When Mothering Is Enough

I am skipping the Sunday Skim this week to write about some of my thoughts on mothering.

I love being a mom.  I spent many years thinking that I would never get to be a mom so I treasure the time I have with the boys.  I have been blessed with the opportunity to stay home with them and be an active part of their days and school and more.  Carpool line may drive me batty some days but getting to pick them up as soon as school lets out is a memory I will cherish.

Staying home full-time wasn’t always my plan.  I really thought that I would be a working mom.  My plan was always to have a career and kids and have it all so when I started staying home it was a big adjustment for me.  I loved working but I also loved my kids and I felt torn.  Would I be happy “just being a mom”?

 

The most wonderful thing about motherhood is that we can all walk different paths and still produce smart, well-balanced children.  There is no right way to do it.  Some of us want a career and some of us want to stay home and some of us want a career but it is better for our family if we stay home and some of us want to stay home but it’s better for our family if we work.  It takes all kinds and I bet most moms would trade places with another mom just for a day.

When I started staying home with the boys I struggled a lot with my worth.  What was I doing?  All of the working experience I had acquired and the degree I had worked so hard for.  What was all of that going to go to now?  At first I felt like I had to fill my time with other things.  Making sure that each day was packed full of doing everything I could for the kids and making sure the house was spotless.  I felt like I needed to take on other things too outside of the home.  I remember thinking, I decided to stay home so things would be easier and now they are just a different kind of hard.  What was I missing?

When I got pregnant with Porter I was reading my bible one night and came across a passage in 1 Timothy where Timothy is talking about widows.  He is listing out what good works should be a goal of a wife and mother.  One of the things he specifically talks about is bringing up children and the importance of that role.  All of a sudden I didn’t see myself as “just a mom”.  I was doing good work.  Some of the best work and it was important.

I really spent my pregnancy being focused on my husband and kids first.  The home was still important but I looked at my job in the house as a means to our family spending more time together.  If I finished the laundry during the week than we were free to spend time as a family on the weekend and so on.  I stopped trying to find something more to do because what I was doing was the good work.

This revelation is what eventually led me to creating this blog.  Opening myself up to doing the right thing rather than just filling my days with anything led me to a job offer with Northshore Parent which led me to a mentor in Katy Monnot which led me to the encouragement and help in starting my own blog.  I had to time to let it organically grow rather than chasing something that wasn’t right.

So the next time you start thinking that you are “just a mom” remember that mothering is the good work.  No matter what you’re mothering journey looks like, working or stay at home, it’s the good work, the important work.  It’s the most important work.

Happy Mother’s Day!

XO,

Tippy