A Mother’s Fears – Hope, Love and What If…

I’m nesting. There’s no other word for it. For years, I’ve swallowed my OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) tendencies in order to get along with my children (otherwise, I’d spend all day yelling at them for things being out of place). Now, I crave order. A place for everything and everything in its place.

I crave the smells of a clean home. I crave the ability to spend time with my children. For the first time in my adult life, I fight with trying not to throw work into the wind and play with the kids.

I love them, you see. They’re so very important to me, and I’m watching them grow from the sidelines. I want to spend my days nurturing, raising and teaching them. How frustrating. My life – the dreary, always busy, always working life that has been my comfort zone for so long – is changing, and I want to embrace those changes fully. – And I can’t.

The Gift of a Son’s Love

My son, the giant

I don’t talk much about my 15-year-old, D. Most of his story is his to tell. Yet, out of all the miracles that God has performed in my life, he’s one of the biggest.

When he was five, D went to spend the weekend with his dad and didn’t come back home. To make a very long story short, I didn’t see him again for 9 years.  I worried about him – not knowing how he was doing, not knowing what he was going through, hoping that everything was all right and that he was living a good life.

We Live In a World of Perception – Can We Change Our Reality?

“We live in a world of perception,” my dad says, leaning back in his chair across from my younger, 24-year-old self. “For example,” he points at the kitchen table, “what color would you say that table is?”

I stare down at the table. It’s obviously brown. He obviously has some point he’s trying to make. –But I’m young and stubborn, and I’ll be darned if I’ll let him make it. “It’s light brown.” There. It’s not just brown; it’s light brown.

He sits up and leans forward, bushy eyebrows narrowed over sharp, blue eyes. “You’re right. It’s light brown. But,” he snaps, holding a finger up (pause for affect), “are you sure you’re seeing the same color of light brown I am?”

The Day I Fell In Love With My Children

All five of my kids, together for the first time

Love – how deeply that’s on my mind now. Just recently, I’ve become aware of the overwhelming love I feel for God, for my children and for others. How sad that it took so much so-called life to reach this point.

C asked me once, “Mom, what’s a dad?” He’d never really had one, you see. My husband and I separated before he was born, and at six years old, C didn’t have the answer to that question. He was trying to find it.

I told him, “You have a biological father that helped make you who you are. Then you have a dad – and a dad is the one who does the ‘dad’ stuff with you. The one who throws a ball with you, wrestles with you and so on. Sometimes, your dad and your father are the same person. Sometimes, they aren’t.”

Now What Did I Do With My Parenting Manual?

“Man, this sucks!” I looked up to see my 11-year-old son, C, stomp into the kitchen where I was working at the table. Full of preteen disgust and frustration, he banged the dishes around as he cleared the sink out to run fresh dish water. “Why do I always have to do the dishes?”

At the now common sounds of anger, frustration and petulance for having to actually do something, I pushed away from my laptop and walked over to the sink. All these things I wanted to say flooded my head. Things like, “I don’t know, why do I always have to go to work? Why do we always have to cook supper?” None of it was helpful.

I stepped between him and the sink, finished running the dish water and started washing the dishes without saying a word. I was in my “I’m a mad, but calm, mom” attitude. As he reached to grab some trash off the counter top, I snapped, “Just leave it alone!” So much for calm.

He leaned against the wall and crossed his arms, tears in his eyes. “Mom, I just don’t understand why I’m always the one that has to do the dishes!”