Ever since I had Ezri I have been struggling. I thought that my pain was because I needed to pour more into myself. I thought my pain was because I wasn’t giving myself enough time. I thought that I was stressed. I was having all these issues, of course, because I wasn’t taking time for myself. I was struggling. I would sit there, cry, and try to find a way to escape. Last week, I hit my breaking point. I was sitting there crying, “When is this going to end? When am I going to feel better?” I feel like the joys of motherhood are being robbed from me. Of course I am having a few good moments in the day, but the rest of the time I am stressed and crying and I can’t figure out what is wrong. I don’t want to be around my husband and kids. I am struggling ridiculously. But my new year’s resolution was to be happy as a mom and I am not doing that! I hit a point where I was just ready to run away from it all. I wanted to stop Instagram because I didn’t feel like I was measuring up there, even though everyone kept telling me “You’re enough, you’re enough.” How could I be enough when there are women out there who workout 5 times a week? How can I be enough when there are women who keep their house clean? How can I be enough when there are women who are happy with being a mom? How can I be enough when there are women successfully running their businesses? How in the world am I enough? I thought the answer was more self love, working on traumas from my childhood, so I dove into that. I had been pinning all the pins, doing all the journaling, and doing all the things that were supposed to make me feel better. All I felt was more and more numb. More and more in pain. More and more alone and afraid. Until I felt like I just couldn’t do it at all. I threw up my hands and said, “God give me a life line because I am done! I know I have been called to be a mom and that being a mom is a great calling. But I hate being a mom! I love my children and my husband but I hate being a mom.” He threw me a lifeline while I was on Pinterest. I found a book that I thought said “ You are enough”. I found this book and started reading it. The first line said “You are not enough”. I was like, I really need to close this book and stop, but for some reason I kept feeling like I needed to read on. This is where the apology comes in. I told you for so long that you are enough and that all you need is self care and self love. I led you down that rabbit hole. But what I learned from this book and what has helped me for at least this past week is the knowledge that I am not enough and I was never meant to be enough. The comfort in that is that I don’t have to live up to some invisible and ever changing standard that I put on myself. The thing is we are never meant to be enough and we were never designed to be enough; we were made to make mistakes and be beautifully messy, to not be complete without Jesus Christ our Savior. The knowledge I have come to is that it is the same in motherhood. I am not complete and I am not meant to be even remotely perfect at motherhood, at business, at fitness, at all the things I want to do. I am meant to give it my best and hand it over. Because He will consecrate my best effort. Falling in the pit hole of self love and looking into yourself for answers will only bring that numbness because you are looking for answers in an imperfect person who is constantly changing. I learned that is why we aren’t enough because we are constantly changing. The comfort of knowing that I am not enough gives me the strength to look to someone who is enough. To Christ and God who are never changing, whose love is always there for us and who sees the best in us and can consecrate every effort that we have. They can take the dregs of motherhood, the pains that come with feeling underappreciated and turn it into something beautiful. In fact, you know I was torn because I felt like still taking care of myself and taking breaks for what I needed, but I realized I was taking them for the wrong reason. I was trying to take them to find myself and look inside more. Whereas the break that I needed was to really replenish and rejuvenate so I can get back in there. Since then I have kind of had a different outlook on Motherhood. Motherhood is my calling. I am my own woman and motherhood is my calling. I am blessed to have the gift of creation. It is a gift from God that I have and He gave me the gift of creation knowing that I wasn’t enough, knowing that he could make up the percentage and the space where I fail constantly. He could make up the heartbreaks and the pains that come everyday. He took me and loved me enough to give me the highest calling. Not to make me feel like I lost myself but to make me feel like I found myself and to remind me that He is the God that sees me. He is the one who can make up for what I lack. No amount of self love and looking inside myself to find the next organization, the next meal prep, or cleaning hack would make me enough. But through Him I am able to be complete and whole. I am okay with not being enough. In fact I am happy I am not enough because it reminds me that I don’t have to be perfect. I get to make mistakes and have a beautifully messy life. I am sorry for ever telling you that you were enough so that you felt like you had to live up to a standard of being enough for yourself, for someone else, to be enough for your kids, because you don’t. The price was already paid by Christ and all we have to do is give our best and lean on him and he will consecrate our efforts. I love you all! Rely on Him and He will consecrate your efforts.
« Back to Blog