How I Became That Mom

May 14, 2014 Lindsey P. BrackettLeave a comment

She was about to go exploring in my cavern of a purse that was draped over the slim back of the tearoom chair. We were sipping sweet tea with my grandmother and had been watching this little one slip away while her mama simply tried to eat her salad. By the time she made it across the small room full of the downtown Atlanta lunch crowd, her sweet mother was in pursuit.

“No, no,” she swatted little hands away from my purse and turned an embarrassed face to me. “I’m so sorry.”

That’s when I got to say it. That’s when words came out that have the ability to ease and emphasize and encourage. “No big deal! I have four of my own.”

Her eyes widened a bit with that oh-goodness-I-couldn’t-do-that look I’m so familiar with. We talked idle chitchat about baby ages and stages and my sisters laughed with us about the nuances of attempting to dine with toddlers.

She went back to her party and I went back to my lunch and it was only later that I began to realize the shift that’s happening in my motherhood life.

I’ve become that mom. The one who looks like she knows what she’s doing simply because four kids in I’ve finally learned how to have more good days than bad. It’s been a slow lift in heart and soul that’s bringing me up out of the sea of motherhood I’ve been drowning in for far too long. Maybe it’s the knowledge that we are truly past that new baby stage and are coming to the edge of a parenthood that doesn’t always have a diaper bag and a sheen of exhaustion. Maybe it’s the support I have from an amazing group of women who man their own trenches of laundry and dishes and tantrums with me on a regular basis. Women who come over in the flesh for coffee and women who respond to tweets and pleas from across the continent have been helping me realize that motherhood can be messy beautiful and full of grace.

Or maybe it’s because I’m making a much more conscious effort to abide daily in the only Word that really matters. I’m writing it out, painstakingly in that pink hardbound journal a Sunday School friend sent when my grandfather died. Its pages of quiet script reveal early morning meetings with my Maker and hard scratchings out of the feelings that lie just beneath the surface of my heart. I’m pounding away trying to understand, digging deep trying to comprehend, but all I keep coming back to is simplistic truth.

Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.

Seeking to understand Jesus is like what I’m coming to realize about motherhood after nearly ten years and ten thousand wads of tissue crumpled with my tears.

It doesn’t have to be hard.
It doesn’t have to be incomprehensible.
It just has to be.

Mothering little ones is sacred, holy work no one is ever ready enough or trained enough or good enough for. It’s all grace. It’s all forgiveness. It’s all second chances, get up again and again and again and tuck the child in and whisper the story and say the love.

It’s not mean to be a frantic treading of water, but a slow swim in the deep with a great God who loves you and your children enough to give you each other.

I’m not telling you I’ve turned a corner and everyday from here on is all light and joy, but I can promise you this. If you can get your head up above water long enough to breath a good, deep breath of God’s abundance, you’ll find yourself surfacing more than drowning.

For some great resources and groups for a Christ-centered Bible study led by Godly women check out Hello Mornings and Good Morning Girls. I’m reveling in Jesus Calling right now and my Holy Bible app gets more use than Twitter. For wonderful reads on motherhood I recommend Surprised by Motherhood by Lisa Jo Baker and Desperate: Hope for the Mom Who Needs to Breathe by Sarah Mae.

Mom Guilt: I’m Getting Over It {Special Guest Post and Giveaway from Lisa Jo Baker}

May 8, 2014September 30, 2015 Lindsey P. Brackett2 Comments

Y’all. Seriously honored to have Lisa Jo’s words here on my little space today. To celebrate she’s letting me give away 3 signed book plates to accompany your copy of her beautiful story Surprised by Motherhood: Everything I Never Expected about Being a Mom. To enter, all you have to do is leave me a comment below about how you’re getting over your own mom guilt. For me, the guilt I’m letting go of today revolves around letting my four year old hang out with the ipad while I hang out with the word processor. Sometimes that happens. I’m pretty sure she’s not scarred from too much My Little Pony. At least I hope not.

And now, Lisa Jo.

