At Home, Arlington, Massachusetts
“The opposite of the ‘One Child Policy’ is not the ‘Two Child Policy,’ but ‘Free to Birth.’ When I think about it more deeply, we are no more better than our parents when celebrating the replacement of the ‘one child policy’ with the ‘Two Child Policy.’ We may not be affected by the national policy, we may have more choice to deal with it (many of our friends went abroad to bear their second child), but we are deeply affected by the values of the world — parenthood should not degrade my living standards, my financial standards, or my standards of freedom — because we are still afraid of losing comfort, pleasure, or something that gives us identity. We are still making the choice in the fear.” I'm editing J.’s blog post for the CP on China's switch to the two-child policy and am incredibly convicted. He basically just tells stories from life about the policy, but he ends by discussing the way Chinese don't care about it anymore because no one wants to have kids anyways. His words above are as equally applicable to me in the West as they are to the Chinese. Lord, forgive me. I am making my decisions out of fear. I am no better. I am afraid of giving up my comfort, my financial security, my time, my independence. But parenthood isn't a degradation of these things and we shouldn't see it that way. I shouldn't see it that way. Please God, forgive me, and change my heart. Help me to see the beauty there is in your world, in the way you made me, in parenthood. Please help me to be more compelled by your design and your definitions of beauty than those which the world tells me are beautiful. Amen.
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Airport, Atlanta, Georgia
I can just feel this pressure welling up inside of me. Why am I not pregnant? Does everyone judge me? My brain and heart are really twisted. Approval has ALWAYS been my biggest idol. One small moment during this weekend has been a surprise blessing, though. An older friend mentioned to me in passing that she was 33 when she had first child and 38 when she had her last. I don't really know this woman well, and I don't know what the circumstances were, but those words were a sweet balm to my soul when I heard them. Gordon-Conwell, South Hamilton, Massachusetts
I really believe that God is going to give me hardship when it comes to having children. I don't know why. I don't know for what purpose. But I feel it. Gordon-Conwell, South Hamilton, Massachusetts
It has been the greatest blessing for me to be back in school. Even if nothing comes of it professionally, it is time well used. This opportunity to study those who have given Christ their hearts, my brothers and sisters throughout the ages, is awakening my soul. I so often feel as if my soul has been in a deep sleep for the past five years and suddenly it's waking up. It's cumbersome and brutish, but my heart is coming alive once more. It's learning to put fear aside. To have a reawakened heart is perhaps the number one thing I need to bravely face motherhood. When I feel God's face shining at me, I am not so afraid to give away my life for the sake of others. At Home, Arlington, Massachusetts
This is the year of transition and it is difficult. Good and exciting, but also just plain difficult. I've had 3 realizations in the last week and I'll just list them out below. 1) There is no way in hell I could be in school while having young children. I would go batshit crazy. I'm not sure what universe I thought I lived in, but it wasn't a real one. Now that I am back in school, I love it, but I also could not do it with babies. Any further educational dreams will simply have to wait until later in life. 2) I have an ideal birth order and number of children. Unfortunately, that is the absolute most impossible thing to control in life. But I'm still going to pray and ask the Lord for this order and number of kids. I would just be absolutely tickled to death if I had a boy first and then twin girls. I know this is absolute madness, but it makes my heart absolutely sing to think about having that family. I would name the boy W. C. and he would be just like Trey. The twin girls would be named V. A. and F. E. They would be just like Ruthie and me, but twins. All three children have a virtue name and a family name. Just thinking about this dream makes me dizzy. I don't think I've ever been so excited about the possibility of having children as thinking about these three mythological children makes me. 3) Negotiating work while planning to have kids is really really hard. In fact, everything I've ever heard about it all of the sudden feels very real. It is true women can't have it all. We don't live in a reality where working and mothering go hand in hand. At Home, East Arlington, Massachusettes
Tonight was a perfect night with my husband that will not be repeated once kids are around. 5:00pm - Get into a fight about stupid hurtful comments made by both parties while reheating leftovers. 5:10pm - End fight and make up, both parties feeling bad. Lots of kisses and sad, repentant sounds. Eat leftovers and watch Parks and Rec. 5:40pm - Set off on a long walk in the brisk fall weather. Fully dissect and dish on work politics and school life. 7:15pm - Continue the conversation over beer, hard cider, and carrot cake at the bar down the block. Conversation moves into topics of dreams and hopes and fears for life. 9:00pm - Go home. Have crazy good sex. As in, really good sex. 9:40pm - Fall into bed. I write while Trey lucidly describes the intimate details of his GRE dominance, trying to understand which 2 questions he got wrong and delving into random word definitions. He finishes with the statement, "I feel like I could take verbal GRE tests every day and really enjoy it, you know?" His greatest woe is that he can't find out which 2 questions he got wrong on the verbal test. 10:00pm - Sleep. Because when you are our age and don't have kids, you can choose to go to bed early and get lots of glorious autumn-breezed sleep. At Home, East Arlington, Massachusetts
