Modern womanhood and the events around motherhood in the 21st century; what gives here?

BECOMING A 21st CENTURY MOM ISN’T EASY

What is so different about the art of motherhood today and why?

How are we to deal with the present-day circumstances of our culture and keep the sacred state of motherhood alive?

Imagine for just a moment that you are a brand-new mother.  You are just over 30 years old, and you are now staring  at a pink and wrinkled new-born  baby girl that was just sent “special-delivery” from heaven straight to you.

How many thoughts are racing through your mind about how your time with her will be?

Will you do to her what our current society has done to you?

Huh????

Did I lose you on that last question?

NO ONE PREPARED YOU FOR THIS

What I mean is the fact that no one really prepared you for what it really takes to grow up and become a mother.

The world and all the powers-that-be fed you the usual fairy tales about how sweet your baby is going to be and how beautiful your family will look on your post-cards at Christmas; but they didn’t really prepare you for a lifetime of raising a child.

Everyone made sure you went to the very best college; and that you were given every opportunity to do anything that a man can do. Your career options were endless and you chose carefully.

They prepared you to deal with the world of business and finance and politics; but they forgot one thing. They gave you not one little instruction in all of those many years from kindergarten to finishing your Masters and your PhD, about stepping into motherhood and raising a daughter and/or a son.

WILL YOU CHANGE THE PATTERN?

Now you are looking down at this amazing child and feeling totally unprepared and much afraid of being her greatest disappointment in life; because you haven’t a clue what you are now getting into.

You know absolutely NOTHING about being a Mom.

So; will you do this to her too?

How are you going to change the pattern when you never learned the right answers in the first place?

The world was so busy teaching you how to be like a man that they totally forgot to teach you how to be like a woman; more specifically; a mother.

A QUIET UNSPOKEN TRAUMA

This is the quiet, unspoken trauma that many thirty-year-old women of today are experiencing.

They want to be perfect; they have been taught they SHOULD be perfect.

Each of these women want to excel; and so far they have been able to excel and accomplish much; but now this tiny little bundle in a pink blanket has thrown them a curve.

Excel????

They just want to know how to survive.

Why?

No one ever told them what it was like to be a Mom.

SURVIVAL IN A WORLD OF NO RULES

For that matter; no one ever encouraged them to seek out the answers to what a woman needs to do to become a good wife. It was all about career and excelling in your field. Everything was a competition between the sexes.  You MUST do more; better and faster.  However; percentages have shown that most young women do eventually fall in love and eventually they sometimes find out they are with child.

It all happens today without any preparation at all; except for some very strange advice that it might be good just to live together first; (just in case things don’t really work out.)

Most young women accept that fact today and do just that.

They never consider finding a man who is willing to totally commit without first testing the waters. Society seems to be saying that doesn’t really happen.  That seems to be unheard of – hence, without being taught to seek total, unyielding commitment from their partner in life; many young woman flounder in and out of live-in arrangements. They only think about marriage from the legal aspect when they are ready to purchase a home.

After all; you DO need total commitment when you begin to share a 30 year mortgage; this is plain for all to see; but it never crosses their minds that a mortgage company is going to let you “try-first and buy later” or that a marriage lasts much longer than a mortgage if it is the right choice.

BEING A MOM ISN’T LIKE ANY OTHER BUSINESS TRANSACTION

Most young couples get married when they decide to anchor and combine their finances with a home and mortgage.   One day they get tired of renting and they look at the fact that their relationship has survived so many years of living together and they simply hope that they can survive more and they make a legal commitment.

What’s so special about that?

Not much actually.  What ever happened to real, old-fashioned romance?

You suddenly find out that all your struggle to be free and make your own choices in spite of being in love has turned into a “I now need you because I need financial help to survive.” Marriage becomes a financial arrangement; like any other business transaction. Then you find out your going to have a baby.

After so many years of being totally uncommitted and free and living life totally self-absorbed with everything absolutely the way you wanted it no matter what; how do you suddenly turn it all around and find the commitment that it takes to be a good parent?

Good question.

There are many young woman out there asking this same question and it deserves an answer!

GETTING DOWN TO THE TRUTH

These are the same women who are fascinated with this new child for a few weeks and months, then begin to look back at how care-free they lived before they gave birth and they find themselves experiencing depression and resentment toward their children.

How can they get it right?

What should we expect of them anyway?

They were never told the truth about what it takes to be a mother.

So let’s start with a bit of the truth:

MOTHERHOOD IS A NURTURING RELATIONSHIP

The truth is that a mother must nurture.

They must be in constant relationship with this child, either in person or in thought for 24 hours a day.

It is built into our genes and it is what God created us to do.

You can’t turn it off or reprogram it to fit your own neat little photos of what you desire to happen.

Your perfect, well-chosen career will be affected by the fact that you are now a parent.

It is inevitable; no matter what the experts have told you. If you decide to mix both things; it will be a very hard juggling act, no matter what magical firm you have chosen to work for and devote your life to.

THE REALITY CHECK WILL COME OUT OF THE BLUE

Believe it or not; one day you will find yourself sitting in a meeting and not listening to a word that is being said.

Your mind WILL be on a little child that you had to drop off at day-care.

You will be remembering the look on their sweet little face and the longing in their eyes as you left them in the very expensive place that you have so very carefully chosen to look after them while you go out and tend to business.

One day, you will catch yourself wondering if these very expensive people you hired are giving your child the things that really matter to them; those things that only a mother can actually know and understand.

