April 10, 2009 5:57 PM
For mothers who need a fresh start - Resurrection hope
Hi Barbara,I stumbled across your website while doing some research on the Ezzos - we are taking a GKGW class mandated by our son's school. While we are by no means "Ezzo-fied" as some call it, we are gleaning very helpful tools in teaching our children to consider others, know why certain choices are either right or wrong according to God's Word, and bear in mind that everything we do and learn is done in response to loving God and wanting to do what pleases His heart. That being said, this email is not about the Ezzo's book.
In that article you wrote, you mentioned that there were things you had done to damage or hurt your children in some way, and that you would address it in your next blog. I searched for another blog on the subject but couldn't find it. I am experiencing that very thing, though, which was what drew me to search through your blogs.
Our marriage underwent tremendous stress the first few years of my children's lives, and looking back, I can see how emotionally unavailable I was to them. I ended up in a Celebrate Recovery group (a ladies' Bible study, essentially), which helped me work out some hurts, habits, and hang-ups I had experienced, while my husband was working out his. It completely changed my perspective on myself, my marriage, and my role as a mother, and God used the program to heal much of what was hurting in me and freed me to truly see my children as God was seeing them.
And my heart broke. I have always loved my children (who are 6, 4, and 3). They know they are loved, but at the same time, I can look back, especially with my little middle guy (who also happens to be the most challenging at times), and see how much I have hurt him.
My parenting style completely changed, and it was as if in one instant, I all of a sudden saw my son and who he was and the precious gift I had. I also saw the empty eyes and the fear of making Mom angry, and the little "bully" tendencies beginning to take shape in him. It scared me to death and I literally didn't know what to do.
At this point, I stopped everything I was doing, everything I was involved in, and left every steering position, chairing position, church position I could think of and focused on being mommy. It is amazing to me how this little guy has blossomed. His little eyes are happy (though he still has a hard time meeting my gaze sometimes - he's fairly shy as well), and you can tell he is legitimately beginning to feel loved. Life has changed in our house, and it is a happy place to be. I am not the perfect mother by any means, but I am at least a nicer mommy and emotionally available.
Although things have gotten better and I can see light ahead, there is still that part of me that finds myself in his room at night (and in my 4 yr old daughter's room as well sometimes), praying and weeping over him and begging God to please heal any damage mommy has done to his little heart, or hers. I still fear future repercussions in their lives of ways they have learned to relate while they were too young to understand what was going on and what they were learning.
Can these things - these insecurities and emotional damage/neglect, or feelings of loneliness and somehow feeling rejected - can these things be healed? I know God can - and is willing to - do anything. And He works with and through our mistakes. And He loves our children more than we do. I still wish I knew, though, of ways to perhaps correct mistakes that were made, judgments that were made in haste, or excessive punishment for simple childish behaviors and mistakes, simply because Mommy's heart and mind were enduring more in life than she could handle. My heart still hurts over all of it.
My babies are so precious, such sweet, kind, loving children who are a joy to everyone who meets them. And my heart still breaks every time I think of years past when they needed a mommy and mommy was too wrapped up in personal turmoil to really and truly see them and respond to them they way they needed. How do you get past all of that? How do you help to heal those hurts, outside of moving forward and just plain doing things differently? Is that all you can do? I am so thankful for a God of redemption and grace and mercy. Surely He will be that in my children's lives as well.
Thank you for your website, and God bless!
M
I asked and received permission to publish this letter because I felt that it reflected something every mother has or will go through eventually. As I've said before, parenting has a way of breaking you.
And I can think of no better time to offer this for reflection than today. Today is the day we remember Jesus crucified for our sins - a good time to take a fearlessly honest look at ourselves and ask God to show us - no matter how much it hurts - all the times we have made the wrong choices, all the hurt we have caused others and all the occasions on which we have grieved Him.
Each of us starts this journey of parenting wanting to be the perfect parent - so determined to do it better than our mothers did, so convinced that we can. We try so hard and often come pretty close to perfection - at least in our own minds. But then at last something happens that brings us face to face with the reality of how far short we've fallen. And it seems that those who have tried the hardest to live righteously have a long way to fall because we SO didn't want to disappoint our Heavenly Father.
Dear M -No mother is perfect and some of us have much from which to be redeemed.
I wrote a series which may be helpful
For moms who need a fresh start, Part 1
For moms who need a fresh Start, Part 2
For moms who need a fresh start, Part 3
For moms who need a fresh start, Part 4
Mothers in the hands of a merciful GodFor mothers who need a fresh start (redux)
But to you personally, I just want to encourage you not to be crippled by your past. As God has given you new vision and is calling you on to better things, Satan would like nothing better than to paralyze you and keep you from realizing the joyous future God has for you.
Our children at some point will have to deal with the fact that their parents were not perfect. It will be a test by which God will help them grow - if they let him. I have children who think I am the best mother in the world, but I have a daughter who hasn't spoken to me or anyone else in our family for over two years. From the vantage point of my age and experience as a mother, I see that she is missing a spiritual opportunity, but even God's first children chose to disobey and dishonor him.
My point is that God is bigger than any mistakes you have made and in fact everything you have gone through is a necessary part of who you are. Had you been "perfect" you might have been filled with pride and not known how to throw yourself on God's grace.
Please read my entry above - and follow the links to the previous ones. It is so important for your future success and growth as a mother to get through this challenge, to forgive yourself as God has already forgiven you and to not allow Satan to snatch this victory.
blessings and hugs,
barbara
Is something troubling you today? Are you feeling remorseful, guilty or unworthy? The celebration of Jesus's sacrifice for us - His death and Resurrection - is a wonderful opportunity to confess and lay these burdens at the foot of the cross, to apologize to anyone you have hurt, to claim the victory over Satan (who wants to paralyze you and keep you from confidence and grace), and to allow the Resurrection to shine in your own life beginning this moment.
Blessings to you all this Easter!
Posted in Easter, Inspiration, Mothering | Permalink
Comments
Thank you so much for writing this. It's exactly what I needed to hear today.
Posted by: Lauren | April 10, 2009 6:30 PM
To M, and all us moms who've had trials that have left scars on our children:
God is a redeeming God. It's in his character. That means he can take the ugly things in life, the damage, the hurt and the mistakes, and he can transform them into the best things that happen to us.
Only God can do that. He does it for you, and for your children. Trust him. Trust him that, in 15 or 20 years, your son will look you in the eye and thank you for everything - even the times that seemed bad. Because God has used them to form your son into something he otherwise wouldn't be, when he's 25.
It's fabulous to love your children, and give them the best home you can. But don't do it to "make it up to them." Let God do that. Shed that hurt. That's part of being forgiven.
Posted by: mary kathryn | April 11, 2009 9:23 AM
Thank you Barbara! I needed this today! Parenting does break you.
Posted by: Shannon Best | April 11, 2009 10:21 PM
