Heart Talk: Mama You Are Doing Some Things Right

Do you sometimes feel like you are failing on every front as a parent? Are you overwhelmed by all the things you didn’t know about single motherhood?

Well, all I have to say is ME TOO.

I started writing Heart Talk articles because I believe there are so many aspects of single motherhood that are unspoken. So many feelings and dreams that are ignored as we juggle through our day.

For Single Moms Struggling with Aloneness

One of the things that I’ve noticed and struggle with in my own journey is the absence of a husband—a witness to my triumphs as a mom and also to my perceived failures. At the end of the day I sometimes just wish there was someone to say, it’s going well babe, you’re giving them what they need. To affirm how I comfort, discipline and feed them.

If you’re lucky—or blessed—and I hope you are, family and friends that try to love you and your kids an support you with words of encouragement. They remind you that you are a great mom, doing great work, even when it is really hard to see yourself. But it’s hard to replace the natural expectation that if you have kids you won’t be alone with your thoughts at the end of the day.

Altered Dreams Are Not Lost Dreams

As a little girl I always imagined that I would have kids with the man that I was in love with, the guy that I was going to marry. While it’s not to say that this won’t happen in the future if I get married, BUT I wrongly assumed that the father of any and all of my children would also be the person I chose to marry.

I never dreamed that at the end of each day I would find myself at my own dinner table, with my own kids alone. The reality of this is still sometimes shocking. I am often caught off guard by a longing for peace and wholeness for my family that comes from the deepest, quietest part of my heart.

It is Hard to Prepare for the Reality of Single Motherhood

When I entered single motherhood, a million tiny dreams that I’d once had for motherhood and my children were buried or permanently altered. I expected that would happen. I tried my best to prepare myself for it when I found out I was pregnant, but as we often find through our experiences, there is sometimes very little you can do to prepare for reality.

Love and Live Deeply With Your Kids Right Now

When you can’t prepare for what life because you don’t know what to expect, because your dreams have been challenged by you circumstances, you have one choice: you have to walk forward through it. My children are by far and wide the best thing that has ever happened to me. They continue to shape me into the woman that God made me to be. Their faces are full of hope. They have a million, tiny, beautiful dreams. They can be so naughty. They can be so funny. They sometimes utter the right words at the wrong time AND the right words at the RIGHT time.

What your children have always needed most since the day they were born is your love. If you love them with your whole heart, you are doing at least one thing right mama. Live with them and love them in the present even though it might not be the picture perfect, white picket fence version that you once imagined the future would hold.

Single Motherhood is Not Accidental

Single motherhood is an intentional choice and an intentional journey. The pregnancy might have been unplanned but that didn’t stop you from moving forward. You are a single mom for a reason. And my guess is that it is a very GOOD REASON.

Dream New Dreams for Yourself & Your kids

Single motherhood has taught me to create new dreams when old dreams—like the dream of bringing my children into the world with a husband—are  permanently altered. Does it mean that I don’t mourn the pieces of our life that feel broken? Absolutely not. There are broken pieces and missing things in our home that I desperately wish I could fix or solve or help.

Our life is not perfect, but I believe my journey through single motherhood is a part of a plan that has great intention for great good.

Not just in my own life but in the lives of my kids and the lives of the people we love and share our life with.  

Thank You for Reading & Welcome to Single Mom Spot

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