Month: February 2012

Categories
Fulfillment

February From the Archives

Digging waaaay back into the archives—today is the second anniversary of my husband’s and my first kiss. (Remember, it’s a special day.)

With five years of blogging about finding fulfillment in motherhood, I have a lot of favorite posts on the subject—and not enough days left in February to cover them all! Here are some more fulfillment posts from Februaries past.

Categories
Fulfillment

February from the archives: Why I really chose to be a mother

We’re looking back at some of my favorite fulfillment posts from the last five Februaries. This one is also from 2009.

All kidding aside, I did choose to have children and it (obviously) had nothing to do with the laud, praise and reward I receive everyday when I leave the house.

I knew I would be a mother my entire life. It was what I was supposed to do—go to college, get married and have kids. My husband was raised with the same life plan (plus “get a productive job” somewhere in there).

I know that we come to this earth to receive a physical body that is necessary for us to learn and progress, and I know that part of God’s plan for our eternal happiness is having children.

When I was a teenager, my mother was trying to get me to go to a midweek church activity. She argued that this was our Heavenly Father’s plan for my happiness. I retorted, “Then it’s not working!” Sometimes, though I know God designed parenthood for our eternal happiness, I still want to shout “It’s not working!”

Before I had children, I knew it would make us happy. Since I’ve had children, there have been a lot of times where I was too tired or overwhelmed or annoyed or hormonal or otherwise off-kilter to remember that—and I think that is a big reason why I started this blog.

It’s too easy for me to forget that I wanted my children—and I did and I do. I couldn’t imagine where I would be without them now, and though I don’t often think/say/admit this, I do think I wouldn’t be as happy without them.

My children have taught me things about myself, lessons about life, truths I sometimes forget. They have made me less selfish (though we have a long way to go on that one!), more caring and, yes, exponentially more exhausted.

Whenever a mother says something (gasp!) less than positive about motherhood (like that she’s so freakin tired she can’t see straight and she could just strangle her dear sweet husband for getting sick on the first morning in two weeks that she could get an extra hour of sleep), she is obligated to add “But it’s worth it.” As I’ve said before, every time I hear a parent say that, I immediately begin to wonder if I could claim the same and really mean it.

But I chose this life because I know it will be worth it. Even if I can’t say it after spending three hours trying to put Rebecca down for a nap only to have Hayden wake up the second she falls asleep, I know one day I will be able to say it.

I hope.

Categories
Fulfillment

February from the archives: Why I chose to have children

We’re looking back at some of my favorite fulfillment posts from the last five Februaries. This one is from 2009.

Just in case we weren’t clear, the following is a satire.

I like me.

No. I take it back. I love me.

I love everything about me. I have blue eyes, I’m tall, I’m fashionable, I’m a talented writer and musician, I’m extremely intelligent, I’m svelte, I’m funny, I’m witty. I could go on, but I’m sure you get the picture.

To make an already-too-long story short (as if you could ever tire of hearing how great I am!), I know that my specific combination of genes and je ne sais quoi is, frankly, the among best that the world has seen. It would be tantamount to a crime to deny the world the perpetuation of my DNA.

july-2008-rebecca-hospital-051Also, I like attention. I enjoy having every eye in the room on me, and before I had children, I couldn’t help but notice how everyone in the chapel turned to stare at the mother with the toddler screaming “MOOOOOOOOOORE WAAAADDERRRRRRR!” during the Sacrament.

Or how everyone in the quiet restaurant clucked at the mother with the five-year-old throwing his $7.99 macaroni and cheese on the floor. Or the surreptitious yet piteous glances at the mother whose teenage daughter will be having a baby of her own any day.

I couldn’t help but think, “Oh, if only I were that mother. Every eye would be on me!”

Let’s face it: mothers are a privileged class in our society. No one else demands the attention of a crowd like the mother with more small children than hands, especially if she should be lucky enough to have one run away or throw a tantrum.

No one else gets to sit at home eating ice cream for breakfast and watching oh-so-premium daytime television, and only be expected to explain to everyone outside their elite tier exactly what it is they do all day. No one else receives the admiration of peers and strangers, evident by such comments as “You certainly have your hands full!” and “Don’t you know what causes that?”

Speaking of which, mothers are never at a loss for conversation starters. Mothers have kind strangers approach them in public places to offer much needed and prized job feedback. Helpful soon-to-be-friends always know exactly where you could improve. (The less kind people just smile and nod, or offer a not-conducive-to-conversation “We’ve all been there.”)

Mothers get tax credits. They get to have the booths and biggest tables at restaurants; they can use handicapped ramps, door openers and elevators without guilt; they even get to board airplanes first! Little wonder I was so envious of mothers.

