COURAGE, BRAVEHEART

Today is a beautiful day for so many reasons. And today is also a challenging day for a couple of reasons.

You see, today is Mother’s Day. It’s a day to celebrate motherhood, this club of growing a baby and bringing that little life into the bright big world that many women are members of. Today is a day to celebrate the person who brought ME into this world, who raised me, who has nurtured me and selflessly stood by me, come what may and is a member of this club. My mom.

But Mother’s Day can be a challenging day for a lot of people.

• For those who desperately want to be mothers but their bodies simply won’t let them.
• For those who have lost their mothers and are constantly reminded of the gaping hole that is left in their still beating heart.
• For those who have maybe lost their babies and feel the immense loss and grief every single day, let alone every year this specific day rolls around.
• For those who thought they would one day have a family and yet they find that they are all alone.
• For those who are single mothers and are exhausted trying to manage everything on their own and feel completely overwhelmed and then guilty for feeling that way.
• For those who are estranged from their mothers and the word mother feels like a sting every time it’s heard because that word doesn’t evoke warmth and comfort and safety and joy and a bonded closeness. Instead, it evokes hurt and heartbreak, fear and mistrust. Sadness and anger.

Whatever your situation, I see you and it’s okay. It’s okay that today maybe isn’t a great, easy, light and celebratory day like it is for everyone else.

Today was harder for me than I anticipated and to be honest, I went throughout the entire day completely fine (celebrating my own mom and my sister-in-law!) until I climbed into my bed late at night to go to sleep and I had this immense feeling of grief and sadness wash over me.

You see, I am not a mother. Nor am I a member of the motherhood club.

Not in the typical sense, at least. Sure, when I was a little girl, I used to mother my baby dolls. In junior high, I would baby-sit others children, imagining they were my own, and I took my job of caring for them and protecting them very seriously. In high-school and college, people called me mom because I was always the one looking out for everyone else, making sure they were okay and were well taken care of. After college, I was mom to about seventy-five college kids and I loved nothing more than to spend Tuesday nights with them, worshipping, talking and listening, praying for them, hugging, comforting and encouraging them. I would have them over to my apartment and care for them as their “mom away from home” as often as I could. It felt like a privilege. Like a gift. And I cherished it. I’ve always mothered my siblings, regardless of whether they were older or younger. So in some sense, you see, I have been a mother my whole life long.

But I’m not a REAL mother. Nor do I think I ever will be. Not really.

And I find that I am sitting here crying after scrolling Instagram looking at all the photos of mother’s with their children and I’m not quite sure why. Maybe because I always thought I would be one. Maybe because at one point, years ago when I was married and looking towards our future, I would stand in front of the mirror and pop my belly out, imagining what it would feel like to be pregnant because I  wanted that so badly with my spouse. But something deep inside me never felt like it was the right timing or that I needed to trust that it would happen when it was meant to happen. I felt in my spirit: “Just wait, Stef.” In some ways, looking back at that now, I believe that was the Lord’s protection and provision over me. Because you see, I’m no longer married and the Lord knew that was going to be a part of my story and I think the loss I felt at the time by not having children of my own was actually his protection over the future pain He wanted to keep me from.

So I wanna take you back to a few years ago, when I was still married to my ex…he said something to me that felt so harsh and soul crushing at the time and I believe it directly affected my desire to have children. At least with him. I believe it closed me up to the idea of being a mother in a very real way because words matter. They carry weight. And they can either be used to uplift and elevate or to break down and crush. I believe in this instance, his were the latter.

I remember we were standing in our bedroom in our apartment in west Los Angeles when he told me that I was the most selfish and un-nurturing person he had ever met.

Sidenote: Now pause. First off, I just want to say, I don’t care WHO your spouse is, I don’t care how “godly they seem,” I don’t care if they are Billy Graham or the Pope himself, you take everything, and I mean EVERYTHING that is said to you and you prayerfully weigh it up against the Lord’s truth. You measure their words (whoever they are) on that and that alone and if it doesn’t line up with who or what the Lord says about you, then graciously but firmly push those unhealthy opinions to the side and speak His truth over their lies. Okay, getting off my soap-box and moving back to me being selfish and un-nurturing.

“Wait, what? I’m selfish?” Okay, sure there are times when we can all be selfish. People are innately selfish. But am I really the MOST selfish person you’ve ever met? Like at my core? “And un-nurturing?” Nobody in my whole life had ever associated me with that word – in fact, quite the opposite. I’ve always been told I was the MOST nurturing person and people went-so-far-as-to call me mom because I was always the one taking care of others.

I was gob-smacked by his attack. I was beyond confused and utterly crushed. And unfortunately for me, I made the mistake of believing him; of taking him at his word. Because I trusted him. Because I didn’t want to be blind to the “dark spots” in my life. Because I valued and cared about my husband’s opinion and because I have always desired to be bettering myself in my life.

