My ten-year-old woke me up this morning to rescue her from a six-legged beast in the bathroom. My girls are as terrified of roaches as I imagine they would be an axe wielding maniac. She stood in the hall as I calmly annihilated the vermin with the flat lid of her older sister's Hawaiian Tropics lotion bottle. The exterminator says our flat roof is very inviting. And so I've become accustomed to leading bug invaders to their death. 

It's learned behavior like killing cockroaches without batting an eye that makes me a little more appreciative of what it means to be a mom. 

I concentrate too much on the lack of glamour in my forty-something life. I complain about my thickening waistline and the quickly appearing grays, the headaches brought on by changes in hormones and my current inability to look at a Hostess cupcake without my pants getting tighter. But why pay so much attention to THAT? 

Today I feel the duty to reflect upon the beauty of being a mother and I sense an urge to share it with you.  

  

Cherished Mothers, 

We are bold. We don't shrink in terror like we once did in the presence of the unsightly. Several years ago I wrangled two snakes (that had slipped inside our house during renovations) with a cookie sheet and a small trash can. When you can't cry to daddy or the husband isn't available you learn to do things you thought you never could. Be it from sheer courage or the lack of choice, we women hold down our babies when they need their shots. We clean up explosive vomit, whose sight once made (and maybe still makes) us gag. We give our children "the talk" when we know that we are incapable in preparing for such a thing. 

We're fierce. The times our children have done wrong and the times they've been done wrong have proven that; like the time one of my kid's fifth grade teachers decided to unnecessarily belittle him in front of the class one too many times. My fury was uncontainable. What about the times our  kids try sassy backtalk when we're trying to correct them? Our ferocity is boundless when it comes to ensuring our kids will be good and will be treated good. 

We're humble. This partly comes from realizing, that even our ferocity to teach our kids right from wrong will not ensure that they behave perfectly. We teach them how to act properly and are aghast the first time we catch them in a lie or the time we see the curse word they typed when texting their friend. 

We're probably all guilty of thinking of at least one "that" which our kid will never do ("My kid will never do THAT"). And there's at least one "that" they'll do whether it's bully another kid or hide important stuff from us.  Our kids teach us that our parenting isn't kid-proof. We're kept modest by unexpected experiences like the whole lice fiasco that lasts for months despite the pinched nerve in your neck that says her head should be clear. We're humbled upon hearing our three year old tell her siblings in the hallway, "Our mom's a jerk". 

We're enduring. Resilient. We're bold and ferocious and still find ourselves failing at subjects like patience and grace and signing our kids agenda and field trip permission slips. We don't just decide we're not good at this "mom" thing. We try again. Try harder. We fall (While we're down there we see the mount of trash and clothes under the bed. We get back up again with determination that they WILL CLEAN THEIR ROOM.). We realize we haven't spent enough time with our middle kid and then make a concentrated effort to spend more time with her even when the schedule is stretched. We make a Plan A and then follow Plan B when Plan A doesn't work out. We carry on when there IS NO PLAN. 

We're knowledgable of the complex. It's in parenting we realize complexity is beauty and mystery. Our kid's delay in speaking or potty training or their two year insistence that they be called "White Kitty" teaches us this. We understand that "one size really doesn't fit all" as we explain to our kids that they don't have to be a certain size to be pretty. We comprehend the unsimplistic nature of human beings when we "get it" that our kid may not receive excellent conduct marks, not because they're not "good kids" but because they're impulsive and easily distracted. As we hang our kids' pictures of stick people on the fridge proudly, or stay silent regarding the first report card with a hard earned "C", we're aware that their work doesn't have to resemble perfection. 

We love and we know love. We rock them and sing them into a slumber arrested by the way their long eyelashes curl up from their sleepy lids. We laugh at their wittiness and smile at their kindness. We cherish the way they still hold our hand or send an impromptu text that they're grateful for us. But it's the hardest days and chapters of parenting that our love for our children finds new depths. Our's is a love unphased by fatigue and unfaltered by the seasonal inability of our children to understand it. The combination of these two loves gives us a slightly better picture of what God's love is like. 

Let's respect the bags under our eyes (until somebody finds a cheap effective cream for that). Let's celebrate with a Hostess cupcake now and then. 

We're roach slayers and comforters of nightmares. We been given the capacity to show a fierce love that protects and disciplines. We're the perfect picture for our kids of "When at first you don't succeed..." as we get up and do another day of an important job that we sometimes feel like we're not doing as well as we should be. 

God is using the difficult and unattractive to refine us. 

 May all we do, and fail to do, point our families to a God who makes all things beautiful. May we understand the gift in a God who abundantly provides and perfectly loves. 

Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised. Proverbs 31:30

Encourage a mom today. 

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