Confessions of a Weary Mom

So my original title to this blog was "Confessions of a Bad Mom", but a wise friend recently reminded me of the power of words! So I changed it to confessions of a weary mom. While "bad mom" is not who I am, weariness has caused me to act as a bad mom! 

I ran away this week. I mean, I went to help my parents pack and kick off a new program in San Angelo, but really, I ran away. I needed a break. I never understood women who left their husband and children - until the last few years.  

This is a very raw and transparent post. I share because I believe there are SO MANY of us bad  weary moms out there! Especially the tribe of moms with children from hard places or children with special needs - and especially those of us with all the above! I share because I want you to know you are not alone! I share because I think we need to talk more about what happens behind our closed doors. I desperately want to protect my children's stories - but the fact is, their stories intersect mine! I will attempt to walk that thin line here, please give me some grace if I overstep. I also want you to know this is NOT a post written after I have it all together and am sharing from a new perspective. I am sharing from the pit - but I am clawing at the sides determined to get out - and I want to take any other moms in the pit with me! 

In the last three months, I have had a child pack their bags to move out because being respectful was too much to ask, I have had a child tell me our family "sucks" and they want a new one, I have scars on my arm from a child's meltdown that left me bleeding (other family members and a few educators wear similar marks from the same types of meltdowns), I have been told I put other orphans before my own children, I have listened as a new diagnosis is explored for one child – a diagnosis that could possibly have occurred because of medicine I was prescribed during pregnancy, I have been told my sacrifice to be a stay home mom in early years as well as pouring my life into another human means nothing, I have heard words in my home that I never dreamed would be said. I have cried, I have screamed, I have walked away, I have planned my own death, I have run away. I don't share this for pitty or to get a "you're not a bad mom" response. I share because too often we put on a smile and walk around like all is well - while the mom we meet in the grocery store does the same thing. But actually we are both weary and dying in side. I share because I want that mom to know she is not alone - and if you are ready to do the work to climb out of the pit, I want to help you while you help me! I am not interested in sitting in the pit and complaining about it, or sitting in the pit and feeling sorry for myself. I have tried both - and they don't work! 

So let's start climbing!

I ran away this week because I needed a break! I didn't "want" a break, I "needed" a break! My physical body and frayed emotions could no longer respond in a loving and nurturing way to my family. There are many dynamics happening in our family. Many that I will never share in a forum such as this. Any one of the dynamics would probably have been manageable, but when you add all that is happening together, it became my perfect storm. 

Let me pause here to say, if you are meeting me for the first time through this post, I LOVE my children!! I have 9 beautiful creations of God that He has entrusted to me to nurture, disciple, and raise into warriors for Him! While some of their choices of actions and words did give me small pushes into the pit, the real issue here is me. I am the adult. So if my home is not running in a way that I can live there in a healthy manner, I have to look at myself first. And the Truth is that God would not give me these children if He was not equipping me to parent them and give them all they need! None are here by mistake or accident. They are all mine by His design!

Therefore, this week has been lots of pressing into God, stilling myself to listen, lots of self-reflecting. I know that I do not like the mom I was when I left last week. It is not the mom that I want to be! That left me wondering – how did I get here? It didn’t happen overnight. It was a slow process of demands and stress that slowly but surely swallowed the moments of joy being a mom has always brought me. The needs of my children, the struggles they have because of no fault of their own, the pull of walking other families through the same struggles – all of it had left me anxious, irritable, depressed, on edge….and empty. Oh so empty.

About 4 years ago I realized I was headed down this path. I had always heard “self-care” and thought “selfish”.  But after being stuck in the house with 8 children, 4 of whom were 3 and under, I realized “self-care” is actually read “survival”! I had to find ways to rejuvenate myself. I had to find ways to pour back into myself. My husband was running on empty too! He couldn’t be my pourer – and no one can pour out of an empty cup! I had to find a way to fill mine!

