What am I thankful for?
…
A man asks his friend what he is most excited about as the friend awaits the birth of his first child.
“I’m excited to have my wife back!” he confesses.
The friend, with three kids of his own, laughs.
“Oh buddy…she’s never coming back.”
…
The last couple years of my life added a new title to my name: mommy. I’ve wrestled with this role and at times let it consume me, become me. I’ve felt inadequate, lonely, balding, detached… yet also so full of joy and life as I’ve experienced a new kind of nurturing love… one I can barely write about without my tired face becoming wet with tears.
Motherhood changed me. Motherhood changes all of us.
But to what extent is up to us—it can define us or become a new, deep piece of us.
And as I’ve fought for my identity to be more than solely *mom*, my husband has stood beside me fighting this battle with and for me.
He has waited weeks, months, to be seen again. He has patiently stood in the shadows of my attention and affection in anticipation for me to stumble out of the tired, newborn fog to not only ask him about his day, but to actually listen and care.
He has sent me away to write and to read. He has sacrificed his own hobbies and alone time to give me what I need to be a mom AND. A mom and all the other things I dream of and feel God calling me to.
He sees me as more than a mom, and even when it feels like his wife is gone – attention and life wrapped up in the little girls that have taken over our home and our hearts—he supports and loves and reminds me who – Whose— I am.
And this year, this is what I am so deeply, deeply grateful for.
There are so many things vying to define us, but finding our identity in Jesus is everything. It’s the game changer of all game changers. Find people—friends, spouses, mentors – who are going to see you as you truly are: sons and daughters of the Most High God!
“For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” Romans 8:14-15 ESV
