A New Outlook on Motherhood & Life

Before having children, I hated children.  I couldn’t understand them, and found them incredibly annoying.  I never gave a second thought to being a mom unlike some who aspire to be one their whole lives.  One day, I would become a mom after marriage and that would be that.  The only fact I knew for sure was that I definitely wanted to have more than one child.  Being an only child, I recognized the importance of giving the gift of a sibling to my first.

Approaching motherhood going on four years now with two babes has given me new perspective on what it’s all about.

I’ve been asked before on the merits of becoming a mom or having children, and while it’s easy to complain about all the difficult parts, it has always been insurmountable to fully put into words the gravity or the magnitude of such a decision on my life.  Obviously, people say, children bring such joy and a newness to life that you have left behind in your childhood or forgotten, but that just barely covers it.  It isn’t about securing financial or emotional security when I’ve grown old and senile, because I’ve always been taught that I can only rely on myself.  I create my own happiness.

Growing up, adults always ask, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  I always gave throw-away answers or what I thought people would want to hear.  I never knew how to even begin approaching that question.  After going through the motions of school, and working hard to get into a good college, I thought I would learn what life was all about.  I made sure to be purposeful in my time in college and not waste my mom’s hard-earned money by applying AP credits and taking classes every summer to finish school a year early.  Surely, once I’ve finished college I would then know what life is all about and what I’m supposed to be when I grew up.  After all, I’m already grown up now, right?  Once I became a teen, it was my life’s goal to become an adult with my own money and decisions.  Being all grown up at 22 years old, the world is my oyster, the places I’ll go! 

The places I indeed went were numerous.  But, the places I went and the name I’ve made for myself at my job for the past 13 years does not define me.  Sure, I have skills to write down on a resume, and stories to share with friends, but all that doing isn’t what life is all about.  It’s not about checking off the boxes of college, job, marriage, kids.  What is life all about?  I’ve come to realize that life is a journey.  Different players and places come and go in that journey, but the one constant is me.  The better I understand myself, the more equipped I am to choose the right path for me.  My goal should not be about attaining perfection, but enjoying the refinement process.

Having children has been the most life-altering, refining event in my life thus far.  It has changed the very essence of my identity like how honey poured over an object covers every surface indiscriminately and completely.  Yes, sometimes it can feel suffocating, and it has been detrimental to my career, but not in a way you might think.  On the flip-side: The greatest gain is a better understanding of my own desires, limitations, and timeline better than ever before.  I did not truly understand love and compassion until I had my first child.  I did not truly understand sacrifice and compromise until I had my second.  In a way that you can’t form a diamond without extremely high pressure, I could not test and find my true self without going through the tribulations of being a mom.  In the face of adversity, the truth reveals itself.  My truth is thanks to the hardest teachers I’ll ever encounter: my two babes.  Not only do they challenge me to raise highly functional contributors to society, they also give me daily opportunities to choose love, patience, and hope in a world where all three always seem to be in short supply.