I know in theory we all know there is no perfect mother. In reality, however, we seem to hold ourselves to a standard of motherhood that’s insane. I mean flat out, crazy-making, cuckoo land kind of nuts. And if that weren’t bad enough, we trick ourselves into believing we’re the only ones who fail at all. the. things. And then we beat ourselves up. And tell ourselves mean things at the end of long days. Days spent keeping tiny humans alive and thriving. When we’ve cooked and cleaned and commuted and brought home the bacon and washed and cleaned some more and checked the homework and sung the songs and read the books we sit down on the sofa and shake our heads and tell ourselves what bad, bad moms we are. That’s insane. And exhausting. And in case you thought you were the only one, here’s a small taste of the crazy that runs in wild and vicious loop through my mind on any given day:

You should have added pureed spinach to dinner tonight.
You should have remembered to buy spinach.
You should have been meal planning for the last four years so that spinach could have made it onto the shopping list.
You shouldn’t have let them watch TV while eating last night. Or this morning.
You should be having more meaningful dinner conversations.
You should have baked the birthday cake from scratch.
You should have bought more favors for the party gift bags.
You should have taught them to do their own laundry by now.
You should at least have a chore chart.
You should have done more educational activities this summer.
You should read more to them.
You should watch less TV with them.
You should work less.
You should educate more.
You should stop feeding them Chef Boyardee anything.
You should make them actually open the library books we checked out.
You should enjoy them more.
You should lose your patience less.
You should have a more creative system for displaying their art than just putting it up on the fridge with the magnets that come with the pizza delivery.
You should have built more fairy gardens instead of just giving them the leftover parts of the last vacuum cleaner to fashion into random pirate swords, wands or zombie weapons.
You should make home made snacks.
You should wash their sheets more regularly.
You should eat less ice cream. You should exercise more.
You should go to bed earlier.
You should be like her.

You should. You should. You should. Until my head is about to split right open. Until I forget that I showed up. I parented. I made dinner. And you know what? You did too. You showed up, you went to the parent-teacher conferences, you read the books, you worried the test scores, you prayed the desperate plea of courage. You woke up when they threw up. You cleaned up, loved up, got up early and went to bed late. You let her paint while you wrote that paper or report or presentation on the day the babysitter was sick.

You carried on and over and through and around all the obstacles of getting to school on time and remembering the activities and writing down the lists and buying the right size cleats and paying the fortune to attend the dance recital that you paid the lessons for all. year. long. You listened to the spats about hair clips and jean brands and tried to find a way to build bridges over the Grand Canyons that recently caved in between best friends. You made lunches or paid for lunches or cut sandwiches into creative Bento Box shapes and still somewhere in the back of your head something screamed, “You’re not doing enough.” You did the car pool and got stuck in the commuter traffic backlash and lost the last chance to re-review that presentation that was due at 9am. You built forts out of old towels and let them jump on your bed. You laughed while they braided your hair within an inch of losing your head. You are a warrior. You are a wonder. You are a mighty-doer-of-grand deeds. You are wildly under-rating yourself. In this season of deep, up-to-the-elbows busy. You are already doing all the things. That’s what counts. Not that you’re doing them differently than the mom at the school pick up, or around the corner or in the next row over at church. You are mothering. You actually already are. So go ahead, let yourself off the hook. Dish up the ice cream at 10pm and not the guilt.

{To see the video reminder of why mothers are braver than they know, click here}.

This guest post comes with love from Lisa-Jo Baker to our community in celebration of Mother’s Day. If you haven’t already – treat yourself, your mom, your sister, your BFF or your grandma to a copy of her new book, Surprised by Motherhood: Everything I Never Expected About Being a Mom. No matter what stage you’re in when it comes to motherhood, we promise it will encourage. And remind you that you are braver than you think.

To enter to win a signed bookplate from Lisa Jo herself, leave a comment below about how you’re letting go of your motherhood guilt. Patience as the conversation loads? Sometimes technology is reminding us that we move too fast 🙂

Friday Five · gus · motherhood

Yes in My Mess (five minute Friday)

May 2, 2014 Lindsey P. BrackettLeave a comment

Disclaimer: I wrote this on the iPad. Typos should be met with grace. But that’s what #fmfparty is all about. Well that and writing and hash tags and food references. We’re at Lisa Jo’s and you’re welcome there too!

Mess

He wasn’t supposed to even exist. That’s what sends me to my knees now and makes me hold him extra tight and give him jellybeans even when he hasn’t had lunch.

He wasn’t anywhere on my radar. No idea he’d be a part of this little family, that he’d be exactly what I needed to crawl out of my own skin and into that of mothering.

And he’s the fourth. It took me that long to really get the amazing grace of it all. I didn’t even know I was missing my life until he was in it and making me see everything through the lens of what if.

What if I had stayed a mess who didn’t really know how much I could love and bend and grow and change because these four little miracles are my stamp on eternity and my charge from the great lover of my soul?

