I needed help as a mom, so I created a community, in case I wasn't the only one!
Why Ruthless Mothering?
My womanhood has been challenged but by my own questions of what it means for me to be a woman. I bounced between girl and woman too often to count. I couldn’t find my balance. The girl in me got married. The woman in me had to live out the consequences. Broken. Shattered. Lost. Thinking that some moms had all the answers and knew how to do all things right made me question myself everyday, as a mom and a woman.
See God's gift of motherhood as Him having trust in you!
We don’t always see the blessings in life. Instead of counting the blessings, we count the woes. When we do that, we don’t see God’s goodness, even when He is blessing us. I struggled to see the goodness in being a mom. I had a terrible marriage – one riddled with infidelity – and little ones who needed my attention through the pain. I didn’t know how to handle what I chose to suffer through because I knew God had warned me about my marriage before the vows. Not knowing God’s loving heart, I thought I put myself into this situation, and now I have to stay in it until God lets me out. I do believe in God’s timing, but I also believe in going when He says, “Go.” I questioned the times when God was telling me to leave. I knew that my feelings and thoughts meant something, even if they meant nothing to my husband. Because of this turmoil, I thought I was a bad mom. Not long after my third daughter, I was lacking much sleep and began fussing, yelling, and complaining over anything I could find. I hated my life because I wanted more for my daughters. I didn’t know that God gave them to me as a gift and that I could have a better life with them, if I would just choose it!
The Backstory
I knew we hadn’t put in the time, money, and effort to prove that we were ready to be married or have kids. We weren’t ready. We didn’t know each other well. My husband and I hadn’t been married for two months prior before our first baby news. We didn’t have our own place or a plan. I didn’t like to admit these things, but I know there are women who need to hear this story. Maybe you’re one of them. I wanted to be seen as the well put-together mom, a Christian. But, I’m glad I’ve gotten out of the religion of Christendom and into being myself with God. Having a relationship with Him is 100% better.
We met almost nine months prior to our wedding day. We had no idea who we were marrying. Having a child under our circumstances didn’t feel like the best decision, to me.
I quietly considered abortion or adoption, telling only a trusted relative. I didn’t know what I was going to do. It wasn’t until we were married, though, that the “I may have made a terrible mistake” hit me. In my marriage, there was no true intimacy, no fun nor excitement. It was as if I’d sat myself right in the midst of the enemy’s camp. Things went from bad to worse when we moved to my hometown (Baltimore).
I couldn’t understand why my husband wasn’t the same man I said I’d marry. I tried to fix him and me, but nothing worked because God never gave me the green light to say that it was okay for me to marry and for me to marry him. We thought God was in it, but we weren’t Scripturally aware of how to make Godly decisions. I saw signs that it was him. He didn’t want to lose someone like me. We had confirmations from our church’s Pastor (a woman, I just had to tell the whole part). We thought we were doing the right thing. All the while, both of us were unfulfilled.
When my daughter was a newborn, I realized I was a mom who would be raising her without my mom, whose name was Ruth. “I’m Ruthless,” I thought. “Ruthless Mothering!” I was as shocked as Rip Van Winkle must have been. I had no idea how I got where I was, except I really did know. I’d met a man, gotten married and had a baby in the span of 17 months (Can you say, “head spin”?) . Within 4 years, I had three babies and a marriage that was failing, miserably. It wasn’t until just recently that I learned I needed a perspective change.
Triumphing!
The Lord has me on a journey, and what a journey it has been! I’ve had to learn to choose Him over everyone else, including me. I’m learning to not just want what He wants but do what He wants because I love Him, and He’s always loved me. My first marriage should have been to God, and it still required to be. Making the decision to marry His creation before committing to Him doesn’t change His command to be first in my life.
What I used to think was humiliating, has been actually humbling. I’m learning that I need God and that worship and praise are still the best helps for me. There’s no perfect parent (other than God the Father), but I hope to not only learn from our Creator, Himself, but from other moms who are following Christ in their own lives and families. Maybe I can return the favor, at times. I’ve learned that there’s nothing wrong with not knowing what to do! Don’t beat yourself up. Not having answers doesn’t mean you’re a bad mom.
Most of my earlier decisions have proven to me that I had no idea what I was doing, and I needed more healing than I ever thought. God would help me, though. As I allowed the negative talk (aka lies) from the devil to tell me that I was ruining my and my kids’ lives, God was listening. He says, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And He means it.
Ruthless Mothering isn’t about sad mothering, it’s about helping one another learn new ways of parenting or new recipes or just how to be a woman while being a mom because they’re both important. I hope join us, as we go into the depths of motherhood – of being a woman, period! It may not always be easy but it’ll always worth it! And as He reminds me, even now, with lyrics from Tenth Avenue North, He’s “greater than all my regrets.” And that, He is.
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