An Open Letter To Weary Moms Everywhere
Dear Moms,
I know at times you grow weary with all of the diaper changes, feedings, and sleepless nights. I truly do understand. I was there, too! But, I have good news! This, too, shall pass! Moms, your work is not going unnoticed at this point in time, although it may feel like it. You are working toward a greater goal. You will get there, and one day soon you will see a light at the end of the tunnel! It only gets better and better! I promise!
I absolutely love being a mother to two beautiful girls! My oldest daughter is 17 years old, while my youngest daughter is ten years old.
I’ve been through all of the late night feedings, blow out diaper changes, colic, and RSV (with my youngest being hospitalized with this at just two months old – very scary, I’ll have you know!).
I’ve been through teething, potty training, the biting stage my oldest daughter went through when she was in daycare (yikes!), to same day surgery when my oldest daughter when she had an accident on a slide at the playground. The same day surgery I mentioned with my oldest daughter on a slide at the playground.The child who went down before her hadn’t yet gotten up, but decided to do so right as my daughter approached the end of the slide! The top of the child’s head caught my daughter’s chin as she was sliding down to the end while the other child stood up! Believe me, ladies, this is NOT a phone call you want to receive! “There was an accident, and she’s bleeding …” That is ALL I heard before I threw the phone down and raced as fast as I could to the daycare to see my daughter’s tongue laying open. Off to the Ear, Nose, & Throat Specialist we went who said they could stitch it in their office without putting my daughter under, OR I could opt to do same day surgery which would be less traumatic. Um, the latter, PLEASE!! Even that was traumatic, though, as I went into the recovery room afterwards to see my precious little girl laying there with an IV in her little arm and tongue stitched up, still groggy from the surgery yet strong willed enough to insist the IV be taken out. It couldn’t be, of course, at that point in time, but she tried everything to get us to take it out. She cried, and we cried with her…finally realizing the biggest discomfort was the piece of tape they wrapped around her arm. Who would have thought something so simple would have been such a big source of pain? I was able to remove it, and she was finally able to rest.
Oh yes, ladies, I’ve seen a lot through the years with my girls.
When I was pregnant with my youngest, we received a phone call from the school that my oldest daughter was playing on the playground when another accident happened! Oh dear! My poor daughter was, once again, just trying to have fun when it went in the wrong direction. She was playing on the monkey bars. She was proudly making her way across when she lost her grip and crashed to the ground…but not before her little mouth hit the top of another child’s head, knocking her two front teeth out! I cringe every time I think of this day. I was very much nine months pregnant and received the phone call. We rushed to her side and found her now toothless smile greeting us as we entered the office. This little girl was THRILLED at her new look. Her parents, not so much!! Check out the picture of my darling daughter holding her new sister, both showing their little gums as they smiled for the camera a few months after. I didn’t think her permanent teeth would ever come in, but thank God it was only her baby teeth that were knocked out by the accident!
We’ve had multiple tea parties through the years with both of my girls, played dress up, and had “silly time” while dancing around to music from a ballerina pop up jewelry box (my husband included,even dancing around with a tutu…that’s just what daddies do). An all time favorite memory of mine is last August right before school started back. We intended on making the most of the last little bit of summer that we had left. My youngest daughter and I had a tea party where we dressed up in almost matching attire. Ah, but the outfit surely was not complete without our heels and crowns. We were the Queen and the Princess at the Royal Palace having tea with our pinky fingers fully extended, of course. Oh, we had a great time that day! Thankfully, my oldest daughter captured this “Kodak moment.”
Through the years with my oldest, we’ve gone through experimenting with makeup, the right age to start shaving your legs, and painting nails over and over again (I’m pretty sure we’re professionals now!). My youngest daughter has now reached the age to where she’s inquiring as to when she, too, can shave her legs. Oh, Heaven help us! She’s practicing applying makeup, too, putting on her mascara right alongside us. I don’t let her wear it out, usually, but it is funny watching her parade around after she’s “put on her face.”