I began allowing myself to take 15 minutes to take a bubble bath, or an hour to get a pedicure, or even just allowing myself to go to the grocery store without any kids to have a mental break from the “MOM!!!!!” that I heard multiple times every 60 seconds. But it just was not enough. The output was still more than the input. I was maxed out, and my emotional and physical bank accounts were becoming more and more overdrawn – taking more and more to even bring them up to zero.

Being an introvert (one who refuels by being alone) in a house of 10 people with 8 of them being children (well 7 – my 18 year old adult child would be very miffed I did not note her adult status!) means there is very little opportunity to refuel. That has to change. That means getting up early enough to have a quiet house to start my day. It also means more structure – a scheduled day for the summer; and with more structure has to come more nurture because the balance must stay the same. For a mom who does not do structure well naturally, that at first sounds like more demands – but I have watched enough moms that I admire to know that structure is a good – no GREAT thing for larger families!

So that’s my one thing I am implanting as I return to my home! I will make myself rise before the sun to insure I have quiet time to refuel and be ready to love my children – and my husband! ;) I will find a schedule that works for us – all of us!

If you could hear yourself in this post – the weariness, the despair of what is happening in your home, can I ask you to think of just ONE thing you can do this week? What one thing could you implement to give you some rest, to pour into your tank?

·       Hire a housekeeper

·       Implement an hour of rest time each day – include yourself in that time!

·       Go for a walk while your husband and kids clean up dinner dishes

·       Set aside 30 minutes a day to read that book that’s been sitting on your nightstand

·       Find some fun stickers to use when scheduling your week! (another confession – I have a horrible addiction to office supplies, and the calendar stickers make me very happy!)

·       meal plan and try out the online grocery shopping if you have not already

Find one thing to help YOU this week! Remember self-care is not selfish, it is survival! And Mommas, we are not just going to survive, we are going to LIVE! Who is with me?! Let’s get out of this pit!

I would love to hear from you and how are climbing out of the pit! You can get in touch with me on Twitter @HPetree or Instagram blessedtimes9.

The Next Faith Journey: The Things I remembered and the Things I Learned

I can't believe it has been two months since I have blogged! Usually my silence means one of two things: 1) I am swamped and too busy to sit down and write or 2)I am an emotional wreck and can't get my own thoughts together enough to put them down. Both of those things would be true of the last two months! I have been at the West Texas office the last three days and had a full day yesterday of simply being with my mom and RELAXING! So as I sit here in the quiet house with my coffee in my Christmas mug (Christmas is my favorite time of the year, but before this morning thinking about Christmas brought great anxiety!!), I am ready to process just a bit..

We are on day EIGHTY-THREE of this madness! From the day we started living out of suitcases to today has been 83 days....and I have now unpacked ONE box! Seriously! We moved our furniture into the house on day 64! Truly this has been the most difficult season of my life as far as complete and total chaos, stress, and learning to persevere! There are so many blog posts that could come from the last two months....but instead of writing the novel that could be written, I think I will just jot down a few of the lessons I have learned or been reminded of over these weeks.

