The joys of motherhood

I have slowed down, God. 

Once again, I've had to cancel some things and change plans and it's actually been alright. 

Yesterday was one of those days where my heart goes out to a poorly little one as my Lizzie was ill with a tummy bug. She is usually so energetic, never still, always doing something, interested in everything, constantly on the go, but yesterday she just was.  Not like her at all. 

So she lay with her head in my lap, or Grandma's, and she dozed a little, but mostly she just lay. I stroked her hair and read her stories and held her when she was sick. I whispered to her, and kissed her and cuddled her. She's usually too fast moving to be much in favour of snuggles and so it was a treat, to be honest, to sit still with Elizabeth. She wanted Mummy, and that, too, was a treat after the debacle of the night before. 

My little girl was poorly and we spent a day together. I couldn't make her better and neither could the doctor - though we've had the palaver of getting a stool sample up to the surgery so that they can determine which evil little bug is making her sick. That was fun. The joys of motherhood. 

My poorly Elizabeth

Actually, the joy of motherhood is sitting with your little girl's head on your knee or on your shoulder on a bench in the garden on an unseasonably hot day in March. We read fairy stories and a bit of Enid Blyton (what a trip down memory lane that was) and we played I-Spy and we sat quietly. The night before I'd hit the bottom of the motherhood experience; the sense of utter failure and defeat, and then yesterday and today I got to claw it back a bit. Maybe make up a bit of ground. I'm not sure who needed who the most these last two days but I think it might have been a close thing. 

Today Liz was much improved though still a pale, thin-looking wraith with no appetite. We went to the supermarket this morning and she made my shopping list and ticked off items for me. We laughed that the list appeared to say, 'hairy-way' instead of 'hairspray'; for a six year old this was hilarious and I'm sure we haven't heard the last of this joke. And you know what? Every time she asks me if I need 'hairy-way' I will joke back. I promise. For as long as it makes her laugh, I will make the effort. To make her smile. It won't be long before she doesn't laugh at my jokes. That laugh is precious. 

In the shop a kind lady on a promotions desk gave Lizzie a tiny pot of ice-cream and she even grated a smudge of chocolate on it and added a strawberry when she heard that Liz was recuperating from a tummy upset. Elizabeth was tempted enough to eat it and declared it delicious. The most wonderful ice cream ever. 

Beautiful Lizzie

We bought a tub to bring home. A winner every time. 

Afterwards we went to the coffee shop for a drink and I'd have bought her cake if she'd wanted it. She was helpful and thoughtful and lovely company and it was good. I love her so much. 

Thankyou Father. Thankyou for healing after hurting. 

I'm not sure if I overlook Lizzie sometimes. She's the older one and the attention has been on Katy, I think. Katy is smaller, more affectionate, more vulnerable in some ways. Or maybe that's just how I see her because over the past twelve months she's had surgery twice and more appointments at the hospital than I could count. She's the one we're worried about all over again and we're psyching ourselves up for more appointments, blood tests, scans, treatments, surgery. Maybe Lizzie gets left out. I didn't think so but maybe she does. Maybe Katy is the baby and Lizzie the more self-contained older sister. I don't know, but I worry.

Oh dear. 

It's so hard, God. It's so hard to anticipate all these needs and respond to them when I'm so tired and when my head is full of so much stuff. I have two small people who depend on me for so much - physically and practically and emotionally and spiritually, and I have a horror of letting them down. What scars will I leave when I do let them down, which I'm certain to do. I let Elizabeth down the other day and she let me know about it. I feel that the last two days have been a gift to bring us closer again and I will always be grateful for that. 

But I'd rather have not got it so badly wrong in the first place. 

I am not a perfect Mummy, and neither are my girls perfect children either. I know that. They are so different from each other, and so different from me. They're not going to do everything the way I want them to, no matter how much I want them to. I don't want to try to make them into something that they're not. I just want them to grow up knowing that they are loved, that they are special. That they are capable and valued and unique and loved, just as they are. I can't do it on my own. Bryan and I can't do it between us. We all can't do it, all the family and friends and church together. We need you. 