Lest I forget, there was a range of experiences I felt fundamentally lacking from my life. I’d never been puked on, peed on or pooped on. I had a queasy qualm about the sight of blood that I definitely wanted to resolve. And I’d never been to an emergency room.

I was getting entirely too much sleep, hadn’t had stretch marks since my preteen growth spurts, and had only ground a few pounds’ worth of food into my carpet.

The privileges our society unfairly reserves only for mothers begin as soon as one is visibly pregnant. Suddenly, people finally feel the license to address my weight gain, to touch my person without the pesky formality of asking permission.

In the end, I think it was a foregone conclusion that I would choose motherhood. Between bequeathing the world with the continuation of my genetic line, earning the admiration and attention of everyone within earshot (or macaroni and cheese range), and the fabulous conversation starters, how could I pass up this opportunity?

Why did you choose to have children? Please, leave only sarcastic answers here; we’ll try this again with sincere reasons later in the week! Also, check out the hilarious reasons on the original post.

Categories
Fulfillment

February from the archives: A Mother’s Love

With five years of blogging on fulfillment in motherhood, I have a bunch of posts I’d like to revisit. I’m running a few February favorites over the next few days. This post from 2011 is, I think, my favorite February fulfillment . . . fulmination. Say that five times fast.

It’s been just over five years since I became a mother. And I discovered that being a mom was hard.

I knew, intellectually, that being a mother was a lot of work. But I had no idea how emotionally difficult a newborn could be. I felt like I had to have every priority and desire wrested and wrenched from me. (And, frankly, sometimes it does still feel that way.)

I was understimulated and overwhelmed, always tired, and never able to get the real rest that I needed.

And now? I have two other kids in addition to my baby. I almost feel as though I’ve been through the wringer and come out the other side—because, I finally realize, I do enjoy being a mother.

For the last five years, whenever a mother concludes the usual list of complaints with “but it’s worth it,” I mentally raised an eyebrow. And yeah, I still do that most of the time. There are still times—lots of them—where I am completely fed up and ready to quit. But slowly I’m finding myself remembering more of those moments where I do feel it’s worth it.

When Hayden was born, just being a mother was so hard for me, I wasn’t sure I could have another (and the epidural complications didn’t help). After Rebecca’s birth, I thought I could have another in due time. But before that “due time” was up, I had Rachel—and with her, every little moment I think, “This can’t be the last time I have a baby to snuggle or see these milestones or love a child of my own.”

A lot of the bitterness of the experience of becoming a mother has faded, and looking back, I know how easy I had it. I realized at the time that Hayden wasn’t a very difficult baby, and my struggles were mostly my own, and of course, I did love him very much. On the other hand, Rachel was my most difficult baby early on (she’s a perfectly happy child now)—and maybe that’s why I appreciate this phase more now.

Maybe it’s just that the older your kids get, the more you appreciate the little moments—and the moments they’re little. Almost every day, one of the kids does something remarkable, adorable, amazing, intelligent and/or kind. The milestones come faster and faster—and then I carry Rachel to her room for a nap, and I’m alternately amazed at how huge she’s getting and how tiny she still is.

I don’t know if I’ve done the feeling justice, but I feel like I appreciate and enjoy being a mother more now than I ever have. So this Valentine’s Day, I’m celebrating a mother’s love by loving motherhood.

How would you write a tribute to mother’s love for Valentine’s Day?

Categories
Kids/Parenting

Today’s post

Is over on the MamaBlogga Facebook Page, largely because that was the only way to get the video off Ryan’s cell camera.

Check out the cute video of Rachel’s latest song and dance. Five words: interpretive dance and JAZZ HANDS. I’m so not joking!

Categories
Kids/Parenting Fulfillment

Mom’s love does a child’s brain good!

My sister came across this article on cognitive development and just new I’d love it. She’s right, because child psychiatrists and neuroscientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that:

School-age children whose mothers nurtured them early in life have brains with a larger hippocampus, a key structure important to learning, memory and response to stress.

Even in a very limited setting—all the nurturing was done at the lab, and they didn’t follow the parents and children home—they were able to observe the difference between children whose parents supported them and those who didn’t:

As part of the initial study, the children were closely observed and videotaped interacting with a parent, almost always a mother, as the parent was completing a required task, and the child was asked to wait to open an attractive gift. How much or how little the parent was able to support and nurture the child in this stressful circumstance — which was designed to approximate the stresses of daily parenting — was evaluated by raters who knew nothing about the child’s health or the parent’s temperament.

“It’s very objective,” says Luby, professor of child psychiatry. “Whether a parent was considered a nurturer was not based on that parent’s own self-assessment. Rather, it was based on their behavior and the extent to which they nurtured their child under these challenging conditions.”

The difference? An almost 10% in the size of the hippocampus.

That’s enough to make me worried I’m not nurturing enough 😉 .

What do you think? What other influences do moms have on minds?