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reflections on motherhood

reflections on motherhood

Wandering through the blogosphere this fine summer morning I find a couple of beautiful pieces on motherhood.

First Danielle Bean muses about grace and 3 am wake-ups:

During the next several minutes while my daughter discussed the daily habits of princesses, the magnificence of ballet, and the impressiveness of her older sisters, I was tempted to focus on how very much I wanted to be back in bed. I thought about my aching hip, the suffocating heat, and my beginnings of a cold. But then, as Gabby chatted on and I thought my patience might wear thinner still, I was surprised by a sudden sense of peace and comfort. Somehow, I found myself able to smile and nod at her monologue.

I know that it is only by God�s generous gift of grace am I able to meet-meet-meet my children�s needs and answer-answer-answer their calls throughout the day… and night. And still I do not always do this as well as I should. But during those times when I am able to be generous and patient, kind and self-sacrificing, I am very much aware that it is a gift. It is not my own virtue that enables me to respond to my children�s needs with love. It has been given to me through no merit of my own:

Every good and perfect gift is from above.
James 1:17

And Genevieve Kineke responds to a mother who is bored with her children:

While motherhood is a form of martyrdom (shedding blood and suffering for the Truth), it is off-kilter in the culture where children’s whims reign supreme and indulgence and pampering are the order of the day. But here’s where definitions are important. The author quotes a friend who takes her rejection of a “kid’s first” culture to this extreme:

 

Arabella Cant, an art director with two young children, admits that she considered jumping off a bridge in the early stages of her career in motherhood. ‘Bringing up children is among the most boring and exhausting things you can do,’ she says.

  Her solution was to avoid subjugating her own life to that of her children’s. ‘I’m certainly not traipsing around museums or sitting on the floor doing Lego if that’s what you mean by being at home,’ she explains. ‘I’m loving it, but my children fit into my life and not the other way around.

Now I have an outlandish idea, ladies. How about “mutual subjugation”? How about teaching the child that he’s part of a small community called a family—where dad likes to fish, mother likes to take walks, and the children like a variety of things. In order to build communion in this small community, we’ll divide our time, sometimes sacrificing our primary desires to spend time with those we love doing the things they love. If love bears all things, endures all things, then mother can take a book on the fishing trip once in a while, and the kids can let go of video games to accompany her for walks now and then. And dad could tag along since those he loves are heading out the door. They might even all … talk, and share their lives.

Read all of each. Good reflections about mothering in the hard times.

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3 comments
  • I think monasticism was once called white martyrdom.  You gave up your life but it wasn’t bloody.  (Or quick.)  But don’t forget.  God loves you and cradles you just as you cradle Bella. 

  • Any chance of a post on the kind of education, total experience that UD offers?  Thanks, and God bless you.
    Meg

  • Wow!  I remember that bell.  Now that my “baby” is 13, it’s not quite so insistent.

    Of course, now the bell comes via my cellphone and not from a cry.  wink

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