You loaned me my two girls to look after for a while. They are your children. You don't have grandchildren - we are all your little girls and little boys. You think I can do this job, or you wouldn't have given these two beautiful little people into my care. You seem to think that I can do a good enough job. I doubt it sometimes, but whether I do or not, the job still needs doing.

Please give me again what I need to make sure that they grow up ok. Please heal them of any hurts that are planted in their little hearts. Don't let anything negative thrive in their minds, Lord. Cleanse the two of them of any ideas that might damage them in any ways. Protect them from doubt and insecurity and jealousy and fear. Lord God, who knew each one of them even before they were in my tummy, mould them the way you want them to be so that they won't have to unpick years of worry or confusion or rejection in the years to come before they can be all that they were made to be. 

Help me, Father. 

• Prop me up when I don't have any more energy. 
• Give me patience to stop the exasperated sigh when they spill their drinks or their cereal or the paint. 
• Give me grace to smile when I feel like snarling. 
• Give me self-control to keep back the cutting words when they're too silly for my grown up way of thinking and my sense of humour is AWOL. 
• Lord of compassion, give me wisdom to find the right words when I need to correct them without crushing them. 
• Prince of peace, show me how to break up a fight with justice when there's no earthly way of knowing who was in the wrong. 
• Show me how to comfort a child who has been pinched, or pushed, or cheated out of the last biscuit. 
• Help me to forgive, and show them how to do it too. They're going to need a lot of practice. 
• Give me buckets and buckets of love so that when my tankful comes to an end I can run on your reserve supply. 
• God of mercy, give me the grace to hug a child who's covered in vomit because they need a hug and it can't wait until they're bathed.
• Show me how to bring joy and contentment into their lives instead of dissatisfaction and envy.
• Creator God, help me to show them the wonder around them; to see you everywhere. To teach them that the world is a beautiful place, not a scary one.
• When they wake in the night with unnamed fears or needs give me the grace to soothe them even when I'm desperate for sleep myself. Even when it's the fourth or fifth time that night.
• When the world is too much for them, help me to help them cope. Show me how to build them up, not demolish them. How I long for my girls to have more confidence than I've had, to be comfortable with themselves. Not arrogant or boastful, but at peace
• Give me understanding when I can't work out what is needed. 
• Lord God, equip me to show my little girls the way to find you for themselves. I'll never ever do that when I shout and glare at them. Light of the world, help me to shine brightly, not bring darkness and shadows.
• Help me to quiet the insistent, selfish little voice that constantly complains, 'But what about me?'
• And anything else I need that I've left out. I could go on forever but I need to get to bed tonight. 

Above all, save me from thinking that I have to do all this on my own. 

The prayer of St Francis of Assisi

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

Where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is doubt, faith; 

Where there is despair; hope;

Where there is darkness, light;

and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, 

Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console

To be understood as to understand;

To be loved as to love. 

For it is in giving that we receive;

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. 

Amen. Oh yes, amen. 

Go back to sleep, please

Hello God.

Today has been one of those days that all mums of small children will be familiar with. Today started too soon. 

I am at my absolute worst when I'm tired. I love sleeping, and I'm very good at it. I also need a lot of sleep. Some people can function perfectly efficiently and affably on a few short hours of sleep but I can't. We are away from home at the moment and last night the children took an age to settle as they are a) in the same room, which is a novelty, and b) in a strange place, with strange beds, strange noises and so on. They then woke up once or twice in the night and needed more attention, and were up to stay at five o'clock.  That's 5am. 0500. In the morning. I was not best pleased.

Lord, it must be so much easier to be a mum if you are a morning person. My Mum, for example, was always up early; always up and washed and dressed and breakfasted before my brother and I emerged to bother her. I never once woke Mum in a morning or got told off for starting the day too early. Now, maybe this says more about me as a child if I never got up early but I can't believe that. All children get up early, don't they? 