Last week, my mom came to visit. Mothers are such complicated things. I don't think my relationship with my mother is any more complicated than anyone else's, but sometimes, in my most disoriented moments, it certainly feels that way. My mom and I are very very different people. She is all practicality. She is rooted in life in a way that I've never been able to share. Her mind is all lines and sense where mine is chaos and flicker. People are central to her world. Ideas are central to mine. She listens to people's hearts. I imagine what their hearts could be. Recently, I've started to realize that as much as she struggles to understand me, I struggle to understand her. For a long time, I thought that I was a lot like my mother. And we are. We both care about people a great deal, and I thought that her gifts and talents were mine. The thing about this is that of course most children inherit some of their parents' abilities. I got just enough of my mother's straightness, just enough of her “peopleness,” just enough of her empathy to think that I could go through life doing much of what she did. As with most children, I tried to pattern myself off of her frame. But I can never be everything that my mother is because I can't understand her frame. And this is currently one of the biggest struggles in my life. Within me, there is a tug to be rooted in reality and people the way she is, but I can't do it. The times I've tried have overwhelmed me. But without following in my mother's footsteps, in whose footsteps do I follow? My own are a scary and lonely place. I can't be my mother. And she doesn't want me to be her. She made it very clear when she was visiting that I have to be my own person. I have not been made to replicate her. But this is frightening. It is being cut loose into a world of decision. It is having to think. It is having to examine. It is having to trust. There is so much within me that comes from my mother. Though we do not think alike, we certainly feel alike. And that strongly. And maybe that is why it is sometimes difficult to relate. Our minds and attitudes are miles apart, but our hearts beat the same emotion. We struggle to comprehend what the other is thinking, or why she is thinking such things, but we feel the same way – strongly and sensitively. Both deep love and great hurt are often produced by this reality. My mother is a great woman. Perhaps the greatest I know. And in the end, this is the most profound reason why it hurts at times not to be just like her. I have risen and called her blessed, and I fear that unless my life looks exactly like hers, my children will not be able to do the same for me. What does it mean to honor your father and mother? Surely it does not mean becoming exactly them. And yet they have shaped me and molded me in indefinable ways. I am grateful to know they love me and are proud of me, despite all of the internal crises I put myself through. At Home, Arlington, Massachusetts
Yesterday someone close to us let us know she is pregnant again after miscarriage. Her voice sounded happier than it has in a long time, but she still seems unsure of everything. I am so incredibly excited for her and her husband, and I want them to also know joy. I've been praying that they would be able to try again without any difficulties. I pray that the Lord will be kind to them, and lavish them with goodness. I mostly pray, though, that she will be able to hide her heart in Christ and with it hidden there, that she would be able to rejoice even when it seems like God's face is hidden. After talking with our friend, I felt old. It was the first time I've ever felt that way. Since I turned sixteen, I've always struggled with my age and the process of time. But this was different. It was so much an emotional fight against the inevitable. It was just feeling old. Over the past week, my body has been hurting. I did something to my knee first and then yesterday I woke up with back pain. Both have kept me from working out and both have been incredibly unpleasant. I'm thirty one years old and yesterday, I could physically feel the process of decay beginning in me. Most likely, I have years left in my life. But my body is already starting to groan and creak in ways that I don't like. But what really made me feel old is the same question I've been struggling with for more than a year – what have I done with my life so far? I'm thirty one and I haven't had children, I'm just now working on a master’s degree, we don't own a home, we've barely made any money, and I'm not sure any of the things I've worked at for the last decade make a squat of difference. Almost all of our friends and family are solidly in the stage of life in which kids, homes, and careers are well settled and flourishing. I feel like Trey and I have been held back a grade, but it's completely unclear for what purpose. So I felt old. Not because I really am old, but because I'm so far behind where everyone else my age is. And I'm not sure I'll ever be able to catch up. And what's worse – I now consistently have people in my life telling me I should catch up. I have friends who reprimand me for not having babies and I have friends who wonder when we'll ever have "real" jobs. I've tried so hard my whole life to live according to what I've believed God is calling me to do. And for many years, I thought it was possible to do that. I did a lot of things I didn't want to do because of it. But now, I don't know that it's not all somewhat arbitrary. That all of the decisions have been mine, only mine, and not some great calling from God. God communicates in his Word and there is nowhere in his Word that spells out the intimate details of my life. I know from the Word what God desires people to be. How he has designed them to live. And I know that his Word applies directly to my life. But it has not told me where to go and what to eat every day. And yet, I do believe God has directed me here. And I do believe that many of the decisions I made were right. Not because God told me so directly, but because the alternatives would have been taken up out of mistrust and selfishness. The things I've done themselves aren't as clearly good or bad as the reasons for which I've done them. Was there something about each life choice I've made that was clearly God's will for me? No. But in each of those moments of decision was it clear that one choice involved trusting God more and the other involved seeking my own interests more? Yes. While I don't know whether or not the particular things I've done in life "mattered" or were God's plan for me, my conscience is clear that at each turning point, I attempted to my best ability to choose the path that required obedience. I can't look back on the last decade and know that the things I've done have mattered, or that they will bring me any degree of prosperity. But I can look back on my life and know that throughout it, I was trying to follow God. I may be "behind a grade," but if that's the case, will I be content in knowing I'm here because I've tried to obey and this is seemingly where the Lord has brought me? Is it enough for my life to be defined by attempted obedience, even if makes everything unclear and even if I don't always get it right? When I feel old, can I find my comfort not in the things I've done or made, not even in the places I've arrived at, but rather in the knowledge that in my heart, I'm here because I have tried to obey God? If we never own a house, if my academic aims never pay off, if I am not able to have a baby, will I be ok knowing that what validates my life is not all of the other things that can be substituted for these achievements, but rather the succession of attempts over my life to do as God wanted me to, even if hasn't ever been clear exactly what it is he wants me to do besides love him? If I can't say “yes” to all of these questions, then I will never find satisfaction as I age. But if I can say “yes,” then it doesn't matter whether I am ahead or behind in life. It doesn't matter if God advances me or keeps me behind. If my peace is in the pursuit of God, then it doesn't matter where I live or how many children I am or am not able to have because they are all just testing grounds, gifted opportunities from God to try to obey him once more. At Home, Arlington, Massachusetts
I'm reading a book for my Jonathan Edwards paper on siblings in colonial America. I love it already. There's so much to chew on in it. An off-hand comment from the author really caused me to pause and think though. She was discussing childbirth rates among the early colonists and in discussing one particular woman as an example, she mentioned her "childbearing career." At first, I was disturbed by this comment; women gave so much in those days to motherhood and everything about their lives was consumed by children. But as I considered the description further, I actually started to really like it, and not just that, but I started to see in it a healthy perspective on childbearing that I need to take on. Childbearing was considered a woman's career. It wasn't just an obligation, or a duty, but it was work on which she embarked and in which she could take pride. She could do it well, or she could do it poorly, just as with any other career. It wasn't so much about her fulfillment, but it could be a great deal about her success and pride. I think many women today would find it vulgar to think of motherhood as a career, but I find it liberating. I love work. I love strategizing about how to succeed and do well in life. I love having my days full with work that has an objective. In many ways, part of the burden of being a mother in my mind has been the need to give this all up. I don't think of having kids as something that will fulfill me – I already feel fulfilled. I don't need children. But if I think about it as work, of motherhood as a career, then it takes on interesting features. It's a project that I can be creative in and with. It's work that has an objective other than my own fulfillment. I don't ever feel the need to have a baby to be happy. But I can get excited about having a baby to create something good. Of course, family is family. It's relationships, not tasks. But I also think it could be healthy for us to remember that it is also work – that bearing and raising children is a career of sorts. And it's not so because it's some special task for women alone. Though part of our career is the physical bearing and feeding of the young, the career of childrearing belongs equally to fathers. When we remember that having children is one career out of many that we undertake, it reminds us that all things exist in unity under the authority of the Creator. Just as our work must always involve relationships, so our relationships often take on the nature of a job. God's cultural mandate did not divide these things – all that God has given us to do intersects and weaves together. (Image by Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin, "Motherhood.") At Home, Arlington, Massachusetts
