I was finally able to listen to Elder Ballard's address to young mothers. (I didn't hear it on Sunday because we were at that moment in the middle of a minor catastrophe--David had plowed Mary into the mud with a giant dump truck.) Elder Ballard wisely pointed out that "the joy of motherhood comes in moments." I imagine that line will be quoted again and again, with good reason. (Come on, you other moms, didn't you like that part of his talk too? About slowing down and enjoying the moment?)
Earlier this week, before I had a chance to listen to Elder Ballard's address, I stumbled upon something similar to his "the joy of motherhood comes in moments" observation. Tuesday I was early picking up David from school (it's actually an early intervention playgroup, but we call it "school"), so I was mindlessly flipping through a baby/parenting magazine in the lobby. A blurb about finding happiness in motherhood caught my eye. (It was one of those "5 Easy Steps" pieces. Aaah, if only any significant challenge in my life really could be solved in 5 easy steps...) The author suggested that we would be happier if we stop expecting to be happy all the time. It's unrealistic to expect to be happy all the time; we'll only end up disappointed and frustrated. We are better off to accept that there is simply a lot of drudgery and monotony involved with motherhood, and then we can look for those happy moments. The happy moments will shine more and mean more if we aren't caught up in thinking that all our motherhood moments should be joyful ones. I think I agree.
When motherhood is monotonous, frustrating, overwhelming, and exhausting, I tend to feel despair. I despair that my life is so miserable, that my children are so challenging. I despair that I am not happy, that I have somehow failed in this role that is supposed to bring me great eternal joy. I envision myself sinking into quicksand, suffocated by my disappointment. I simply can't believe that it will get better. But it always does. Always.
For example, Thursday was a terrible day. We hosted playgroup, and David spent the majority of the time running in circles, strangling kids, and throwing toys. After his nap, I thought we would get a fresh start with a fun outing to the park, but that ended abruptly when he began throwing sand in kids' faces. After dinner Greg took Mary to a church meeting, and I thought David and I could have some nice one-on-one time feeding the ducks or playing at the park. But he practically threw a tantrum about wanting to go to the Y instead. Good riddance, I wasn't going to force him to have fun with me. So I dropped him off in the childcare room at the YMCA and worked out. So much for some bonding time together. To top it off, bedtime was a struggle, and he wasn't asleep until after nine. I went to bed feeling despair that my happy, enthusiastic child had permanently transformed into something from my mommy-nightmares. The worst part was that I had really tried to make it a good day, and I was bitterly disappointed. I went to sleep feeling powerless, hopeless, and dreading the next day.
But, you know what, the next day was better. David and I spent the morning listening to "Drive My Car" (David is going to be a Beatles fan whether he likes it or not!) and cleaning up his toys. He picked up all his Legos by himself--he even searched all over the house for the random misplaced ones. He was so proud of himself when he was finished. And I was proud too! Later that morning we had some friends over to play. David and I talked about how you treat your friends, and he was quite well-behaved. Not perfect (there were a couple of time-outs), but I could see that he was really trying. Then he took a THREE hour nap--heaven! And that afternoon he astonished me with how patient and cooperative he was with his speech therapist. It was not a bad day. In fact, it was truly a good day. But I had been so hung-over with despair from the day before that it took a while to recognize that "Hey, my kid's not so bad after all. In fact, he's pretty darn cute, he's doing the very best he can, and I sure love him! I really can do this mom thing."
The bad moments are just that, moments. They pass. Things get better. They may get worse again soon. But there will be moments of joy, often unplanned and unexpected--like picking up Legos to a Beatles tune. So it is important for me to stop expecting motherhood to be easy and happy all the time, and, instead, follow Elder Ballard's counsel to slow down and treasure "the shining moments of joy and satisfaction." Because the joyful moments are just that too--moments.
