Your ‘Parenting Style’ Is Not Your Identity, and It’s Ok If MY Kids Eat Lunchables

I KNEW deep down, as a woman who left her career to stay home with her baby, whom had never had any semblance of parenting experience whatsoever. I knew what was wrong with her.

Breastfeeding. She was not getting enough milk, and the milk she was receiving was making her puke. As a now eight year old, she still does not do well with dairy, which I had to cut out of my diet while trying to nurse her.

But when well-meaning advice and internet and books and ladies in the stores will tell you, “breast is best”, you stick with it, even when your gut tells you NO, because that’s the motherhood identity that you chose at checkout, right?

The Identity of Motherhood

You chose this identity of breastfeeding, cloth diapering, baby wearing, organic eating, oil diffusing, homeschooling, cooking from scratch, or maybe career-pursuing, private school searching, daycare seeking, balancing it all, and while all of those are beautiful choices (really, they are), they do not line up with the heart of who you are on the inside, the hidden heart that no one else sees, but you go along with it anyway, because you sold your soul to the identity that you presented to the world.


Christie Elkins
Christie Elkins
Christie Elkins is a mother of 3, cop's wife and Junior Mint lover. She writes at lettersfromthenest.com and is a columnist for her hometown newspaper, The LaFollette Press. Christie and her family live on a farm in the Appalachian mountains of East Tennessee, where sweet tea is served at every meal and hospitality is second nature.

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