The other night about an hour or so after I had fallen asleep I heard our daughter crying for me. I rolled over and tapped on my hubby’s shoulder to ask him, “Is that her crying?” He responds with sleep filled gibberish that I can’t understand. So, I get up as I do and go to our daughter who is crying and very unhappy. Teething, these dang molars, just come in already!
As I crawl back into bed, I hear my hubby’s snores and all I want to do is punch him because it is not fair that 9 times out of 10 it is me that gets up with Allie in the middle of the night. Somehow his ears are able to ignore the sounds of our daughter unless she is full on screaming. I wish that I could have the ability to not hear every sound she makes in the night but I do not get that special, I have gotten the “Mom’s Special” package.
This package includes a personal whine/cry that is only used for mom and no one else. A strength of will that can test every last ounce of a momma’s patience. And as a free added bonus the determination to push, test, and cross almost all boundaries within the same day. Now I could go on with the list of traits that could make a mom, or at least me, want to pull my hair out, but I would be focusing too much on the really hard parts of the “Mom’s Special”. And that wouldn’t be fair to you, me, or our babies. Yes, being a mom comes with its own set of personalized frustrations, or at least it feels that way to me at times. But it also comes with some amazing, tailored-made love that makes the hard days feel a little less hard.
Within my “Mom’s Special” this includes big, drooled filled, open mouth kisses! Being the person Allie runs to when she needs to feel safe. The one that she looks to when she is trying something new or in a new place and wants that reassurance that everything is okay. It includes the ability to never have enough of her momma, just to name a few.
These are the traits of the “Mom’s Special” that I really need to spend more time focusing on. I have a bad habit of just calling out the harder traits of the
“Mom’s Special” throughout the days and nights. So though I may not have the ability to sleep through the sounds of our daughter, I do have the ability to know what Allie’s different cries mean. I can understand her toddler-ese and for the most part understand what she is trying to communicate while annunciation is being developed. I really need to start saying, “Oh that’s a Mom’s Special,” in those moments to help remind me of the many perks and gifts that come with being a momma.
And it can be hard to focus on the joys of being a momma due to the pressure we put on ourselves to be the best momma’s we can be and raise up little people that can be used for God’s glory and good within this world. When I worked in the Preschool we would say that we were teaching little Abrahams, Sarahs, Davids, Esthers, and so on, to help us remember that we were laying the foundation for those little lives and that was not something to be taken lightly. Now being a momma and it being my own daughter that we are laying the foundation for, those words have so much weight and meaning to them. Though I know that I am going to make so many mistakes in raising Allie, I’m human and that’s a part of the deal. I still feel the pressure to be the best/perfect mom, even though I know that is unattainable, I still feel it. And focusing on the harder parts of the “Mom’s Special” only intensifies that pressure. This pressure is not going to be the place where good fruit is going to grow in myself or my daughter. Love is what produces good fruit and relationships. As 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 says,
“love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always preserves. Love never fails.”
I want to be the kind of mom that embodies these words of scriptures for Allie to the best of my ability. The ability to embody these words means that I also have to apply these traits to myself and my journey in growing as a momma
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