Suddenly you realize that each and every child that is born is different with a whole different set of individual needs.

They aren’t all the same!

This never occurred to you before.

How can anyone else totally understand the needs of YOUR child?

You will wonder if your child is getting the attention that they deserve and if the daycare worker will pick up on the fact that they don’t always operate the same way that the other children do.

YOUR HEART WILL BELONG TO ANOTHER WORLD

Someone will have to nudge you to get you to answer the questions that are going around the conference room table, because no matter how much you want to do a good job; your heart will be in a whole other world no matter how much you try to tear it away.

It is just how we are wired as women.

This is how God created us to be.

The feelings are real and there is a reason that they are real.

Life is not about you anymore.  The REASON is the child.

THEY GROW UP VERY FAST

No one will ever get around to discussing this point with you; they will always have their minds on helping you to develop in your chosen profession; and if you are like most other working women a day will come when you will begin to realize that these little kids really do grow up. They don’t stay the cute little bundle in the Christmas card photos. They grow so fast!

You will be amazed at this.

One day you will start to think more about this fact than any of the other facts.

All at once you will begin to regret that someone else might possibly be the first to see them take their first step, or hear their first real word spoken.  You begin to realize that someone else will get to  spend time with them as they are first learning how to do things.

NOTHING WILL EVER BE ORDINARY AGAIN

Well; you will try to tell yourself that these are just “things.”  Just ordinary things that everyone else on earth can do; but they are not really; and deep down you know it.

They are NOT just “things” to you; they are MOMENTS and more importantly they are moments that by all rights belong to you!

These are very special moments to you; where they are just normal accomplishments to others.

To you, these little moments are now EXTRAORDINARY things; because they belong specifically to your own child; your very own flesh and blood; the object of the love that you have shared with this man you have called your husband who finally made a TOTAL commitment with you and married you and became a Father to this wonder of flesh and blood that you rush home to hold in your arms every night.

All of this and so much more than this will occur.

So now you know.

You have been told.

It happens all over the world all the time.

Women DO stop in the middle of their power lunches and walk right out the door of the posh restaurants filled with professional net-workers and sometimes they never return again.

Some women stop right in the middle of their conferences and scribble notes in a notepad that give notice to their boss that they will be leaving their jobs.

In some places everywhere and every day; some women choose to take off the designer clothes and the fancy jewelry that they paid way too much for and they put on jeans and a T-shirt and go out to play in the dirt with their children.

It DOES happen all the time; grown, highly educated women with stellar careers hand in their notice and don’t ever look back.

THE REST OF THE STORY

They go home to become Moms that actually bake cup-cakes for school parties and go to PTA meetings. They read fairy tales and build with blocks. They watch Disney movies and sometimes they cry when they listen to the lyrics of the songs.

Many Moms do this all the time; and you know what?

They love it!

Surprise!

No regrets; not even one moment.

Give them a choice of flying a kite with their child or attending a board meeting and they will pick the kite every time.

If you give them a choice of having a picnic on the back porch steps over dining at the most posh restaurant for lunch and they would rather have Cheerios with a three-year-old than sample a sushi bar.

A SURPRISING DISCOVERY THAT COMES IN TIME

The funny thing is; they discover this by surprise.

It has to sneak up and hit them in the face because no one told them or prepared them enough to let them know that all the dirty diapers and cleaning and the long hours of staying awake night after night with the stomach aches and ear aches are worth every minute when you get to eat Cheerios on the back porch steps together.

No one ever tells you all of the laundry and car pooling aren’t so bad when you get to see that second-grader hit their first home run in little league baseball.

They forget to say that the neighborhood kids will all want to hang out at your house because they think your kid has the coolest mom on the block.

No one prepares you for this reality; but it is real.

So if you are a thirty-something having doubts about what to do now that you are hitting a wall with your career and you really long to do nothing but stay home with your child; let me be the first to encourage you to change the world.

ONE MOM CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

Do it.

Make it happen.

One really courageous Mom really can change the world.

If you don’t believe me; go read it in the bible.  Read the story of Mary; the Mother of Jesus.

Mary had a hard choice and she made it without hesitation.  Do you think she ever had one regret?  Probably only that she did not have more time with Jesus as a child.  They grow up so fast!

She had to go against the grain of her culture.  Technically, in the eyes of the world she was an unwed mother.  Mary’s position in life was frowned upon and misunderstood; but she listened only to the voice of God who was lovingly telling her what was best for her.

Today she is the most honored among women.  Why?  Because she choose to be a mother against all other choices.

No one prepared Mary either.  At the age of 14 she had no clue about motherhood.  She solved that by listening to and depending on God.

FIND YOUR OWN REALITY

Don’t trust a world that didn’t even prepare you for motherhood to make your life decisions.  Pray to God and then chose the reality that He directs you to choose.  He knows the end of the story.  God always knows what is best for us; even if we can’t see it.

Make this reality happen just as hard and fast and surely as you did when you  worked on that professional career.  This is YOUR season to be a Mom.  Don’t let anyone or anything take it away from you.

It is worth every minute and all of your effort.

Also; don’t forget that daughter you hold so tenderly now needs to know about these things too.

Teach her the things that our society forgot or neglected to teach you. Let it be a natural choice for her to want to enjoy the joys of motherhood. You have come this far; you can go just a little bit further. The world will be a better place and you will be a happier person.

Take a deep breath and go out there and change the world in a whole new way.

Forget feeling guilty; for what? For making the world a better place for the next generation?

No more guilt – but DO remember to feel very, very blessed.

Go for it!