Mine do. And it seems to be getting earlier, to my immense discomfort. 

Every night I go and see my girls before I go to bed. Every night I sit on the edge of their beds and say a prayer for them and I make a promise to myself to be more patient. To be less cross. To be smilier and less critical. Then come the morning it's all gone, poof, blown it before breakfast because they wake me up and I hate being woken up.

I suppose the answer is to go to bed earlier - but after their bedtime at night and after I've got them settled I have a precious couple of hours to do all the things that I have to do and all the things I want to do before going to bed myself. No matter how tired I am it seems to stretch to longer than it should and as a result I am in sleep deficit mode before my head hits the pillow. 

Moan moan moan. Complain. 

I think perhaps when the children reach adulthood and leave home I shall spend a fortnight in bed. Maybe that's when I'll balance the books. But that day is a long way away and I need a coping mechanism soon, please. 

I just want a tighter grip on my temper.

I am a light sleeper. I never used to be, or at least I don't think I was, but when the children came I learned to be woken by the slightest little noise. Bryan could always sleep through the girls' screaming but all it took for me was the little baskety noise that indicated that Elizabeth had wriggled free of her swaddling and was waving her arms and legs around and batting the Moses basket and I was awake. Not willingly awake, but awake. Praying that it might be some mistake, that she might miraculously go back to sleep rather than allow her thoughts to turn to an early morning snacklet, but she usually woke up feeling peckish. Awake. 

Now it's pretty much the same. I hear the whimpers that precede shrieks when there's a nightmare. I hear doors opening and footsteps on carpet when someone is out and about. I'm sure that compromises the quality of sleep, doesn't it?

So I've had a whinge. Got that off my chest. What can you do to help, God? Well,  if it was up to me, my first choice would be that you suddenly bless both my children with the desire to get a good twelve to fourteen hours sleep per night. Could you see your way clear to that? Please? 

If not, and I suspect you won't mess with someone else's body clock in order to please me, it'll have to be me, please. 

I'm not good at this. I am often tired and when I am tired, I'm not good. I'm not nice. I am grumpy and short tempered and narky. I don't like it about myself and I admire the opposite in other people but I seem to be powerless to change it. So, as ever, if I can't, please help me, because you can.

Help me to be nicer. Help me to understand that my little girls are up and raring to go when I am not, and  yet that isn't a character flaw in them. Help me to love them for their enthusiasm to start the day instead of trying to beat it out of them. Help me to respond with love and grace and patience even when I feel like the undead. 

Hmm. Sorry for the zombie reference; for illustrative purposes only. Not because of any strange unacceptable theology.

I'm being silly, but my problem is a real one. Most mornings my day starts when I am not ready for it. I try to have my 'quiet time' first thing in a morning because last thing at night I have a tendency to fall asleep if I close my eyes. If I am permitted to wake up in my own time (and I include with an alarm clock - not talking about the sheer indulgent luxury of a lie in - ooh, just imagine...), have twenty minutes or so to read my daily readings and have a little chat with you, I feel so much better. When my girls then burst into the room I can greet them with a smile. If I manage to fit in a shower and getting dressed as well - my cup runneth over, but that doesn't often happen, more's the pity.

I know that the answer is a combination of going to bed earlier, setting the alarm a bit earlier, teaching the children to have some consideration for other people and above all, changing my own behaviour in modifying my reactions. Keeping control of what I say. Not being Crabby Mummy every morning. 

Easier said than done. It might sound a little thing, but I still need your help. Thankyou that nothing is too small for you to be concerned with. I am fed up with my days starting wrong. I am fed up with starting the day with sharp words and criticism and complaints. I am fed up with the nightly transaction of looking at my children asleep; beautiful, innocent and guileless, and resolving to be nicer and then blowing it again before breakfast. 

Help me, Lord. Help me to gain control over my brain so I can sleep more quickly and more efficiently. Help me to give love when I feel more like being cross. Help me be a better Mum. 

I'm off to bed now. Better had, I think.