So often there is a disconnect between the mom I am, and the mom I want to be. Or make that the mom I think I ought to be.
A lot of times, I feel like Julia Roberts’ character Isabel in the movie Stepmom.
In the opening scene, Isabel is frantically trying to get her live-in boyfriend’s two children ready for school. She struggles with making them breakfast, getting them dressed, and even finding the youngest child, who has hidden himself in one of the kitchen cabinets.
She has a moment of panic when she realizes that she hasn’t washed the daughter’s shirt for Purple Shirt Day, and as she suggests that the girl just wear orange instead, she’s met with eye rolling and obvious disdain.
Then in the middle of all this chaos their real mom arrives and says, “I can take it from here, Isabel.”
Just like the stepmom, I live in the shadow of a better, more organized, more patient mom. The one I’ve created in my head.
She shows up whenever I’m feeling defeated, frustrated, or just having a hard time keeping up with the demands of two children and all the housework. She whispers to me that I’m a failure.
She looks at me with contempt, saying smugly “Why can’t you get it together?” She follows me around throughout the day, constantly criticizing everything I do and the way I do it.
The so-called “real mom” is who I measure myself against.
I’m guessing you do, too.
As moms, we usually know somewhere in our heads that we are what’s best for our children. That God gave them to us– not the lady next door, or the woman in church who seems to have it all together.
But getting our hearts to believe that can be another story. When we’re honest, many of us face a nagging fear that we just don’t measure up.
