Dealing With Mom Guilt

Alright so I got to moms in the studio today and I will ask my wife and this question first, and it's if you had to think of one word just while that's hard to describe. Being a mom who, the word would be overwhelming to put the other one with it. I think it's a beautiful overwhelming welcome to family life today.

We want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most and Wilson and Dave Wilson and you can find us if we live today.com or on our family life at this family life today. It's interesting there was a survey in 2014 I want to ask you moms if this is true. That said, one in four working moms cry alone at least once a week I would say even mom that are staying at home are probably trying to times a week. I think both are superhard but yeah I think that could be true for pressure so we get some help today so excited about the listeners who we got we have with us today. Becky Beaudoin and she's written a book called enjoy every minute. That's not the best part is the go and other ridiculous things we say to mom. Welcome to family life today. Thank you.

I'm excited to be here. I know you can tell I'm a little excited and all you moms out there.

You're welcome to start talking about things that people have said to you that people have made you feel great about or guilty about working to kinda tackle these issues yet on your mom of three, yes three daughters see a whole early 2220 and 15 yeah, and not only authored a speaker, but you used to write for the Chicago daily Herald I did.

That's how I started writing I would say and that sort of led to the speaking engagements, and then this is my second book, so I've been writing and speaking primarily to moms for about 10 years. So what a great title you go okay. Then I did. I had I've had this on my heart for a long time. I knew this was the title I wanted most people think it's hilarious.

There is sometimes when people say what's the title and I tell them they don't really get the subtitle part and they just stick with the yeah you have to enjoy every minute, and it's scene also doesn't always exactly land, but most people think it's it's funny now that our kids are out of the house yet. Yes, I do think that yet we do need to enjoy every minute, and people always used to tell me that, though. Yeah when I was a young mom and what you think when people said that he was a young mom is a you as a young overwhelmed mom that would be the word I would pick your younger but right now I would say transforming because I have been in and being transformed as a mom as I raise my kids so and that kind of encompasses I think the wonderful and the difficult yeah all of that, but that's a good word. I just text my son and daughter-in-law last night. They have a two-year-old and they have a four month old and what I said to them was I know that you think you you shaping your child which we all do. Yeah, but you'll be amazed of how your child parenting will shape you yeah think is shaped me or change me more yeah and parenting. Yes, absolutely. They are overwhelmed yeah yeah that stage right now are just crazy. So half a million. Again, I'm just dead here just watching to moms have a conversation so I want to hear what you guys have the talk about but obviously the book is all these ridiculous sort of things that have been said and we can walk through many of them so even the first first one. Enjoy every minute because time goes so fast. What is the thought of like, really. I have to say the first time I was in the grocery store.

I had three boys with me that were 53 newborn NS mom came up to me and honestly this is very well-intentioned yeah she's been through it she's knows she's wise and she said oh, honey, you need to enjoy every minute because the days are can fly by Thierry and I said then why does every day for like, exactly, is that what you found what you mean by that. Enjoy every minute he put really it is because like I'm in the stage. Now I have to stop myself from saying it because when I see moms with their little kids especially little girl want to say you know my girls used to be that age and you know enjoy it because it goes so fast.

I can see that now. It's always moms who are further down the road and it's often in the grocery store is when they will tell you that. But when I was in the grocery store with my kids and moms would say that to me I would just think I know I know I'm supposed to be enjoying every minute, and I know that it's going faster. It's going to go fast but it does not feel like it's going fast and some moments are really awful, terrible, and the best thing about them is that they're momentary and you move through them, but you never hear moms of young children say this to other moms of young children ever yeah you know it's something that is you know it's it's when you're looking back on them so and I agree it's very well-intentioned.

A lot of these so there's 12 clichés or myths in the book well-intentioned. There's a nugget of truth and most of them but I had so much fun sort of picking them apart. A little bit and using some humor and then digging deeper to kinda find what do moms really need that really good yeah and so what else did you say in this chapter of enjoy every minute. So one of the things that the Scripture foundation kind of for this first chapter and then for really the whole book and sort of the view of motherhood that I want us to really take hold of his Psalm 84 and verses five through seven says blessed are those whose strength is in you whose hearts are set on pilgrimage and I love that yeah raise so I really am encouraging moms to view motherhood as a pilgrimage, and it's allele we talk about it being a journey but a pilgrimage is it's a long trip with the spiritual significance and I think that is a great definition for motherhood and for parent yeah with that comes an awareness that it's like it's lifelong.

We don't have to figure everything out today. We don't have to fix every problem right now.

Good just yeah and of itself because when you're in it you feel like this is the hardest.