How great the mess can be. How powerful the realization.

faith · motherhood · reflections

The Sweetest Moments of Forgiveness

April 15, 2014 Lindsey P. BrackettLeave a comment

My kids break the rules a lot. Whether it’s one more episode of Netflix after they’ve been told to turn it off, or only brushing their teeth with water instead of toothpaste, or just plain going out of their way to aggravate one another, there’s always someone doing something wrong.

It doesn’t help that I’m not all that great an enforcer. Follow through has never been my strongest trait.

So sometimes there’s a lot of yelling and a lot of crying and a lot of frustration. Sometimes there’s me holding them to an unattainable standard that I haven’t even really spelled out for them, so it’s unfair to punish for something they didn’t really get was wrong in the first place.

That’s my middle child’s favorite excuse.

“But you didn’t say don’t eat ice cream in the living room. You just said eat a snack!”

Well I didn’t realize I had to remind you for the 1000th time that the living room isn’t where we eat snacks! Sound familiar?

I tell you honestly, this journey through motherhood has taught me more about God’s love than the twenty-four years prior I spent in a sanctuary. I get that love now without having it spelled out in a sermon–how His love is unconditional and passionate and fiery and jealous and merciful. Because until I have walked through the fires of sleep deprivation and chore charts and please, please can someone pick up the crayons off the floor, I didn’t get it. I didn’t get how much He must love me.

And how exasperated He deserves to be with me.

Because I keep trying to live and raise my kids and govern my life under the letter of the law. Rules are good, sure. Rules give parameters and guidelines and function to society and classrooms and homes. But following rules, checking off boxes, getting a sticker reward–that does nothing to forgive my soul for it’s ugly tendencies toward sins like coveting or anger or pride.

As Easter approaches, I’ve been trying to really, truly grasp the weight and glory of the cross. I’ve been trying to see it through the film of my own life, to better understand this faith I hold to be true but sometimes cannot put into words. Then a pastor friend uttered these words at Friday’s MOPS devotion:

We have to sit under the weight of God’s curse before we can truly grasp the meaning of the cross.

And I thought about my kids.

So often we put our children under the weight of law and of course, when that law is broken there are consequences. And if you’re anything like me, you’re doling out those consequences with a pretty short fuse and a whole lot of irritation.

But God’s law doesn’t work like that. Instead, with Him, we have to commit the sin before we know the sweetness of forgiveness.

We have to break in order to mend.

Once, I really, really lost it with my middle daughter. She had pushed me beyond my limits and I slammed out the door in a fury to cool off before I could deal with her anymore. I was mad, and I just knew, I was going to have to go back in there and issue a punishment fitting to her crime and also, explain again, that I was sorry I had gotten so angry. I was so tired of being the one to ask for and offer forgiveness that seemed to mean nothing to her.

But she came to me first. Out the door in a sobbing heap, she crawled into my lap, grasping at my neck and saying, “I’m sorry, mommy, I’m sorry.”

And my anger just melted. I think that’s what God does for us. His anger has just melted away because through Christ, we can come to Him, we can climb in His lap and beg forgiveness and He can give it wholly.

Until I sat under the weight of motherhood, under the weight of a love so great I would give my life for any of my children, I didn’t really understand the depth of unconditional forgiveness.

I didn’t really grasp the meaning of the cross.

Now it is an extraordinary thing for one to give his life even for an upright man, though perhaps for a noble and lovable and generous benefactor someone might even dare to die. But God shows and clearly demonstrates His [own] love for us by the fact that while we were still sinners Christ [the Messiah, the Anointed One] died for us.

Romans 5:7-8 (Amplified)

giveaways · linkups · motherhood

Surprised by Motherhood {The Launch and the Giveaway and How I Stalk Lisa Jo Baker}

April 1, 2014September 30, 2015 Lindsey P. BrackettLeave a comment

The first time I met Lisa Jo Baker she was totally cool about the fact that I was stalking her via twitter and the Dayspring booth at the MOPS convention. This incredible woman who put my heart into words on her blog about motherhood and how it can break us into a million little pieces and then put us back together in the best possible way looked straight into my eyes, recognized my twitter handle and my Five Minute Friday presence, and hugged me like a long lost sister.

Then she told me she loved my earrings and in the most real way exclaimed that she thought she had the same ones from the dollar clearance at Kmart.

Because she may be my writing hero and have thousands of followers and a real live book on the shelves of stores today, but really, truly, Lisa Jo Baker is a budget-conscious mama who knows the power of a great pair of earrings no matter where they came from.

