No greater love has a mom …
Maybe you’ve heard this saying: if you want to know what real love is, look at a crucifix. I’ve heard it, too, and I remain humbled and eternally grateful that the Creator of the universe loved me enough to die. What I didn’t know was that it would be through my calling as a wife and mother that I would truly understand what it meant to die to myself for the sake of another—for the sake of love.
A funny thing happens when you begin traveling this road to holiness called motherhood: lots of things change. At least, they did for me.
Suddenly, I was thinking about someone else’s needs as more important than my own. Did the baby get enough to eat? How many wet diapers has she had? Did we forget her blankie? Is she breathing?? Meanwhile, I wasn’t really eating so well myself, or going to the bathroom on my own, or remembering my name or what day it was due to severe sleep deprivation. For the record, I do NOT recommend this model of postpartum recovery, as it’s completely ridiculous and totally unsustainable. If you want to know how to really do it right, search online for “how to postpartum like a boss” and see what my friend Blythe had to say about it over at her blog, The Fike Life. I promise you’ll thank me (but especially Blythe).
Anyway, it wasn’t as if I’d never put others’ needs before mine, of course, but this was exponentially different. This little baby girl needed so very much from me at all times and couldn’t do a thing (save the occasional gas bubble I decided to believe was a smile) to repay me for my efforts.
And the crazy thing was, other than wishing I could actually sleep for a few hours in a row, go to the bathroom in peace, and fit into my pre-pregnancy anything, I was okay with it. Glad, even! What a miracle! What a blessing! My husband and I had created, with God’s help, another human being! We were totally, thoroughly, head-over-heels in love. We were also totally, thoroughly, orange-juice-poured-into-the-cereal bowl exhausted.
It wasn’t long before I wondered whether I would ever feel like a real human being again.
Over the years, I’ve heard a lot of talk around the concept of the “Martyr Mom.” You know—a well-meaning friend tells another friend, “Don’t be a martyr!” And what she means is, “Quit sacrificing your mental, physical, and spiritual health on the altar of perfectionistic, Pinterest-worthy motherhood!” For the record: I agree 100 percent. I am fully and completely on board with moms taking care of themselves. And I mean that from the bottom of my heart. Love your kiddos and your husband and your neighbors as you love yourself. I encourage all mothers everywhere to do what they need to do to soak up God’s love whenever and however they can. I do not advocate taking on more than you can handle, because I’ve been there, and it is not a good road to travel. It leads to much crash, lots burn.
What I’m suggesting is this: sacrificing our own wants and desires for the good of our children in motherhood is bound to happen, whether we’re ready for it or not. It’s kind of part of the job description. So, how about we moms decide to reclaim the word “martyr” and restore it to its original glory? A martyr is someone who dies—whether physically or in a spiritual sense—for his or her Christian faith. But the word martyr doesn’t mean “dead.” It means “witness.” A martyr is one who bears witness to the Gospel. As mothers, we are frontline witnesses. We bear witness to Jesus Christ in our children’s lives; we bear witness to other moms, encouraging one another in our common sisterhood; we bear witness to God’s strength, glory, and power, even if we can’t see it sometimes through the muck and the mire of everyday living. We moms can bear witness to our faith precisely through our calling to motherhood, every time we die to ourselves by performing acts of love for our very own “least of these”—our children.
Call me an out-of-touch throwback, but if we’re using this reclaimed definition of “martyr,” I’m in. I want to be a martyr. I want to be a witness. I want to be someone whose life testifies to the love of God in my marriage and in my motherhood. It would be ludicrous to think I can do it on my own, broken, weak, and sinful as I am. But if I allow Jesus to take the wheel of my heart, and the Holy Spirit to be the motor animating my actions? Hallelujah! I wonder what a witness I could be.
Yes, Mom, I was listening
Growing up, my parents frequently told me, “Love is not a feeling—it’s a decision.” And when I say “frequently,” I mean I heard it about a million times. And yet, even into my newlywed years, the concept of human love being anything more than good feelings flew right over my head. In all those years, I must have done something because of love rather than duty, guilt, shame, or what I’d get out of it, but I still didn’t understand that love was a choice that I could make.
Until I was a mom.
They say the longest distance in the world is the ten inches from the head to the heart, and that certainly rings true. In my case, however, covering that distance took precisely 21 ¾ inches and a little more than nine pounds of baby.
Let’s take a slight detour here for a moment. How much did you know about driving a car, really, before you sat behind the wheel? If you were like me, prior to taking the test for your driver’s permit, you probably read the manual. You might even have studied it. And hopefully you passed. For me, it wasn’t until I actually had my hands at ten and two on the steering wheel (that’s how we did it when I was a kid) and my foot hovering over the gas pedal with my dad riding shotgun that it hit me: “Wow. This is a big deal. I better take this seriously.” In other words, it was personal. I was calling the shots. I was accelerating and braking and turning and avoiding potholes and pedestrians. If I ever wanted to pass the driving test and get my license, I was going to have to demonstrate that I was a competent driver. And I learned to drive by … driving. I practiced. My dad was my coach from the passenger seat, but I was the one behind the wheel. I had to choose to do it.
Now, as the mom of a teen itching to get her driver’s permit, the thought of fifteen-year-olds cruising around on the highways and byways scares the poop out of me. I don’t think I’m alone in my anxiety.
Here’s the point: To genuinely show love to those around us, we have to practice being loving to them—not just in our words, but in our actions, too. Those fizzy, fluttery, twitterpated, lovey-dovey feelings may be MIA, but we can choose to do the next loving thing anyway. And I’ve been around the block enough times to know that it’s tough to flip a U-turn with my behavior when my thoughts are angry, unkind, and resentful. I have to choose to shore up my thoughts so that they’re loving, too.
It sounds like an awful lot of work, doesn’t it?
Except, here’s an often overlooked reality: You’re already doing it.
You’re already doing the work of being loving, my friend. Every mom knows exactly what it’s like to sacrifice her own body; brain cells; schedule; short-, mid-, and longterm plans; and personal hygiene for the sake of her kids. The question is: are you doing the work, making the sacrifices, offering it up … with love? BOY-YOY-YOY-YOING!! That’s the sound of me being convicted by my own words. Every day, I have to ask myself: am I doing small things (and big things, too—have you seen my laundry pile?) with great love, as Saint Thérèse of Lisieux said, or am I complaining about the cooking (gah), the dishes (oy), the clutter (gak), the driving (oh, my word), the children’s sass (!!) and all of the 9,432,681 things that come with being a mom?
I’ll always remember when I realized what a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal I tend to be about certain tasks. It turns out that I can get all the laundry washed, folded, hung up, and put away, but if I’m not doing it with love, I’m missing the point. I can master meal-scheduling, crush grocery-shopping, successfully herd everyone out the door, get them where the need to be on time, and slay my to-do list … but if I don’t have love, what is the point? (See 1 Corinthians 13:1–3.)
Eventually, I asked myself: what would happen if I just did these small (and big) things with as