I haven't been doing so well with the whole "having kids" thing this summer. I was ok for most of the beginning of the summer. The first Greek term kept me really busy and I just didn't think much about it. But recently, I've been having a hard time. Fear is behind it. And the knowledge of the sacrifice it will take. I bought a copy of Taking Charge of Your Fertility right before we went on vacation with Daniel and Bethany. It's good I have it now, but thumbing through the book was a bad idea. It's a very graphic and very brutal reminder of what I'm about to try to do to my body. And it's a reminder of how much every aspect of it is hard work, and uncertain work. Ultimately, I set the book aside and have decided not to look at it until shortly before I'm going off of birth control. There are many women I know who would devour this book with joy. Their bodies, and bodies in general, are mysteries to be figured out and enjoyed. But I've never liked riddles and I've never been comfortable with my body, so there are two huge strikes right there. Yesterday, I was doing research for my paper for the Jonathan Edwards class I'm taking. I'm researching and writing on the women that surrounded Edwards and it's reminding me just how much I love research and how much regret I have that I didn't do grad school earlier in life. I firmly believe that God gave me everything in my 20s for good reasons, but I admit that sometimes it's hard to see those reasons. I wish now that I was ten years younger and going straight out of undergrad into a PhD track. But then, I don't really wish that, because I wouldn't be the person I am today and everything about the last ten years has given me the interests and voice I have. So that's that. But it is really hard to look at my life and the reality that my chances are so incredibly small of doing further academic work once children are in the picture and not feel some regret. The problem is that I can't escape the idea that my life will truly be over once I have kids. Trey has been concerned about this in me from the beginning of our marriage. He tells me I always talk as if having kids will be tantamount to self-immolation. I always deny that this is the case, but the closer I get to actually trying to start a family, the more I see this to be true about me. Bearing and having children seems like it will be the total negation of Hannah. And I don't want that. But I struggle to know if my rejection of it isn't just pure selfishness. I want to homeschool. I want to be with my kids. I truly truly want those things. But I also want to be more than those things, not just for myself, but for my children. There is a big world, with so many interesting things to think about, and sometimes it feels like my soul will die if I don't have space, mentally and physically, to think about anything but children. Sometimes I feel so guilty for feeling this way – most women for most of history have not worried about these things. Identity is only a problem for the privileged twenty-first century woman. If I could change myself out for someone who never thought about these things and who was certain of herself and her space and who didn't have anything more to be known about herself than the community around her, I would. But I can't do that and that's not who I am, and so I struggle. Last night, Trey and I were lying in bed. I half-jokingly reminded him that hopefully in the next year or so, he won't be the only one with access to my body. We continued to joke about it, mostly about the differences between his and little babies’ touches. And then, all of the sudden, very quickly the joke dried up as the reality that everything about my body will be destroyed in the process of becoming a mother set in. My children will literally suck their life from me and it will take its toll on me, and on my husband. The only response I have to that reality when I face it is fear. And this is where I meet up with my sisters throughout all of the ages. My struggles with identity, my regret over lost opportunities, these things set the modern generations apart from the long chorus of motherhood. But the abject fear of giving up your physical self for the creation of another physical self unifies me with all who have gone before. It is raw and it is scary, and this, I think is the real source of my struggles with motherhood. |
About the ProjectThis is a very personal project. It tracks my growth and development as I journeyed toward motherhood over the recent years. It doesn't document every experience I had, and probably neglects my more joyful and peaceful moments in the frenzy of trying to communicate my fears, anxieties, and doubts. If you are a friend or loved one, please do not let anything you read here overshadow what you know of me personally. If you are a stranger, please remember that a living and flawed person stands behind these words. To all my guests here, please understand these are not political statements and try to extend me grace, even as I share my failures and foibles - I have repented of much of what I share. I don't share this journal as an exemplar, but rather out of the desire to share my hope that entrance to motherhood does not need to be a fearful thing - despite the very real fears I have fought against. Motherhood is simply a part of life and one through which I am discovering more of myself and my God. Archives
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