My dad finished his radiation and went for numerous tests, including a PET scan, which detected something in his thigh now. The tumor on his vertebrae had shrunk, however, it seems to still be causing a great deal of pain. So now we wait for his MRI appointment, at which time they will determine if more radiation and perhaps chemo will be necessary.
Jay's mom's surgery went really well. They removed the couple of spots as well as her emphysema from the lungs and she recovered nicely. Turns out it was cancer, but stage 1 lung cancer, so no further treatment was necessary. And she is now in her fourth month as a non-smoker! Now if that's not a PTL, I don't know what is!
I am T minus 8 weeks or so until this baby arrives; which will make Jay and I parents of four, yes FOUR, beautiful girls. And, NO, we will NOT be trying for a boy! Four girls is enough!
Now, as I reach the end of this pregnancy, I'm beginning to feel the stress of spreading myself between four kids - three of which will be three & under. Maybe stress is too light of a word. Panic is more like it. Isabella is completely a Mommy's girl; very busy, demanding, and full of attitude. No one can do anything for her except for me, which tends to be quite frustrating at times! Sophia is completely the opposite. Daddy's girl all the way. She's much less demanding, but she's only 11 months, so maybe that will come yet - I hope not! And Danica is 13 years old and a typical teenager trying to find her way in the world, which brings me to why I felt compelled to write this post.
I'm having a hard time balancing everything and making time for every one. It used to be so easy when I was the parent of one child only for ten years. This is when I believe I began thinking it was okay to spoil her; not even realizing that sometimes in our quest to make sure our kids have what they "need" we also become prideful. I'm sure every parent worries that their child won't make friends in school, or will be the one picked last for a team in gym class. I certainly did. I think it's partially because I was that kid. I was always picked last and picked on. In the beginning anyway, until I found my voice and the wrong group of friends.
So, in this quest to be the "cool" mom, I think I forgot a few key components. The biggest is be their friend SECOND. Parent FIRST. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I completely dropped the ball. It used to be, "If you see someone being picked on, make sure you are nice to them and extend a friendship to them."
Looking back, I now realize that no 11 year old needs a laptop. They don't need the $120 brand name shoes. Nor does turning 12 or 13 entitle them to have posters all over their walls, a big screen TV, a blu-ray player, a Wii, and a closet so full of clothes that some she has already grown out of and they still have tags on them. Nor does it mean that they need to have their Ipod touch on them everywhere they go. These are dangerous tools. What are we teaching our kids?
I watched the Joyce Meyer broadcast this morning titled Humble Yourself Under the Mighty Hand of God. It spoke of being prideful. It made sense when I was watching it, but it's always easy to watch the half hour, then go about the day and not think of it again, really.
Tonight something told me to do one of our "random checks" on the Ipod. I wasn't impressed. It really made me realize how prideful we can be as parents. No parent wants to admit that they struggle with parenting their kids; it's far easier to look at other families and pass judgment on how their kids behave, dress, talk, etc. This all came into perspective for me today. It brought me back to the day when I received a letter in the mail from the VBS that Danica had attended the summer she was six or seven. It said how proud I must be that she asked Jesus into her heart. When I read this, I was shocked. Danica didn't tell me this; how could she not tell me?! So I asked her why she didn't share that news with me and she looked at me and said, "Mom, I did tell you." Wow. Talk about a punch right in the gut. This was such a huge deal in my little girl's life and I didn't even acknowledge it. That's actually what forced me to go back to church after 18 years.
So here I am, facing some challenges of being a mom to a teenager. I would love to blame it solely on society; there's garbage everywhere in the media! Or maybe I can blame it on being stretched too thin by life in general. But in the end, I have to take a good hard look at myself and ask God to reveal the areas where I have failed. This was one. So, again, in the quest to be a "cool" mom, I failed at being the mom she needs. The one that will just sit and paint her nails and talk. The one that will do devotions with her. The one that will still tuck her in and pray with her. My life is so full of crazy busyness that I let my first precious blessing almost fall through the cracks. Please don't misinterpret this to think she did something terrible; she didn't, I assure you. I just realized today that I need to equip her with love, strength, self-worth, confidence, respect, and all the other necessary tools to not allow herself to grow up too fast. It's impossible to do this if I have pride in me. I need to be humble. I don't need her to have a billion friends, to be the "cool" kid. I don't need her to like the decisions that we as her parents make for her. She wants to wear make-up, which I have let her. Does she need it? Nope. Gone are the posters, the TV, blu-ray player, laptop, Wii, Ipod. She doesn't need those things. They just get in the way of her relationship with God. And I have realized that they are just distractions for her and I to not have to communicate effectively.
Will I ever let her have these things back? Probably. When she earns them. But until then, I am going to look forward to each new day that I have with my precious D. Without the distractions of unnecessary stuff. I will step up with confidence in myself as a Mom and as a Woman of Christ because I know that is what God has intended me to be.
Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it. Proverbs 22:6
