November 23, 2009 | Mama Smith

the healing process: parenting

One of the things Jesus helped us come to grips with this year was just how low we’d sunk into our victim mentality of parenting.

We had a whirlwind romance, getting engaged 5 months after we’d officially met and had spent less than 24 hours together face-to-face, with Matthew heralding from the great state of Colorado and me being on the opposite side of the country in Philadelphia. 5 months after that we were married, with a lot of “getting to know you” to do.

Little did we know, that process would be interrupted by the surprise news that I was pregnant, 11 months after our wedding. 49 months sooner than we had “planned”.

Thus began the Victim-Parenting.

As we inevitably rode a roller coaster of emotions those next 9 months, ultimately we became super excited to meet our little boy. As long as he fit into perfectly constructed life. Picking up on a theme yet?

“Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain.” Ps.127:1.

Brighton did not fit into our nice little box, as any baby rarely does. He didn’t sleep more than 3 hours at a time until he was 10 months old. Two days after we found out I was pregnant with Levi, to be exact. He didn’t wait to cry until Matthew and I had perfectly worked through an argument. He didn’t hold off demanding to be nursed until I had peed or gotten some sort of food in my stomach or a glass of water. He didn’t stop shrieking at the end of a very long day for both Matthew and I to help calm our nerves.

That first year was intense as we all three adjusted to what being a family meant and what total selflessness looked like. Unfortunately for Matthew and I, selflessness was a begrudging, steaming pot waiting to boil over at the slightest provocation.

Along came little L when B was 18 months old and things only ramped up. We constantly waivered between overwhelming love and adoration of our kids to frantic stressed out mode.

We chalked that up to just not being DNA-wired parents and being more easily stressed than most parents who can ride the wave of whining, tears and tantrums more smoothly than we did. Basically slotting our angry, demanding, rights-oriented hearts in the category of just not being as “into” parenting as others.

With how tough parenting felt to us both, we decided at the start of this year that we were done having kids. That a nice, manageable 2-kid family was a perfect solution to keeping things calm, stress-free, and easy at home.

Two months later, God flipped my life upside down. In his great mercy, he showed me what a heart of fear I had. How surviving life was my MO instead of enjoying life. As his love began moving mountains in my heart, things began to change in the Smith household.

Three months later, that proverbial shit, I spoke of, hit the fan. Our marriage was thrown into a blender and out came a bloody, fleshy knob of something. But what was so painful, and so terrifying, suddenly became the greatest mercy either of us had ever know.

God took something that was destroyed, from our standpoint, and let the Spirit loose. I used to think letting the Spirit have his way would mean a nice warm fuzzy feeling with some goosebumps. He’s much wilder than that. Matthew and I experienced a purging so profound, we literally found ourselves on our knees over and over. I don’t know why his mercy was so great in our lives as we hear of so much marital brokeness that takes years to recover from, or not at all. I guess that’s why it’s called mercy.

Within weeks, after the Spirit partnered with our counselor, we found ourselves to be deeply changed people. What years of counseling could do, the Spirit literally did in a months time. The past 6 years of our relationship was purged of it’s filth, bad patterns of relating, lies we had believed, and victimizing we had done. We found ourselves on the other side of WWIII Smith-style and it was BEAUTIFUL. Obviously, we still have our junk to deal with but moving out in repentance and faith with each other daily is much more of a habit and default than we’d ever hoped for.

Back to parenting. Our two sweet little boys. Let’s just pause for a moment and give a shout out to those two sweet little boys, who have always been and always will be SO adored by their perfect Father. Thank you Holy Spirit for loving on these little boys when Matthew and I have failed so miserably at it at times.

These precious little guys have already endured such crap from Matthew and I in their few years here, even if they weren’t fully aware of it. Our sarcasm to their whining, our eye-rolling annoyance to their demands, our angry tone to stop their fighting. No parent is perfect, but there never is any excuse to walk away from the ways I fail them passing it off as my right.

So what does new parenting look like in the Smith home? Are we perfect Ned-Flanders-style parents who go around while a scary-fake-smile slapped on our face? No, we still fail these boys an awful lot, but I’m learning to repent more. And repenting to a toddler more than once a day can get very old, very fast. Without much understanding of what’s going on, they awkwardly laugh and try to poke a finger up my nose or something.

Just a few mornings ago I was snipping at Levi for accidentally spilling his smoothie, when Brighton remarked, “Mom, I think you’re being grumpy” to which I barked, “I am NOT being grumpy!” and marched away to the sink…totally convicted…totally annoyed at being convicted by my 4 year old.

It took more energy than I had that morning to walk back over to the boys, kneel down and admit I was being grumpy and to apologize and ask Levi and Brighton to forgive me. Brighton quickly interjected, “So you’re happy now, Mom? Good, you’re HAPPY!” He’s our little pacifist. I had to say, “Honestly Brighton, I’m not really happy this morning. I’m kind of grumpy and I don’t know why, will you pray for me?” I know, I know, this all sounds CRAZY, right?!? So super-spiritual, it seems ridiculous!! I would have said the same thing one year ago. I would have discounted that blog as being too goody-two-shoes and give me a break, like ANYONE really does that.

Well, what I’m realizing people, is there is a very fine line between doing the right thing because you’re supposed to, and following a path of truth because you are a ravenous, lovesick being that has no hope of any real living apart from FEEDING on the One who is that truth.

I cannot half-assed survive my way through motherhood any more. I am an angry, irritable woman that will snap if one too many things are piled on my plate. I have GOT to have Someone doing it perfectly and leading me through the stumbles and stubbed-toes and skinned-knees I’ll get in the process.

And the mysterious thing is, the more I’m learning to repent about the tiny insignificant things, the more I see my anger dissipating. Like a tiny pin prick has been place in my balloon.

Through these months, the less and less I feel like a victim, beginning instead to feel like the wildly, adored daughter that I am. Who even in her crummiest, most pathetic state during the day does something powerful to God’s heart that makes him well up with such delight, that even a parent looking at their precious little sleeping child can only imagine a tiny droplet of the depths that ocean of adoration goes.

“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” Eph. 3:17-18

I want to know more of that love. I want to offer more of the overflow of that kind of love to my kids. As parenting, as I once knew it, begins to blossom into something I really enjoy, something I come alive to, my preconceived notions about what I could handle are dissipating. As my heart for orphans and the fatherless/motherless overwhelms me and Matthew at times, we want to open our home to as many as God wants to bring us. That may be one, that may be a dozen (ha). Life is less and less about what we can “handle” and more and more about getting more of and giving more of that wild love He offers us.