A couple years ago, while volunteering in the Church babysit one Sunday, a little girl came up to me and asked “do you have any kids?” I told her “no, I don’t”. She replied with something along the lines of “well if you’re not a mom, what are you?”
I sat in silence in a cloud of mixed emotions, lacking a child-appropriate answer and eventually muttered that I was “just a woman”.
I was just a married twenty-something woman, with no kids.
I felt belittled, unseen by her and myself.
Kids will be kids and will say what they say, but I couldn’t help but wonder what that little girl had been taught about a girl’s (eventual)/woman’s worth being defined by motherhood.
Years later, through this my first pregnancy, I have been pondering my identity shift of becoming a mother, especially leading up to mothers day.
An important lesson I’ve been clutching close is that I will still be a child of God FIRST and foremost. That is who I am, a daughter of the King—an image bearer of Him—that is where my identity lies. A Mama [woman, wife, daughter, sister, aunt, friend, creative...] second.
Please know, ladies, our worth in womanhood is not defined by motherhood.
Our being chosen and loved is not defined by motherhood.
So happy Mom day to all the inspiring Mother’s around me, young and experienced! Your unlimited amount of patience and love for family is a glowing testament to the One who first loved us.
And to those longing, losing, lacking or simply “not right now-ing”, God loves you just the same—now and always. --- Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Proverbs 31:30 ESV
