I love my kids something fierce, I am bonded and connected with them in such a profound indescribable way.  I have had to come into my own story though, that this – this mom stuff, has not come easy to me.

There is a voice in the back of my head that gives me some pause.  Because mothering for me, doesn’t always come naturally.  I’ve been doing some digging and soul searching lately and so much of what I’m connecting with is this idea of owning your story.  For the longest time I thought I did.  Then I came to realize there were layers to my story I didn’t know at all.  I think where I view myself as a mom is one of those.

We all know that for women, pretty much across the board, our greatest insecurity is our own self image or how we look.  However, I recently read that for women who have children, looks and how they are perceived as mothers are about the same in terms of where we feel the most insecure.  So basically now, as a mom, you get to have 2 things that make you feel like crap most of the time.  Yay!   And let me tell you, does this ever ring true for me.  I get it, we are never going to feel pretty enough (although we are enough and society sucks!)  But that mothering piece, when I read that I was like yup… so. me.

Just like how women tend to feel the judgement of their appearance from all angles – the worst being from your own self.  Mothering has that same effect.  We are acutely aware of our flaws, and they feel more heightened when we are exposed, in public, out of or our comfort zone.

So since, I’m such a deep person, a recent show I’ve been binge watching on Netflix – Jane the Virgin – shed a bit more light on this for me.  I absolutely love this show.  The second season sort of pits these two moms against each other.  The one mom, is Jane.  She is the natural.  Then there is the other mom.  She is the one who is struggling and slightly out of touch when it comes to being a mom (she names her twin girls Elsa and Anna — kills me!).  As the season goes on, I am finding myself relating more and more to the struggling mom.  In my own world (at least where I understand Disney movie references) I am starting to feel more and more out of touch.

My story is that I struggle to enjoy my kids more than I thought I would I guess.  There are a lot of nights that I am looking forward to their bedtime.  We have always been an early to bed, early to rise family.  Part of that is because of my kids, but a lot is for me and my own sanity.  I know people joke about this, but I’m not joking, I mean NO GO TO BED…always.  Exceptions?Maybe 4th of July.

I have given up on packing lunches for my school aged kids.  I am all about eating healthy, but I just truly hate packing lunch.  I have not been able to publicly admit that until now.  With that, I actually hate grocery shopping too, and I will move hell and highwater to make sure that I can go alone when I don’t have to take a kid or three with me.  I remember taking babies to the store and it was pure stress.  Not much has changed now that they are older.

I know I am not alone in some of this.  Good news for me is I am leaning into these feelings.  I am trying to work on what I want to improve out of a place that gives me peace, not out of a place that makes me feel like I’m a bad mom.  To be in my story is to know I’m not perfect and that’s ok.  To live my truth as a mom is to fully accept that I don’t always love every second doing the mom thing, I know most of us don’t, but who will admit it? 

This.  This is what I’m talking about.  When my kid colors all over our new house with a black marker I am not happy.

Women are expected to (by society and ourselves) to think of our children as little angels or at least let the world think that is how we feel about them.  Sometimes we might slip and say what we really feel, but that is a moment of weakness if you’re the mom. What kind of message am I sending to my kids and what kind of unattainable pedestal am I putting myself and my family on by buying into that?  My kids are no angels and I’m sure they would say they love me, but could rattle of plenty of not-so-angelic things I’ve done in the last 24 hours alone.

You know what I love most about admitting that my mom game is pretty weak?  I know God has my back.  He can work with weak.  He can mold weak.  He can train weak.  He can us weak to help others be strong.  

1 Corinthians 1:7 — …God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.  

So if you’re out there maybe, just maybe, struggling to find the joy.  Wondering if you are the only one who has no clue.  Looking at the rest of the “perfect” moms out there thinking WTH?  Know that you’re not.  God is seeing you in those moments and He will use it for His glory.