The biggest thing you'll ever face. Yeah, you feel overwhelmed by the decision-making and what year it could be potty training. Yeah, you know that you're just in and to realize all this is just a phase it's just part of that journey part of the journey is a reminder about the one of the hardest parts of the journey because when we go see her grandkids now. I mean even our son that lives near us with just the two and the oldest is just to so little baby.

The house is a you know only a second elevator just toys of the night is cleaned out or where it should be protecting our daughter and not just you know when you just take a glance in there. So, everywhere, and is a good exactly the way should be toys everywhere, but that's what your brain feels like it feels like things everywhere else like somebody said raising kids is like a bowling alley and you just feel like that's the overwhelmed part right yeah then the verse continues as they pass through the valley of Baca. What's the valley of Baca. I talk about the valley of tears. The valley of weeping and that's what meets yeah but it says they make it a place of springs, the autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion, and this Psalm is so beautiful it's the sound that talks about dwelling in the presence of God. So the idea with this is just as we passed through even the valleys of motherhood and parenting.

They can become places of springs because God is with us so we hold the Longview and there's also then this expectation that were going to go through hills and valleys, so I think part of what makes motherhood hard is thinking is not supposed to be this hard. Yeah you now looking around and thinking everybody else seems like they're doing just fine and what's wrong with me, especially in social media like we have had it together yeah walk us back to your beginning of being a mom.

What did it look like for you. Did you feel overwhelmed. I felt overwhelmed in the sense that I just never felt like I was ever going to be caught up again with anything.

It's like this always is feeling of just never been able to catch up but I remember it just the expectation part of it I were I wanted to be a mom. I was so happy to finally become a mom. We lost our first baby so by the time we had Caitlin. I was so ready and just couldn't wait. And then the disappointment I think of seeing some of the things in myself. I wasn't a mom that I imagined I would be.

I never thought I would be perfect, but I certainly didn't think I would be angry as you haven't had a nice thought, who I'll yeah I become.

I never think I ever really yelled and then I could see myself. I remember going to church and I was yelling to the kids in the minivan and Dave, of course, the pastor already there so I see myself in the review mirror yelling and I thought what is to me yeah and then I had this thought of my kids have done this to me and then it goes deeper and take no you are really messed up. Yeah. And so then you feel the sense of shame and guilt even getting most moms come to that point of feeling like what's happened. I'll yeah and I think that some of these like even with and you know I should be enjoying every minute. There's this internal dialogue that we all have, but some of those well-intentioned things people say or that we think turns into really negative self talk like some of the things that you just said I am really messed up. What is wrong with me I shouldn't be this way. I'm the pastor's wife is struggling. I'm a Christian should be getting angry like this, you know, yeah, and then we can talk about mom guilt to because that is just I knew I wanted to talk about that in the book. It's something that most moms I think would say they kinda deal with on a daily basis. I don't know what it's like for dad is the ideal dance is going to say is mom guilt different than did you explain what mom guilt is and I'll tell you if it's the same guy had Becky, first of all, I knew I wanted to hear from other moms on this. I put it out on social media and that while asked moms to kinda chime in and say what kinds of things you feel guilty about. As a mom and what is that sound like in your head and I thought I would get a lot of comments and there'd be this really engaging online conversation and what I found is that none of the moms wanted to talk about it publicly.

They were just saying things like, what, how much time do you have her only every day of my life. You know, but I invited them to private message me and I my inbox was flooded with very raw, honest, I put a lot of them in the book boy to go to a private message. You would then you put no permission of their names are put in there early and yes, those sounded like so by the way just yet.

That fact shows you the feel so bad they feel shame is not hundreds and thousands of other moms feel the same thing.

They really didn't want to say it publicly. They had to go private because they think they're the only one you those moms messaging me might've thought. I'm sure I'm the only one sending her an email. You know, I'm sure about this. So what I found is moms feel guilty over almost everything a lot of things that are outside of their control so young mom pair are moms of young children were saying. I feel guilty that they don't sleep well my baby is not sleeping through the night. They don't eat well, you know they get a little are they get sick. I remember feeling so bad that I let my daughter get an ear infection. That's how I took it on myself that I had somehow allowed this and then moms feel like you hold your hand so your daughter get an infection like in my head. Now I know that that's I'll just say it's irrational, it's not true but in the moment you think you have more control than what you do so and things like that happen. It's just the sense of it must be my fault, then your kids get a little older and maybe they're not behaving well or they start to struggle. Maybe they struggle socially or in school than they even get a little bit older than that and you start to see thing you just feel guilty about everything, and I even had several mom said I feel guilty that I can't provide a sibling for my only child. Well, that's certainly something that were not in control over you know and then I had moms who are in the empty nest season of life who still were feeling guilty about so many things as their kids on rent turns into regret. Yeah, or if they see their kids maybe taking a wrong path. They put it all on themselves.

