The Ugly Truth

There are days when being a mom seems like the hardest job around. I hate those days. I don't like feeling overwhelmed. Guilt starts to settle in when I feel like there's no possible way I can do this job. There's so much to do and so little help getting it done. My patience wears thin when someone is always humming, singing, or clicking their tongue. Oh, if I were just that calm and collected woman who has it all together.

There's so many facets to being a stay-at-home mom. There's laundry, dishes, baking, cooking, yard work, gardening, keeping each child in the right size clothes, scrap-booking all those hundreds of pictures that I take, and the list goes on. Every time I think I have things "under control" something else pops up. There's this nagging thing inside me that says, "It all has to be perfect. What if I mess this up and my children always remember it?" I want perfect, but I am anything but. 

I am trying so hard to come up with a way to be content. I worry about doing everything and being everything to everyone. There are so many people in my life who seem to demand things of me, sometimes things that I am not even sure that I want to do or be. I want to do things that matter. Things that I care about. I HAVE to do things like laundry, budgeting, yard work, and dishes. I WANT to do things like scrap-booking, gardening, and baking. I have decided that I need to do those things in such a fashion that it sits well with my gut and makes me feel like ME. 

I need to focus more on the fact that I am doing more than being the maid, cook, and the gardener. I am raising children. That's not something I want to take lightly. I want to be instilling into them the values of the Bible, teaching them Scripture verses, teaching them to be helpful, and teaching them the joy of a good day's work.

Sometimes being a farmer's wife adds to the frustration I feel. With a husband gone from 5 a.m. to 8 p.m. - it makes for a long day with two older children on quest to drive each other crazy and a teething baby climbing up my leg. But, this is the life I have chosen, and I have to find a way to find peace in what I do and know that there is a reason for my place in this world.

But more and more, I am settling in to the idea that more than anything else in the world, I need to be ME. I need to go with my gut. When I feel overwhelmed, there is usually that feeling in the pit of my stomach that says, "just go with that." And, when I do, it's usually the right thing. Worry is such a thorn in my flesh. The "what ifs" of life prick at my mind to the point that I wonder if there are any truths that I can count on. Then, I remember. . .Luke 12:22-25 "Then Jesus said to his disciples: 'Therefore I  tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear......consider the ravens: they do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" 

No matter what other people may think of me or whatever the doubts in my mind say, I am who I am. I am in this situation and in this place in the world for a reason. God made me the way He did, and I need to be true to myself and count on Him to make my life beautiful.