Yes, there are many good days!

I won't lie about it. I have had a very hard week. I have had many pity parties with just myself and a few with my mom. I grew up #8 of 9 children. All brothers, no sisters. You might think...How sad? Not really. I actually do have sisters. The sisters I have never took my clothes, never said an unkind word, or never pushed me around. My sisters came into my life one at a time as each of my brothers got married. I watched my sisters-in-law as they raised their own children and they made Motherhood look so easy. Maybe, I wonder, some women are just better at this than others. As my mom left my house the other day she said to me, "Beth, I am not going to sympathize with you. Motherhood is hard and you just have to be strong." As I have cried many times, wondering what it is that I am doing each day, I am reminded of how many mothers there are that do so much and no one sees the sacrifices made each day. My mom told me of my Grandma Wolfe, my dad's mom, and how her mother died when she was 16. She raised her younger brother and sister. She married my Grandpa at a young age and had her own family of 6. Two of her six children died early in life. My uncle Jimmy died in Vietnam and my uncle Pledger died in a car accident. I guess, I have to realize that life is hard and that everyday isn't going to be fun and games. What I am doing right now has meaning and purpose. I know there will still be times when I feel like I could not handle another thing on my plate, but hopefully with the continued support we can give one another as women and mothers, and with the tender mercies of the Lord, we can all feel our loads get lighter. After having all of these thoughts rushing through my head, about Motherhood, I just received an email from my mother-in-law that I will attach because I really liked it and I feel like it was another tender mercy.
> Invisible Moms
> It all began to make sense, the blank stares, the lack of
> response, the way one of the kids will walk into the room while I'm on
> the phone and ask to be taken to the store. Inside I'm thinking,
> 'Can't you see I'm on the phone?'
> Obviously not; no one can see if I'm on the phone,
> or cooking, or sweeping the floor, or even standing on my head in the
> corner,
> because no one can see me at all. I'm invisible. The invisible Mom.
> Some days I am only a pair of hands, nothing more: Can you fix this ? Can
> you tie
> this? Can you open this??
>
> Some days I'm not a pair of hands; I'm not even a
> human being. I'm a clock to ask, 'What time is it?' I'm a satellite
> guide to answer, 'What number is the Disney Channel?' I'm a car to order,
> 'Right around 5:30, please.'
>
> I was certain that these were the hands that once held
> books and the eyes that studied history and the mind that graduated summa
> cum laude - but now they had disappeared into the peanut butter, never to
> be
> seen again. She's going, she's going, she's gone!?
>
> One night, a group of us were having dinner, celebrating
> the return of a friend from England . Janice had just gotten back from
> a fabulous trip, and she was going on and on about the hotel she stayed
> in. I
> was sitting there, looking around at the others all put together so well.
> It was hard not to compare and feel sorry for myself. I was feeling pretty
> pathetic, when Janice turned to me with a beautifully wrapped package,
> and said, 'I brought you this.' It was a book on the great cathedrals of
> Europe . I wasn't exactly sure why she'd given it to me until I read
> her inscription: 'To Charlotte , with admiration for the greatness of
> what you are building when no one sees.'
>
> In the days ahead I would read - no, devour - the book and I would
> discover what would become for me, four life-changing
> truths, after which I could pattern my work: No one can say who built the
> great cathedrals - we have no record of their names. These builders gave
> their
> whole lives for a work they would never see finished. They made great
> sacrifices and expected no credit. The passion of their building was
> fueled by
> their faith that the eyes of God saw everything.
>
> A legendary story in the book told of a rich man who came
> to visit the cathedral while it was being built, and he saw a workman
> carving a tiny bird on the inside of a beam. He was puzzled and asked the
> man, 'Why are you spending so much time carving that bird into a beam that
> will be covered by the roof, No one will ever see it. And the workman
> replied, 'Because God sees.'
>
> I closed the book, feeling the missing piece fall into
> place. It was almost as if I heard God whispering to me, 'I see you,
> Charlotte. I see the sacrifices you make every day, even when no one
> around
> you does. No act of kindness you've done, no sequin you've sewn on,
> no cupcake you've baked, is too small for me to notice and smile over. You
> are
> building a great cathedral, but you can't see right now what it will
> become.
>
> At times, my invisibility feels like an affliction. But
> it is not a disease that is erasing my life. It is the cure for the
> disease
> of my own self-centeredness. It is the antidote to my strong,
> stubborn pride.
>
> I keep the right perspective when I see myself as a great
> builder. As one of the people who show up at a job that they will never
> see finished, to work on something that their name will never be on. The
> writer of the book went so far as to say that no cathedrals could ever be
> built in our lifetime because there are so few people willing to sacrifice
> to
> that degree.
>
> When I really think about it, I don't want my son to
> tell the friend he's bringing home from college for Thanksgiving, 'My Mom
> gets up at 4 in the morning and bakes homemade pies, and then she hand
> bastes
> a turkey for three hours and presses all the linens for the table.'
> That would mean I'd built a shrine or a monument to myself. I just want
> him to
> want to come home. And then, if there is anything more to say to his
> friend,
> to add, 'You're gonna love it there.'
>
> As mothers, we are building great cathedrals. We cannot
> be seen if we're doing it right. And one day, it is very possible that
> the world will marvel, not only at what we have built, but at the beauty
> that has been added to the world by the sacrifices of invisible women.
>
> Great Job, MOM!