this helmet mom

i am done. tonight and every night, day, and moment after i refuse, resign, and remove this iron helmet fasten so tightly to my head. this helmet i have worshiped and invited onto my body. this helmet covers my ears. it seems to protect me. it seems to conform me. it keeps me from confronting me and my creator. this helmet locks me in place and steals my freedom. i hate and love the way it fits me and for the fleeting moments it whispers to me that i am safe. the helmet carries with it generations of pain and a society that is so muttled in sin that it licks its own bloody wounds to find pleasure. i put this helmet on 10 months, 17 days, 7 hours, and 42 minutes ago. at the moment of his birth i became- this helmet mom, with all of its heavy burdens, and black chocking guilt, with all the anxiety and the fear of lack of anxiety, with the voices of a million other moms screaming -"this way,that way, my way, wrong way" with the cries of my mothers abandonment, and her mothers abandonment. With all of it and them, this helmet digs into my skull, it pulls clamps down around my ears and over my eyes, the helmet has chains that lock around my mouth and tighten around my throat- i can not breathe. and after all this i realize that i can't see my son. he is there, but so far away. there are these walls and layers between us. i can't smell the warmth of my sons skin, feel his sticky hands on my face, i can't hear his constant glorious babble, i can't kiss his soft forehead. i have forsaken these precious treasures in exchange for this helmet mom- the helmet thickens every moment that i let it go unnoticed. tonight- again, with many more days to follow- i remove this helmet. i say no thank you. i stop. i don't want this helmet anymore. this helmet is filled with poison and it is corrupting my soul. i say no thank you to the voices that run rampant in my mind, no thank you to my 'shoulds' and 'oughts', no thank you to my mom, no thank you to the nameless eye that i seek to please, impress, or find applause, no thank you. yes please to freedom, yes please to my son.

a million things...

and a million more. always a million more things to do and a million things left undone. what kind of life is it living from one busy task to the next. i've heard, " that if you have little kids then, that is just the way life is- busy." God i don't want that life. i really don't. i don't want to live life frantically, by a 'to-do' list, or trying to cram 100 different events into one day. i refuse. to be honest- i really shouldn't be writing this blog post right now. i should be taking a shower while Manoah sleeps, i should be working on the two books i need to be editing, i need to pay bills, plan out tomorrow with Manoah, write a letter to Sam, pull out the dry clothes that have been in the dryer for 3 days now, pump, pick out my messy home,and most importantly pluck my eyebrows (am serious about this one). i think about the next week ahead of me and i everyday feels the same way- does it ever end? When my list gets longer and longer, i hope desperately that Manoah will be good, fall asleep when he is supposed to and not need me as much so that i can multi-task. in a sense i wish him away. how insane is that- i wish my son away so i can accomplish something to which i have placed greater significance on. that is insane. While i was working tonight i received an email from an old friend (bless you). something about her email touched me so much. to sum it up- she basically said i wasn't alone in my struggle. I honestly feel like everyone else has their life all put together in these amazing and beautiful packages- and me, i am a mess 99% of the time. I really never know how to love Manoah well, i am a terrible cook, my home is never clean, and to top it off i really believe that i am forgetting how to have normal conversations that don't involve babies, poop, or sleeping. Maybe it was just that fact that someone out there struggles too that brought tears to my eyes. Someone to confirm that being a mom, wife, and woman isn't an easy thing to reconcile. i don't want to live my life from task to task. i really don't. i want to live in the freedom of the Spirit within me and not controlled by the stress and anxiety of the clock screaming at me " hurry-you don't have time!" i don't ever want to wish away my son just so i can finish a load of laundry. maybe it sounds silly- but i really want to learn how to play with Manoah- to get down and dirty- and simply play. i want to be with him. to really just 'be' (in every sense of the word). all the other one million things are just not as important.

thin

sam is gone. he left saturday for a cabin in Washington to find jesus. i am alone. it is a strange thing being alone after not being alone after two years of marriage. i long to be alone, but once Manoah is asleep and i am alone with my cup of tea i realize something- i am not sure who i have become. i am not sure if i like myself that much. i mean- everything i've wanted and aspired to be/become, i am not she. i feel thin. my words come a thin place. when i speak my words don't feel thick, they feel frail and tired and insecure. i am consumed with guilt most days. i am living out of a place that needs to please and impress others and i have forsaken my own soul. i act from a place of neediness and not centered-ness. i am afraid of hurting, offending, betraying, and not living up to the shadowed expectations of others. i am living out of a shell of shallowness. i am sorry. sorry. i am not living faithfully to who i believe i am. i am thin and i don't like who i have become. i am sorry to my husband for not living out a life of centered-ness, but self-centered-ness. i am sorry to my son... i fail him greatly to not be who i am created to be. i am sorry to myself, that i have allowed myself to let my soul become so unattended to. i am sorry to jesus. my soul longs for you, and yet i have found satisfaction from a cluttered mind and divided heart. i feel thin and so afraid. i miss wholeness and my middle. and it all makes me very sad.