![]() It was tiring and frustrating, but we could protect them and when they didn’t meet our expectations or desires the issues were smaller. In the midst of this season (even at its best), we pray for more wisdom than ever and if we glance in the rearview mirror, we start to realize that life was simpler back there when they were little. When the teen years roll around, we hear the stories of others about the ups and downs of hormones, peers, and challenges in every direction. Each one stretches that child to nudge their interests, skills, and gifts to another level and with that our own expectations, dreams, and hopes sometimes hang on bated breath to see what happens. Maybe it’s music lessons, concerts, and recitals or maybe it is beginning sports where skills are taught and the “rules of the game” are learned. Peers and outside activities slowly get added to our daily family life. How will others see this one we have already poured so much of ourselves into? Will this child be as smart and able as we believe or hope they will be? ![]() Now there will be other standards for them to meet beyond our own dreams, desires, and demands. Whatever challenges the child may have or provide for us, we hold our breath when school begins. Along the way we discover there is much to learn about ourselves as well, no matter how well we thought we knew ourselves. And though it feels as though this “never enough sleep” phase will last forever, it passes and soon we are on to the milestones of crawling, first steps, and more.Įach season of parenting brings fresh challenges and fresh insights and we are on a continual journey of learning about this wondrous creation God planted inside us. We glory in each new thing and our dreams for this little one blossom and grow as we consider who they might become and be. In the midst of those early weeks of exhaustion, we are grateful for our own mothers, aunts, and friends who have walked this journey before us as they offer their stories, insight, and support. But we also feel more inadequacy than we might have guessed as we recognize the responsibility in our arms and how much we do not know about this new role. When the day arrives despite what we may have expected, we are overwhelmed with a love we could not have imagined. For others of us it was delayed, postponed, or upended by various reasons. For others it came at a season we would not have chosen. For some of us it is a dream we have had since we played with dolls as little girls. There are many ways we come to parenting.
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