Dear Mommas

Dear Momma,

Hi, you don't know me. We will more than likely never meet. That's ok, we don't need to for me to tell you what I am about to say.

First, I am a mother of 5 in a world that thinks 2 is the right number. I am somewhere between "weird" and "you poor thing". Let me tell you, I may be weird, but that has nothing to do with the number of children I have, and I certainly do not feel like  "you poor thing", in fact, I am blessed. I am so, blessed. There is no part of me that thinks I am anything other than favored by God. These 5 babies are everything I ever wanted. Actually, they are a lot more.

This post is not about family size though. Sorry, to confuse you. No, this post is just about how hard it is to be a momma today.

Can we all admit that it is so hard to be a momma? The amount of information thrown at us on a daily basis through social media, pediatricians, other mothers; I mean, sometimes it just seems like we are drowning is a sea of information.  What is the right decision? What our mommas' say? what the doctors say? what our friends' say? or what our friends' doctors' say?  Because lets be honest, they never all agree, all the time. Maybe, what our neighbors' say? What is it?! Should I cosleep, sleep train, cry it out? Should I give baby food, cereal, do baby led weaning? Formula, breast? Attachment parent? WHAT IS THE RIGHT WAY?!

Can I be honest? I am 7 years and 5 babies into this journey, and I haven't got a clue. That isn't to say that I do not know how to be a mother or don't have an idea how I want to raise my babies. I do. Each of my babies are different though , and I have done things different for each child. There is no one size fits all. We all have opinions. Opinions are like assholes, we all have one. It doesn't make it right. In this over informed world, sometimes our inner mother voices are stifled. Not just stifled, but down right intentionally drown. Intentionally drown? Yes, I think so. I think, with risk of getting to "spiritual", there are forces at work that want us mothers to doubt, second guess, and fail. You know why? We are training the next generation, we are tasked, by God, to raise children that make this world a little better than we did. We are supposed to raise our kids to do and become a little better than us. With each generation we should improve. What better way to destroy a world that longs for hope, than to crush the souls of the people tasked with raising the hope??? Our kids should be lights, they should be hope. If we as mothers doubt ourselves at every turn, if we think of ourselves as failures before we have a chance, then we will pass that on to our babies. We will crush hope. How tricky is our Enemy? He doesn't have to try hard when all he has to do is plant a seed in our own heads saying, " YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH, YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING, SO AND SO IS SO MUCH BETTER. YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE X,Y, Z."

What a freaking lie the enemy has told us. We can't be perfect. It's impossible. We can do our best and rely on God for the rest. We, as mother's, have to be firm in our own identity in Christ Jesus to affirm Him in our children. We are not solely responsible for our children's future. We have a God to fill in the gaps. We have got to stop comparing and desiring to be more like someone else. YOU are your children's mother, no one else. God knew your children before they were given to you. We are the women meant to parent these children.

I want to encourage mother's to go to the cross. When you feel like you are failing miserably go to our Father. Go to the Cross. The reason this season of our lives is so hard is because we are raising children that can make a difference. They can make the world a little less gray. They can make the world a little brighter. They can save humanity a small act by a small act. They can be world changers. Our enemy DOES NOT want that. He wants this world to be hopeless, depressed, lifeless. He want's to devour us and our world. WE can be world changers by raising our children with out the guilt we are fed in our Facebook newsfeeds. We can raise children with our God given mother's intuition. We can raise our children with other women who also want to make this world better. We have to "encourage one another and build each other up." We have to do this life differently. We have to do this life counter to what the world wants. We are raising game changers. We just have to stand by each other. To admit, "THIS IS THE HARDEST THING I HAVE EVER DONE!" and to still want to walk along side each other. We do not have to have "it" all together. We just have to know God is at the center of this. When our momma friends feel like failures and nothing we say can talk them off the brink of comparison we have to help point them back to Jesus. We need to be a village of mothers (and fathers) that have Christ as our center. If we trust that Jesus is who he said he is we can strengthen each other and raise some babies that will further the Kingdom more than our minds could fathom.

We may only get one shot at this mothering thing. We may make mistakes, even big ones. Thats ok. As long as we are firmly rooted in Jesus we can ask forgiveness and start new each day. Our children will remember we made mistakes, that we hurt their hearts as we navigated the murky waters of parenthood BUT they will also remember what it looked like when we humbly asked for forgiveness. What it looked like when we hit our knees with passion asking God to direct us. They will remember that we were willing to love them so much that we didn't try and do it by ourselves. We didn't think we knew it all. Contrarily they will know that we stood firm in our Father's embrace and we sought redemption and grace and that we extended both those things to our children as well. That is how we do parenting right. That is how we raise compassionate Christ-followers who set this world on fire.

Let's do life together. Let's seek Jesus together. Let's admit we don't know everything. That as long as we are all seeking the face of Jesus and wanting to love our babies as He does then it does not matter if I attachment parent and you don't.

Motherhood in all it's glory is messy, hard, and beautiful.