1.  You can survive a week without a shower...but those around you might not. (The one who went a week without a shower will remain nameless to protect the stinky.)
2. As a mom you have to do things that make you want to throw up and tear your heart out, but you do them because they are the best thing for your children in the long run! And it makes you think about God and how He sees some of the things I do/don't do!
3. I am stronger than I think I am in some areas, but not as strong as those around me think I am in others.
4. A family of 10 is really expensive to feed without a kitchen.
5. You can cook with only one small knife, one sauce pan and one skillet..even for 10 people!
6. You can't survive tough times without a village. There were people who picked up kids when I couldn't make it to the school. There were people who took or picked up from practices when I just couldn't get there. And most importantly in the days when I could not even form a prayer to lift to heaven, there were warriors holding up my arms and praying for me! I never doubted God, I never felt mad at God, but from shear emotional and physical and spiritual exhaustion, I just couldn't pray. But they did. And through their prayers, I saw God move mountains and make provisions that left me in awe of my good, good, Father!
7. Free will stinks!
8. You CAN survive a move, remodel, emergency appendectomy hospital stay for one kid, a week long hospital stay for one kid all while living in two different houses with no family close enough to help. It's not pretty, but you can do it. 
9. A hug from a friend at just the right time will release a sea of tears and make you do the ugly cry right there in front of them! 
10. When you get bogged down in the process and forget all that God just brought you through (I HATE it when I act like an Israelite!), God will send a friend going through the exact same process he just took you through so that as you share all your faith and stories of miracles with your friend, you are encouraged in your own walk! 
11. Self care is vital! Stress will do bad/weird things to you...like make you itch all over!!! And without self care, it will eventually take you down.
12. Self care has to involve all three parts of your being: Spirit, body and soul!
13.  Dogs who run through the woods do get fleas. And fleas are very hard to get rid of. And just mentioning fleas makes me itch.
14. When one of your kids' counselors dismisses them to ask you how you are and you fall apart, it might be time to get your own counselor. 
15. You can hear God in the sound of the falling leaves and the chirping of the frogs and no matter what is going on in your life, in that moment there is peace.
16. You can't take junk into the promised land. You have to leave it behind...and that can mean war with the "giants".
17. Not all people keep their word. I hope the new owners of our old house enjoy my bedspring chandelier... :(
18. God makes provision for the things in your future that you don't yet know you need. Like an employee that it took three years to find, but was right on time for what we just went through. Without her, the agency would have crumbled over the last three months. God knew that and had her in place right when she needed to be. Satan better watch out! Monday morning we are both back in the saddle and ready to kick him in the teeth to redeem a generation of waiting kiddos in Texas! 
19. It took Caleb 40 years to see his promised land from the time he stood in faith and said that they could take down the enemy that the other spies said would never be defeated! FORTY YEARS! I guess I shouldn't be whining about 83 days! #perspective
20. Obedience to God does not always end in nice happy endings. Really, the Bible doesn't teach that. But somewhere in American Christianity that has become an expectation. But what obedience does is allow you to see God work in your life and teach you knew facets of His character as you experience them instead of just reading about them in the lives of other people! 
21. God's provision is limitless. Financially, emotionally, physically...there is so much that I can look at over this process and KNOW that while it has been the most trying thing I have done, God never left us, but provide again and again to give encouragement and the ability to keep walking in the direction He told us to go! 
22. Finally, I have learned that I want to always choose obedience over safety. I can't say that in the really hard days! But on a day like today where I have had rest and am sitting at my mom's house where it is quiet with my coffee in my Christmas mug, I can say that the lessons learned and the ability to see new facets of God's character are worth the struggles! And just like Him, he reminded me this weekend two different times that despite what we have been through, if I will cling to Him, He will bring me through! I had seriously felt like I had lost all my joy. I wasn't sure I would get it back. The last 83 days have taken everything I have on all levels. The enemy has lied and tried daily to steal, kill and destroy all the promises God has given about the move. While I have known I made it through (really, what choice did I have), I felt like I would never be the same! But this weekend I had a stranger tell she loved how positive and happy I am. Then a friend I ran into that I had not seen in probably 10 years said, "You look exactly the same! You still have your sparkle in your eye!" Neither one of these people knew I feared that my sparkle and my joy were gone forever, but God knew! And he used the words of these two to encourage me and silence the lies of the enemy! Oh how I love Him! 

So that's it in a nutshell! There really is so much more! But I have to get my suitcases packed to head home! You know I have made a comitment to be transparent on here. So in keeping with that commitment, I will share that as I woke up this morning, anxiety and the overhelming fear of returning home stated to take over. I am one of those that becomes paralyzed when I am overwhelmed. It is a weapon the enemy has used all of my life! But I refuse to let him win today. So if I come to mind, I would love your prayers for those feelings to bow a knee and alow me to hit the floor running when I get home! Love on my kids and then unpack a few boxes! Thank you all for taking this journey with me! It has been amazing to hear your stories and know that sharing some of mine has encouraged you in yours as you have in mine!