The Most Beautiful Mess

The contradictions woven throughout motherhood are endless.  The days are filled with highs and lows; early mornings and late nights; moments of sweet silence and fits of screaming.  In the morning we pray for strength, patience, and understanding; and when night falls we lie on our pillows and cry tears of frustration in response to what we feel was a day lacking all of the above.   Motherhood is the most beautiful mess.

From the moment we realize we are to become mothers the weight of what we must teach and instill in our children becomes evident.  As mothers we will teach our children the alphabet, how to count to ten, and to recognize those pesky colors.  It is our job to teach them to use the toilet, say “please” and “thank you”, and grow up to be upstanding citizens who contribute in a positive way to the world.  It can all seem a little overwhelming at times.  But as each day passes we realize that while we are doing our very best to teach them, we as mothers may actually be learning the most.  We are learning patience and humility as we deal with tantrums in the grocery store.  We are learning selflessness and sacrifice as we wake up for the eighth time in one night to calm a restless child.  So while at times it seems that the teaching might never end, the lessons learned are oh, so great.

Never at another phase of life will our strengths and weaknesses be so magnified.  On a daily basis motherhood reminds us of our capabilities, as well as our inadequacies.  We find unknown courage as we confront the scraped knees and broken hearts of our sweet children, but yet in the same moment we feel entirely helpless that they were ever in such a situation to begin with.  Motherhood brings us those moments of ultimate joy, but can also lead to life’s deepest sorrows.  Our happiness soars as our children learn, accomplish, and overcome; but our hearts break when wrong decisions are made or babies lie helpless in hospital beds connected to tubes.

Motherhood is easy and it is hard.  It is full of small disappointments and large accomplishments.  We spend hours cleaning clothes just so that they can be dirtied again seconds later.  It is being able to focus on serious matters like saving for college in one minute, and letting the silliness of dance parties  or introducing your toddler to rolling down hills take over in the next. 

The greatest contradiction, however; is that of time.  We spend long days, and often time longer nights, wondering when one phase will end and the next one, an easier one, might begin.  Twenty-four hours can feel like twenty-four years, and the thought of doing it all again tomorrow can be overwhelming.  But then we sneak in to take one last peak at that sleeping child and we realize they have grown up in the blink of an eye.  Somehow that day that seemed so long actually passed by too quickly and we wish we could live it all over again and again.

I am so grateful for my little family.  I am so lucky, blessed, and happy to have them.  They make my life worth living and my mistakes worth fixing.  I often find myself overwhelmed with the beauty they bring to the world.  That idea of your heart swelling with pride and joy, I am fairly sure it is a real, physiological occurrence.  Because I most definitely feel mine doing just that every single day.