My parents, who have always been such an active and important part of my daughters’ lives, have shared in these moments with them as well. They are so incredibly close to their grandparents, and it thrills my heart completely!
We’ve been through the whole right of passage of my oldest daughter getting her permit and driver’s license. THAT is a scary experience. Imagine your daughter (or son) years from now behind the wheel for the very first time while you sit beside her (or him). I promise your foot will go through the floorboard as you try to apply the brakes FOR them. Luckily we survived, and I have to say she is a very good driver now and is responsible behind the wheel. We have a while before we have to worry about that with my youngest daughter. Thank you, God!
And now…with my oldest daughter, we are looking at colleges and shopping for prom dresses! She’s a Senior and this is a very important year in her life. She graduates in May of 2015. Oh my! How can this be?! We just ordered her cap, gown, and graduation invitations as well as her Senior portraits! It’s happening … faster than I’d like it to!
My youngest daughter is in fourth grade. I am perfectly fine with that as I do NOT want my children to grow up so fast and am actually thankful that they ARE so far apart in age right now! Time is just moving way too quickly for my liking. I truly find myself asking, “Where did the time go?!”
I’ve vowed not to be too clingy with my youngest daughter as my oldest daughter seeks her independence and self-identity apart from me. That is hard, ladies. Let me just tell you … that is so very hard!
But I’m getting a second chance here to do all of these fun, and scary, things again with my youngest daughter. Yes, I get to experiment with hair and makeup with her, too! I get to watch her get all dolled up with sparkly earrings and lacy dresses, just for her to strip it all off and go straight to her jeans, cowgirl boots, tee-shirt, and hat as she goes outside to get her horse ready to ride.
I get to watch her in this in-between-stage right now. She still likes to use her imagination to play, and she loves to imitate what she sees in a movie. She had a bow and arrow like the character in Brave, and now she pretends she’s in The Hunger Games. I love how she puts her heart and soul into her play, too.
And then, there is her very serious side as she’s making ten her own. She’s growing, she’s learning, she’s exploring, and she is becoming her own person with her unique personality. She makes me smile so wide and melts my heart as I watch her in action. She is also very serious when it comes to her ponies, Petunia & Trigger! She is the best little cowgirl around, too!
Right now she still wants to cuddle with me. Pretty soon she will slip into the “don’t show affection in front of my friend’s, Mom” mode. Oh Lordy, help me when that happens. But, for now, I am enjoying every single moment when she wants to come sit next to me, cuddle with me, and share a blanket with me as we snuggle in to watch a movie. It is rare that I have these moments with my 17 year old, but when I do, I still treasure them! It means the world to me to be able to spend time with my girls and to know that they actually want to spend time with ME, too!!
I am very proud of both of my girls! I will share more with you about my journey with these two Girly Girls and Tom Boys in future posts.
For now, I’ll leave you with these words:
Brace yourself, ladies! The best is yet to come! Hold on tight and enjoy the ride!
Although It’s Hard, It’s Possible
It’s true when they say you never know what you’ve got til it’s gone. I know that from experience. I recently lost my best friend Daisy because her and her family moved back to their home of Paraguay, and this is the hardest thing I’ve ever been through. We’ve been friends for seven years. She knows me better than most people do, and she’s the one I always turn to when I need someone to talk to.
My heart was crushed when she told me she was moving back, but I’m not going to talk about the sad times. Instead, I’m going to talk about how happy she made me.
Each time we’d go out to dinner, we’d always get lost in a fit of seemingly uncontrollable laughter. She was the first person I’d ever play my new songs for, and that’s because I valued her opinion so greatly. Daisy is the type of person you never get sick of talking to. She’s such a selfless person who seems to never be able to put herself before others, and I’ve experienced that for myself.
Daisy was, and still is, the first person I go to for advice on boys, or style, or whenever I’m feeling alone. She never fails to say what I need to hear. Sure long distance relationships of any kind are hard, but they’re do-able. I know that she and I have a strong enough bond to stay friends even though there’s hundreds of thousands of miles between us.