I guess what'd I do, my friends kids are super successful in my kid is still living at home and it be me. Yes, comparing your kids to other people's kids. So then I also saw there was a progression from what I would call guilt into shame explain. So the guilt that I would hear sounded like you know I yelled at my child. I shouldn't of done that I lost my temper. I hurt my child I need to apologize. Shame sounded like. I'm a horrible mother. My kids deserve better than to have a mom like me, they'd be better off with someone else.

That's a really dangerous level of shame so one of the things that I I got from that was I think there is a difference and I think it's important to identify. Are we feeling true guilt, or are we feeling shame.

And so the way that I would break this down is true guilt. Some people would call it conviction or godly sorrow.

You know in Scripture. And I'm going off of second Corinthians 710 that says godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. So I think true guilt is something we want to feel when I do something wrong when I lose my temper and yell at my child I want to feel guilt. I want to feel like I didn't.

We want kids to feel guilty when they do something wrong. We want to know that we've done something wrong. We want to repent.

Ask for forgiveness from God, the person who we hurt and do the repair work that needs to be done and I can be a conviction of God's spirit.

Yeah, and it can be a healthy thing and then we automatically I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that. Yeah.

And then that's it. Yeah we give it to God.

We repent we turn the other way yeah but the shame part is I'm a mess though. Exactly. Guilt is about what I did and I think the shame is more about who I am, yeah, did you ever feel that he think of a time that you felt that all yeah I felt like growing up in my home anger was out of control and someone actually said to me you you interned in the school of anger. I never had thought of it that way but that was as much as I didn't want to become an angry mother. When that started coming out and I began to really see that underneath my anger was fear. It was often times I'm afraid I'm not in control. I'm afraid my child is getting off track, losing their way, which that alone yeah is really insightful because we've all heard anger is a second emotion yeah so you track back and now you realize all my first emotion was fear. Yeah it's been so helpful to be able to then take my fear to God and beyond what am I really afraid of, and so often it's something I don't even have control over its itchy when you talk about the second motion again again said you go right back to fear.

Most of us, like I never did. I was like DL linen until I understood it was connected.

The Simpson I remember as I was studying this in learning this goes I had some anger there was inappropriate for me not hitting or you know just a yelling thing and so I started a little bit another's first emotion we skip over, especially as a parent is frustration. I remember trying to fix my dryer in the slab of our basement you would have finished basement.

I'm laying in this dryer and again people know me know why I'm doing this because I'm not your pay anybody to do this to do it the cheap way in. My son CJ comes down.

What is a six all. Not even 54 was to help daddy reaches in that I'm okay.

Just take this little you know screw it head and cruising it and he couldn't do it because it it was Yolanda Becker and it kept falling off the thing. At first I was so general was like oh, and I remember thinking is so cool dad and son.

But as he kept missing the head of the screw. I'm excited to just put her on CJ seeks to annexing a new unsorted yellow and he literally just feels her body crawl.

He's headed upstairs and there are Himalayan in the lint and a member here is low footsteps go upstairs and like a Lincoln. He can remember dad is an angry man remembers again. I've got to get a handle where the singers come from.

It was everything you're talking about is just like enjoy every minute. All one. It's crazy in your you know it's chaos you're frustrated him. If you drive fix the dryer with a four-year-old. It's got magma go all right yeah you should expect frustration and yet that's where we live is moms and dads and yeah and I were just to get the anger part and we never connected to like you said fear. Maybe what you're doing your kids or other Internet or frustration or even emotional hurt is another one yeah that's insightful that you were able to hold that out as a mom, I'm afraid. Yeah. So take us back to that then you realize you are feeling afraid is a young mom that was displaying itself in anger. Then what happened, how did you figure the rest out. It's just been years and years of test I feel like I'm sort of tripping up the stairs, you know, it's like I'm it's not like oh I discovered this and then I was able to change it from me the grace of God is so transformative, so what that means is that even in the middle of a moment that is going very badly because I am getting angry I'm I'm expressing my anger in a way that's hurtful the more sensitive I become to the work of the Holy Spirit and also other moms that I'm friends with and I know their stories and I know how they have been wounded. Sometimes that pops into my mind and kinda gives me insight so to be able to just in the moment or shortly after go back and own it and ask for forgiveness and I tell the story in the book of the first time I remember getting angry with my oldest daughter Kate. She was six months old and she got in this ear infection and I didn't want to give her an antibiotic because mom this one person had told me that would mess up her digestive cells and then I had to give her younger and she doesn't like yogurt and so I remember giving squirting the medicine in her mouth and she spit it all out and I lost it, not on her with her I walked into the kitchen but was an apartment all open and I grabbed the frying pan that still had our scrambled eggs and I threw it in the sink. I slam the doors and then I caught her out of the corner of my eye, and she was just like stunned. She was just looking at me and I remember thinking I totally lost it, but she's so young shall never remember and I'll never do it again and that was how I lived my early years just thinking I think I could really pull this off and be almost perfect. If I just keep trying and maybe they won't remember and when I prayed that all yeah we please Jesus, let them forget all of that. Yeah yeah so then fast forward, you know, 15, 16 years now she's a teenager were fighting a lot to you now butting heads and I remember one day in her room and it was fear underneath.

