Growing Into Motherhood

  • by Trish Berg
  • March 19, 2014
  • 362
                        
Struggling with loads of laundry, clutter in the kitchen and chaos in your life? Stress can easily steal our joy. Trish Berg reminds us to simplify the small stuff and find Joy in the Journey. Not too many years back, I sat in my minivan, parked in someone’s driveway and cried. I am not sure if I can even remember whose driveway it was, but I do remember why I cried. I had just dropped off my oldest daughter, Hannah (then four years old) at her very first kid only birthday party. She was growing up way too fast and I was left an abandoned mother, sitting in her car crying. Hannah is now eighteen years old and heading off to college in the fall, and I sometimes feel like that same old mom, sitting in her minivan in the driveway, crying her eyes out because Hannah has grown up and I am just not ready for her to leave. Just yesterday, or so it seems, we brought her home from the hospital with peach fuzz hair, big blue eyes and a wail that could wake the dead. Then I blinked and Hannah grew up. Hannah enjoys growing up, as she should. I miss my little girl. She loves doing things by herself and exploring the world. I want her to need me. She loves talking about college and who she will be when she is all grown up. I want to talk about who she used to be when she was my little girl. It seems to me that somewhere along the way, I was left behind. She kept on growing up, like a flower in spring soil, and I wanted to hold her back, keep her from blooming too bright and too big. When we become moms, we start putting roots down for our children. We tend to them, nourish them, prune them when needed. And we watch over them every season of every year as they continue to bloom and grow. But we eventually discover that they don’t need us as much as they used to, and we are left to watch as they begin to bloom on their own, without us. It’s spring once again, and the temperatures are warming, the sun is shining and the flowers are beginning to bloom in my yard. I know that all four of my children will keep growing up, keep blooming in their own ways, and I am proud of each one of them. Life keeps changing and I am not ready. I feel left behind, as Hannah gets ready for college, Sydney starts driving, Colin heads to high school and Riley becomes a tweenager. I do know that the times we share together are more precious with each passing moment because the days they are with me are limited, and the countdown for launching them has begun. 10-9-8…can you hear the clock ticking down? 7-6-5…why does time have to move so quickly? I can’t reverse time, or re-spin the world like Supermom, so I have no choice. I have to keep on walking forward and allow my children to grow up. There will be times when I need to step back and let my children bloom on their own, with their own colors, in their own way. I will need to stop pruning long enough to notice the beauty in their petals, the wonder in their eyes for the great big world out in front of them. Though I know I will shed a few tears over the coming years longing for what has been, I will find joy in the knowledge that we have rooted them in faith so that they can grow with confidence in God’s plan for their lives. I will smile because I am blessed to get to watch them grow into who they are meant to be. And maybe, I can grow into the mom I am meant to be.


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