I said to him, “Do you actually think that about me? Because if you do….if you actually believe that, then there is no way I should be a parent and there is no way we should bring children into this world because children need selflessness, not selfishness. And children need to be nurtured and cared for and if you actually believe I am not only incapable of these things, but that I am the most selfish and most un-nurturing person you’ve ever met, then there’s no way I need to ever be a parent. Ever. ”

I think in that moment, something deep inside of me died. Thinking back on it now makes me angry. Why did I believe him? Why did I believe those critical and unthoughtful, harsh words he spoke over me. Why did I allow the projections of his experience with his own mother to fall as truth over me? Why did I allow his triggered and unhealthy opinion crush me and determine my thoughts, from then on, on my chances of ever being a parent? Why couldn’t I see what was happening? Why didn’t I stand up for myself and tell him he was wrong? I mean, I did, in not so many words, but when you’re married to a narcissist who desperately wants control, they will gaslight you and convince you that you aren’t seeing things clearly, and so you start to doubt your own mind and thoughts. Why did I? Why didn’t I? Why couldn’t I? Why? Why? Why? I could ask myself why until I’m blue in the face…

But the truth is…

It doesn’t matter why, because this is where I find myself now. And asking why won’t change the past. It can’t make things better. It won’t make me feel smarter – if anything it makes me feel more foolish or it just makes me angry or sad.

But something shifted in me that day and I decided and chose to believe that maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a parent. Maybe I wasn’t capable. Maybe it wasn’t in the cards for me like I had originally thought. Maybe I needed to do a ton of work on myself to learn how to be less selfish and more nurturing before I could ever possibly think about revisiting that. So I think I just shelved the whole idea of it and pushed it to the back of my mind, thinking maybe one day something might change.

My ex and I were rarely connecting intimately because of some new excuse each week. One week it was our stressful marriage, the next because he was too tired. Or maybe I was too tired or he had hurt my feelings. Maybe one week it was a stressful work environment or I had been mean to him that week and after all, “sex starts in the kitchen,” he’d always say. Maybe it was because I had approached him the wrong way and it felt too pushy to him. But if I didn’t approach, we weren’t getting anywhere either. The following week it would be because of his lack of sexual drive – it just wasn’t something he was interested in (partially from some childhood trauma and the other part because of the emotional intimacy it required). I’m exhausted just re-visiting it while writing this blog post.

So all of this was going on inside the bedroom and yet, for the next seven years of our marriage, he’d always talk about “…one day when we have kids.” Until one day, the dam finally broke and I said, “Please stop saying when we have kids, or when we are parents, because that’s never going to happen!! In order to have children, you have to have sex with your wife and that’s not happening…so please stop saying that. It’s too hard for my heart to handle.” It was like a mind game and I was mentally and emotionally exhausted and I was done playing. I don’t really remember him bringing it up much afterwards and a few years later, days after our ten year anniversary, we were divorced and it was no longer a topic of conversation that we’d have to revisit.

During those last seven years, people would always ask us, “When are you going to have kids? Or why don’t you have any yet? Or how many kids do you want?” And “You know, you’re not getting any younger! I had ______ babies by the time I was your age.” And, “Don’t wait too much longer – you know, you aren’t in your twenties anymore.” Of course, they would say these things, not knowing any of our story that bubbled under the surface. And let me tell you…ugh, every time it came up, I would smile, trying my best to cover the hurt and pain and anger I felt, thinking, “If only they knew the truth,” and I would graciously respond with, “It’s just not the right time for us right now. But we’d like them eventually one day.”

From this response, and because of my job, I later realized that people naively drew lines and assumed it was because of my career. Because I was an actress and I was only focused on furthering my career at the moment and that I wasn’t currently interested in starting a family. “Ehnt!” Wrong answer. But you know what, my husband let me take the fall for that. I certainly  wasn’t going to throw him under the bus and air out our sex life for the world to see, so I became the scapegoat. It was me. It was my fault that we didn’t have a family. That we didn’t have kids. Because I wanted a career.

So here I am today. A spouse-less, child-less 36-year-old divorcee with no family to call her own and today I allowed myself to feel sad about it. It hurts. This is not what I thought it would look like. The chasm of loss is vast and great and some days I need to just mourn that. Other days, I’m so content and thankful for where I’m at. It really just depends. And you know what, thinking on it now, I’m really not sure if push came to shove, I would still want kids anymore. I’m tired. I love holding and caring for my friends babies and my nephews, but I love and value my sleep and my quiet and my sanity at this stage of my life. And if/when I find my person, I am going to want time with them and that time will feel incredibly precious to me and I’m not sure I’ll want to share that with a crying baby.

So one day if that Lord calls me to be a mother (be that biologically, through being a step-parent, through adoption, through mentorship or any other angle, shape or form motherhood takes on) then I’d be all in. But He’d have to give me vision for what that would look like and He’d still have to do some work in me to heal some deep wounded places that still feel raw. Especially on a day like mother’s day.

I want to leave you with this beautiful quote that my friend posted today:

“The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The women existed, but the mother, never. The mother is  something absolutely new.”                                                                                                                 – Osho

So anything you feel today, be it good, bad, sad, joyful, exhausted, overwhelmed, grateful, humbled, reflective, angry…whatever you feel, just let yourself sit with it and feel it FULLY. For just as the moment a child is born, a mother is born, so just as a new thought or idea is born, a new way of living and believing and moving forward is also born. You are something absolutely and entirely new. So be truthful and honest with yourself. Recognize where you are at. Recognize where you have come from. Recognize where you’d like to go in your future and what you would like your own journey with the word mother and motherhood to look like for you, and then move in the direction to make that vision a reality. Whether that means you’re a member of the motherhood club or not.