesn't care what activity L. chooses to do that it is fun for him because they are together. He said it doesn't bother him to play silly games or do redundant and monotonous tasks with a toddler. Lots of feelings were shared, the gist of which was that M. was not sure that I was the person he thought I was and that he wasn't even sure that I wanted to be a mother. He said that this made him question spending the rest of our lives together and made him sad. He said that he thought I didn't know what I wanted. He said he had thought it would "go away." I began to share that I had thought that it would go away with my illness, as well. That I had imagined these thoughts and feelings floating away on the dark cloud that was my PPMD. That I never imagined that I would not enjoy being a mother or wonder if I really wanted to be one. I tried to explain how devastating it was to already know your child and love him and yet wonder if you would have had children if you had never known a child that you already had. That it was so sad, as well as frustrating for me to not really find joy in the activities of mothering. That I do love them both and want to be married and be L.'s mother even though I feel this way sometimes. That though I love to be alone, being alone does not mean not wanting to be a part of our family. We walked in silence from the dock to the house, both filled with thoughts and concerns too big to voice at that moment.
Later in the day I found myself going about general tasks such as dishes and marinating the steaks for that evening. As I was doing this, my husband was sitting in a recliner watching television and L. was playing with toys throughout the room. I looked out from the kitchen area and it was as if a glimmer of hope hit me in between the eyes. Something seemed to become clearer to me. Perhaps it wasn't me, it wasn't the experience, and it wasn't the age of my child. Perhaps
it was how I was viewing the situation. Was my need for control and my serious nature ruining my ability to find joy in this experience? Was my inflexibility preventing me from being the mother I wanted and needed to be for myself and L.? I thought back to a conversation we had had with a couple who lives in PA still and has a child of similar age to L. The mom had mentioned that even with a child who never slept through the night that she would love to have 10 kids. At the time I took her as naive, simple-minded and frankly a little crazy! Saturday, I began to see that maybe, just maybe, the reason I was not enjoying motherhood as I could was because I was taking it too seriously. Maybe it doesn't matter if L. is exposed to some grown up TV shows. Maybe it doesn't matter if he is consistently challenged and engaged throughout the day everyday and never allowed to play with electronic toys or watch cartoons. I think back to our sweet friend and think maybe she's not out of her mind, but simply ok with being who she is and being a good mother, but not taking motherhood too seriously. She has been open about the fact that she and her son spend their days in the family room, her on the computer half-watching HGTV and him playing independently with the toys in the room. She probably takes a break from work once in a while to give him a squeeze or suggest a new toy. I am sure she makes sure that he has balanced snacks and meals and fresh diapers. But, she doesn't obsess that he might see a commerical, might not be enrolled in preschool or other "stimulating" programs, or really much else. She takes it one day at a time. She lives in the present.
Saturday, God opened the blinds a little for me. The view is still not absolutely clear, but the I feel like He is helping me to see that there is joy for me, too, and that finding it may actually be easier than I thought. If I can capture the moment, live for it, realize that God is working in me in big ways (Thanks, C. for pointing this out), and take myself and motherhood a little less seriously perhaps I
will find the joy.
BTW- I shared these thoughts with my husband who seemed to think I was on to something...things aren't perfect...the storm of PPMD still has left a lot of clean-up for us in our marriage, but we are happily working on it.
