Motherhood and the Blue Lines

I sat in a Target bathroom stall waiting to see if one blue line or two blue lines would appear on the pregnancy test I had just taken. I sat there, nine years ago, wondering how having children would change my life. I had no idea just how everything would hinge on that 30 second period.

Some days I just want to go to the bathroom alone. Then there are other days where I cannot imagine putting my make-up on in the morning without my brown eyed set of blue lines wrapped around my leg. Tonight I sat on the couch snuggling with my two two blue lines thinking about everything I have sacrificed for them and wondering if it was enough.

The reality is that motherhood is a constant state of never enough. There is never enough time, there is never enough toilet paper, there is never enough patience, there is never enough groceries to make dinner, and there are never enough hours in the night to wake up feeling rested. Sometimes I wonder as I juggle school, work and being a mommy if I am doing a disservice to everyone around me. When I am at work I wish I was at home, while at home I wish I had more homework done so that I can actually BE THERE with my kids. When I hear "I don't know" for the 800th time I wish I was at work and the whole cycle begins again.

So many mommies want to be SuperWoman, WonderWoman and everything in between. Why are we unable to be everything that we expect ourselves to be?

God called me to care for my blue lines and teach them His ways. That so far has involved some very painful choices that tore my life apart and theirs. I did not protect them from that which I did not know I needed to protect them from. Yesterday, my oldest set of blue lines asked me why I did not have her bio-dad fingerprinted? She said if I had, that I would have known that he was bad BEFORE she was born. How does a mom answer that?

For now, I will just keep doing what I know is right. I will teach my blue lines to be Responsible, Reliable and Respectful. I will teach them the value of hard work at a job and at school. And, I fingerprinted their new dad.

The mountain of responsibility that is expected of me is seemingly insurmountable, but I will just keep climbing that mountain step by step. And in the end I pray my two two blue lines will accept that I am not SuperWoman or WonderWoman . . . I am just Mom.