The Mothering Truth

Mothering guilt.

All mothers have felt it.... at one time or another.

But if you are on social media, you probably don't see it from others...

I mean, we all have seen the wonderful Pinterest-inspired birthday parties, the beautiful family portraits, the happy children working on their schoolwork...

We all have done it. At least I have.

And to a certain degree, I think that's appropriate. Social media is NOT a place to air the dirty laundry of our family.

But we're missing something big here.

The truth.

The mothering truth....

I have been to the dentist 7 times in the past two months. The first two visits were dental checkups for the four children. The other 5 visits were dental work for these four children. Talk about guilt.... For different reasons, my children hadn't been to see a dentist in YEARS. I grew up going to the dentist every 6 months, so I KNOW what they're SUPPOSE to do. And it definitely wasn't that our children and their teeth lacked importance to us. It was just.... crazy. We moved. A lot. Things were always up in the air. And we just didn't get around to it. So fast-forward to a couple months ago and suddenly I had one child who had four cavities (and three teeth needing to be pulled unrelated to cavities), one child with two cavities, one child with one cavity, and one child who we almost missed our opportunity to fix some teeth (ortho) before they did damage to others! Yep, guilt.

But this post isn't just about dental visits- or the lack thereof... I'm happy to say that now my kids are all caught up- cavities have been filled and we are proceeding on the ortho work.

However, there's other truth that needs to be uncovered.

I don't usually read to my children each evening. I KNOW, I KNOW.... reading to your child is GOOD and you're SUPPOSE to do that. But.... I don't. Sure, if they bring me a book I'll read it, and we do some read alouds for school, but nope. We don't sit down and read together each evening.

We don't always have Bible time. Yep. Pastor's wife here.... Total honesty. Do we do it more often than not? YES!!! But some days.... despite my best laid plans.... the day just flies by and then everyone is in bed and I'm kicking myself for missing it.

My three oldest children are behind in math.... by quite a bit.

I sometimes lose my temper.... and find myself having to apologize.... yet again.

My house is never clean. Not really. And more often than not, my "style" of housekeeping is frustrating to my husband. Thankfully, he helps keep things in line, order, and uncluttered or the house would probably overtake everyone! What can I say? Keeping things neat and tidy has never been a strength of mine. Ask my parents!!!

Look.... I could go on and on, but the thing is... people sometimes look at me and think I have it all together. But I don't. Far, far from it!

Keep that in mind the next time you see a "perfectly" put together mama or read about a great homeschooling day! Changes are.... they are a lot like mine. Good days, but never perfect.

Here's to the truth!!! I may not have it all together, but God is gracious and loves me anyway. I count my blessings daily and pray for strength to conquer the rest of life!