Limping

So this post is not so fun to write. It's also not so fun to think about people reading it. But I think it's important to be transparent about how hard motherhood is and how moms and dads fall short of perfection over and over and over again.

I went into being a mom naively thinking that some things that I've always struggled with would suddenly be easier as soon as that double line showed up on my pregnancy test. For example, I thought I would be braver when it came to medical producers because I would be thinking of my baby. I'm not. I'm still a huge wimp about it to be honest.  I break into a cold sweat every time I hear the snap of plastic gloves.

Granted I've only been a mom for 10 months (I'm counting pregnancy because if someone believes that the trials of motherhood don't start during pregnancy they're very mistaken) and I know that you constantly grow and evolve but I'm still surprised by how the same I am. It's like motherhood didn't grow out of me so much but became a new part of me. It's like I added an addition onto my proverbial house. It's a huge, game changing addition (like a new kitchen) but the building is still the same. It still has the same leaky pipes and scratched up floors. A new kitchen didn't make leaky pipes go away.  You still are going to get a flooded basement no matter how awesome and wonderful your new kitchen is. Does that make sense?

The addition of motherhood hasn't made my anxiety disorder go away.

(This is a picture of me on a particularly bad anxiety day. You might not be able to tell from my face, but there is a whole mess of turbulent emotion going on.)

And really, I didn't think it would. That seems too foolish, even to an optimist like me. But I did think that I would somehow be able to handle it differently. I thought that I would be able to power through the anxious days without tears or panic because I was a mom and that stuff just doesn't stand.  And I think that will happen eventually, God willing. But it hasn't come naturally or easily. In fact, the it has been harder than its been in years.

This round of anxiety has been especially rough for four reasons. One, my old coping mechanisms are totally not going to work. I can't withdrawal and watch a movie or nap on really bad days. I can't take medication even if I wanted to because I'm breastfeeding. I can't just do some art work or binge on Netflix. Two, I am severely sleep deprived. Sleep Deprivation has always been a trigger for me and I have NEVER been so tired in my entire life. Three, hormones. Hormones, hormones, hormones, hormones. Hormones that will, with time, even out. And four, I'm a new mom. 'Nuff said really. If there is ever a time in your life that produces waves of core rocking anxiety it is during birth of your first child.

So I'm still struggling. It's the same panic-inducing anxiety that I've had periodic battles with my whole life. I've averaged about one bad day a week since Tiny Baby's birth, except for Week Three. Week Three can pretty much go to Hell. Everyday was a bad day. Let's not talk to or about Week Three because it was pretty much the worst. Week Three can bite me.

Now, I'm going to totally contradict pretty much my whole premise up to this point. Because, while I have the same problems, I am not the same. I have an addition. A adorable, adorable addition, weighing about 9 lbs and is pushing 24 inches long. An addition who really needs me. All. The. Time. And what's really, to the bottom of my heart, terrifying is that he already recognizes when his momma is losing it.   He cries harder and louder when he feel the tension in my arms. He smiles less on the days that are hardest for me. As much as I try to stuff down the anxiety, it bleeds through and I HATE that. It breaks my heart in a way that is alien in it's intensity. I have never wanted to shield a person from my problems more but he is in the direct fallout. And no matter how much I try to smile more or give more kisses he somehow already senses my unease.

Sometime during high school a book became popular in my church called "Leading with a Limp" by Dan B. Allender (you can buy it here). I read it at the time but it didn't truly resonate with me until now. To summarize quickly, Dr. Allender writes that weakness is one of your strongest assets in leadership. When you allow those you lead to see how you're broken they more easily see how God has made you whole.

Do you know what Kintsugi is? It's the ancient Japanese practice of fixing broken pottery with lacquer mixed with precious metals such as gold.  By repairing the break in such a way it becomes a part of the object's history. It is impossible to look at the object and not see the break but it has also been made more beautiful, more precious because of it.

(An example of Kintsugi. Source)

I feel like this bowl sometimes. I feel like I've been shattered and God has painstakingly glued me back together using the blood of Christ. My story has been made infinitely more beautiful because of it. And that story will, hopefully and only if I'm honest, teach those whom God has put me in charge of; namely my children. 

So my new cooping mechanism has been the healthiest yet -constant and uninhibited prayer. I have never prayed like I have in the past two months, prayed like it's truly a lifeline and not just a discipline. On the bad days, I've found myself chewing my bottom lip (an anxiety warning sign to my husband if there ever was one), laying on the floor next to my little one and crying out to the Lord. Actually, the crying out is oddly familiar. It very much reminds me of how my tiny baby cries out to me. This is healthiest way to cope, like I said, but it is also the most uncomfortable. It's not instantly distracting or comforting but it is lasting in a way I've never experienced. It fills me and sustains.  For the first time I feel like I can see a horizon that's totally and anxiety free. It will just take time. Put I also know that I will always have a limp, a fatal flaw if you will. A crack that God can make beautiful. 

And there is always grace. God has grace for my me in all my shortcomings, not just in parenting, and I hope my son will have grace for me as well.  All parents screw their kids up somehow and I know my kid is no exception.  I just trust that God has provision to heal the hurt I will inevitable cause Tiny Baby. Just like God's love healed the hurt I endured from my parents, and the hurt they endured from their parents and back and back and back, all the way to Adam and Eve.

But until that time when all hurt has been healed and that cycle has been broken, I will pray ardently and without ceasing. I will not try to hid my cracks from the people who can benefit from them. It's the only thing that has truly felt like freedom.

"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18