I saw something that she was looking at. It was actually a story that her teacher had asked her to read for school and I just walked in and saw on the iPad some words and I just flipped out. You know you reading she's like it's for school and I'm like, well, then I'm really even more upset. You know, and walked out of her room. I slammed the door.

I like to slam doors anymore as we redid our kitchen and I we have soft close doors.

So I really try not to slam doors but I slammed her door in this picture frame fell off the wall and it's a cherished frame of pictures of her and her sister and I open the door said, I'm so sorry didn't break we hung a backup.

I said, I'm so sorry.

I'll never do it again and then a couple months later we had an even bigger fight.

I left her room.

I slammed the door as soon as the door left my fingers.

I had that you regret. I just cringed the door slammed. I heard the picture frame file again and my daughter yelled you broke my frame.

I just thought 15 years of like I am trying but I keep doing the same thing.

That was a defining moment really just in the sense of I have got to really look at this what's underneath my anger, because I'm really hurting the people that I love the most and a couple days later she came to me and said will you help me fix my frame.

So we sat at the dining table and we put some wood filler in the crack of the frame. We put some stain over it. Go back and share the conversation that you had with your daughter about that about your anger.

He now did you talk to her about it. I came back I said I was sorry.

You know I said I was wrong. The problem was that I had done it a couple months ago and said I wouldn't do it again so she was angry and she was so hurt, you know, and there was this like you can say you're sorry but if you can keep doing it and I think that's what can be so frustrating as a parent it's not like we just messed up once and then are able to fix it and not do it again. We I think so many of us feel like I keep just doing the same thing over and over again.

So for me the grace came when we came to the table and we sat together and we were repairing the frame and I just thought this is what God is doing in our relationship. That's what his grace looks like we are not going to get it right every time, and we are not even going to always be able to change completely. As quickly as we would like to, but we keep doing the work we keep coming back to the table.

We keep saying were sorry we keep showing up we get help to understand what's going on so I was doing all of that work, you know, and trying to understand and there has been growth.

I still get angry but I don't think that I do the same things that I did before and the best thing I can do is when I know that I have messed up again is come back and humbly own it and say I'm sorry and ask God for forgiveness and then do the repair work in a relationship. I love that your daughter came to you, it says that she trust you even that she would ask you to fix the frame with her and it shows that you have a good relationship with her that that part even in parenting of going deep into the shame I have felt that where I have turned it from. I did something wrong to. I am so messed up. I am so broken and we know that there is an enemy of our soul who loves he's called the accuser the accuser of the brethren. Sometimes I get discouraged.

How often I went there and I believed him and I would agree like I know I am broken. I am messed up. I am going to mess up my kids and I think our father was like he is the gospel I come to give you hope and grace because of the cross.

I've set you free from the lies and you don't have to go down the same path will I continue to mess up probably and hopefully I'm getting better because I'm seeking Jesus and kind of I'm asking him also like Lord what's underneath all of that and I do love Psalm 139 I'll never forget friend that super confident is a young mom where I was thinking my kids would probably be better off if so-and-so is raising them and she remember she said no I don't think that I think that God put my kids under my roof because he's already quit me she for me.

Psalm 139 for you formed my inward parts, you knitted me together in my mother's womb, and she said when God for me.

She knew the children that that I would be raising and summer adopted summer biological and she said to confident everything you need. Even the mess start up parts God can use for his glory and I was like I need to have that handy to have Lord you knew me before I was created and you know my weaknesses. You know my strengths and you know that you've already given me inside what I'm mean to raise kids under your roof. All of those whose parents know our flaws or feelings.

It's easy for moms to pull back and think I'm ruining my kids and yet God's grace is sufficient in our weaknesses. We just need to keep crying out to God, David and Wilson up in talking to Becky Beaudoin, the author of a book called enjoy every minute and other ridiculous things we say to moms. We are making the book available this week to family life today listeners. Those of you can help support this ministry with the donation.

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W ever had somebody say to you listen. God is not can give you more than you can handle when you think I can handle this. What what I'm going through. I can't handle tomorrow. David and Wilson will continue their conversation with Becky Beaudoin and Bill talk about how we should think rightly about the challenges that come our way and whether it's more than we can handle or not you can tune in for that on behalf of our host Steven M Wilson I am Bob Lapine.

We will see you back tomorrow for another additional family life today. Family life today is a production of family life accrued ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most