So just like that, she took me in and talked to me about motherhood and writing and the balance and waiting for God’s timing and having a story that I’m not sure I’m ready to share and all the messy grace in between. We stood surrounded by waves of moms and people who I’m sure needed her time and attention, but she gave it all to me, and that’s when I knew that the internet may sugar coat some things, but this woman? She was exactly who I imagined her to be because she doesn’t write to make herself look good.

She writes to glorify Jesus and to pour out the love He’s poured on her.

ThatIsMine_Poster_web

Surprised by Motherhood is her offering to mamas everywhere. She wrote the back story, the before story, the story of how she went from being a civil rights lawyer rescuing women from sex trafficking to a mom with three kids who believes “motherhood should come with a superhero cape.”

She wrote a book for every mom at every stage.

To the mama with the screaming toddler in the checkout line at Target who just wants to get home and cry on her bathroom floor.

To the mama who has worn milk stains and vomit and possibly poop all day long because she packed extra clothes for the kids but forgot them for herself.

To the mama who has pried chubby arms from around her neck and put her crying child into the arms of another so she can bring home the daily bread.

To the mama who has wondered how she got here, surrounded by little people, in a world that seems foreign compared to her degree and high heels.

To the mama who makes the beds and sweeps the floors and churns the laundry every singe day on a constant cycle of rinse and repeat wondering if she’s ever going to feel that magic she’s read about.

To the mama who has navigated blindly into playdates and church visits and library storytime in an effort to meet someone else who just might understand.

To the mama who has never felt undone by her child but whose skin prickles when she thinks of her own mom.

To the mama who has flown cross country and cross ocean flights to bring babies home to the world that raised her.

To the mama who has had enough of feeling like she’ll never be enough.

Reading Surprised by Motherhood was like having a friend bring me a chocolate milkshake and then offer to watch my kids so I could take a bath by myself in a tub that’s not drowning in toys.

It was like hearing my own voice when I read, “There’s no rage like the exhausted rage of motherhood” and just about every other line in the chapter titled “How to Fall in Like” as she discusses with frank honesty what it’s really like to parent a child with a strong will and a fiery temper.

It was having someone finally understand that while we all know motherhood is so much better than we expect, we also choke down the reality that it’s so much harder than we expect.

But here’s the real beauty of Lisa Jo’s offering back to those of us who sometimes wonder if it matters that we’re just a mom—this offering came first from her knees when she realized that it didn’t matter whether or not she mothered, it mattered that the great Creator of all that is good and perfect* loved her.

He loves you too. And if you struggle to believe that, I’d like to put a copy of this book in your hands today.

Then I’d like to have you over for chocolate cake and coffee and tell you a little more about my own story and how I’m learning after nearly ten years as a mother and twenty-five as His child, how to finally find comfort in the skin He knit for me.

And if you’re not a mom or don’t want to ever be a mom? Read it anyway, just for the sheer joy of seeing these words:
“But when we metabolize love, it can sustain us for years. It feeds the parts of our hearts we didn’t know were starving. This never-giving-up, always-chasing love that isn’t afraid…this lavish love that loves us first.”

You can get a copy of Surprised by Motherhood here or here or here. You can read more about Lisa Jo here and you can read the first three chapters here. There’s a linkup over here (scroll all the way down) where our launch team is posting all our reviews and lots of those bloggers are giving away books too.

It’s a powerful thing when a community comes together to say we believe this is important. We believe this story is that. We also believe it’s important to give back a measure of what’s been given to you, so that’s why portions of the book sales also benefit Lisa Jo’s South African home.

You can read about how I’ve fallen in love with the world next door right here.

And my giveaway today? It’s going to be for one of my personal facebook readers. So many of you are my real life mama friends who have walked this journey with me. So leave a comment on my personal page where we do life together with silly pictures of our kids and our dogs and our piles of laundry, and I’ll have the random tool pick one of you to get a copy by the end of the week.

So much love to my online community who writes raw on Fridays with Lisa Jo at the helm, and so much gratitude to my real life community who shows up with Chic-fil-a and donuts just when I need it most.

Motherhood surprised me. But you people who love me like Jesus through it all? You’re a gift straight from the Father above.

Follow the movement on twitter and instagram with #surprisedbymotherhood .

*James 1:17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.

Linking up with Crystal over at Behind the Scenes as well. Because we all need a glimpse into the reality that’s on the edges of those photos. My beautiful family pics? My friend Merideth takes them and that day was a hot mess. That’s the only picture of Gus where he’s looking at the camera and wearing both shoes.