When The Path Leads You Home
When the path leads you home, after all of these years together and you have lived with your spouse “til death do us part …” what legacy will you leave behind?
This is a sad chapter for me to write on. It is sad because this is the last chapter and last day in this series, but it is so much more than that. It goes deeper in that this chapter talks of when you get to the end of your life and you go on home to be with the Lord. It is sad for me to think of leaving my children behind. It is sad to think of me leaving my spouse or having my spouse leave me to go on home. It is sad as I sit and write this thinking of my parents who have been together close to 50 years and how they have shared everything together all of this time. One day they will be forced to walk alone in life unless the Lord calls them both home at the same time.
I think of my grandmother who lost her husband and how lonely she was when she was forced to face life alone without him after he passed away. She lived on several years after his passing, 12 years to be exact, but she loved him and missed him so. She was so incredibly lonely. While their marriage was not perfect and while they had their share of strife, they found a way to work it out and stay together. They were best friends, and they did everything together. They enjoyed retirement years together, and then one day, he fell ill all of a sudden and was rushed to the hospital by ambulance where it was later discovered by the hospital staff that he had an aneurysm. They operated, but he developed more bleeds in the brain. There wasn’t anything more the staff could do, and pretty soon a decision had to be made as to whether to discontinue the life support. This was a decision that my grandma did not want to make, and so she called in her three children for them to make the decision together. My dad did not want any part in this, and so he allowed my grandma and his brother and sister to make this decision while he prayed for a miracle. Sadly, my granddaddy passed away a short time after they took him off of life support. Through all of this, though, my grandmother did not leave my grandfather’s side. She said she had been with him all of these years, she was not going to leave him now. And so she stayed as long as she possibly could … until she was forced to leave the cold hospital room … without her life companion.
When we are fighting and fussing with each other, do we stop to think that all of our days are numbered? None of us know if we will see tomorrow. We don’t know if we’ll be one of the lucky ones that live well into our 80s like my grandmother did, or if we’ll be called home at an early age. We hope we have a long life ahead of us and that God will allow us to be here to see our children grow up, graduate, go to college, get married, and start a family of their own. We pray that God will allow us more time to be with our families, our children, our grandchildren, and to one day hopefully see our great grandchildren. But, none of us are promised the gift of another day.
Lay your foundation early on in your marriage. Commit yourselves to each other and to making it work! Giving up is not an option. Staying together no matter what comes your way should be your top priority. Love like Jesus – for we love because He first loved us!
Leave a beautiful legacy behind for your children to talk about long after you’re gone. Give them something to boast about with their children as they talk of how they witnessed the love you two shared and how you two did special things for each other. Let them be a witness to you walking hand in hand and heart to heart into your golden years together as best friends, partners in life, and life long companions. Let them be a witness to your living happily ever after.
If you have been on the fence during this 31 day series and not sure what direction you should take with your marriage, we hope that this series has been an encouragement to you to keep fighting the good fight. Hold on a little longer, a little tighter, and pray for your spouse and your marriage. Pray together, and ask God to help you in your marriage. When things look bleak, remember … all things are possible with God!
What are some things that you have held inside of your heart all of this time and just haven’t spoken to your spouse? What are some things that you’ve had on your heart that you really need to say? Won’t you take the time today to let your spouse hear those words not only from your lips but from your heart? Share them today while you still have the chance. Write it all down if you are better with the written word than speaking them verbally, but it is important that you say what you need to say now while you still have the chance!
We hope you have been encouraged through this 31 day series. It has helped me, personally, and I feel it has helped my marriage. This series came at just the right time when we were struggling. I can see God’s hand in this and how He is working miracles in my marriage. He can do this with yours as well, if you only allow Him to.
Thank you so much for joining us! May God be with you all and help strengthen your marriage and draw you closer to each other as you walk together with Him.
For all posts in this 31 day series, click here.
Buy the book on Amazon: When Couples Walk Together: 31 Days to a Closer Connection
