Say My Name, Say My Name...

When Lorien was a baby and started to talk, I was so excited!  I had been thrilled with coos, and smiles, and other more subtle forms of communication, but I was itching to hear her be able to verbalize what was in her sweet head.  And of course, I was just dying to hear her sweet little lips utter the all important "mama"!  Unfortunately for me, this took quite a while.  Her first word was 'boop" for book, followed shortly there after by 'bef' and 'bewwa' for our dogs, Macbeth and Bella, and then 'da-da' for daddy.  Once da-da showed up, I started getting particularly hopeful.  But she continued on to many, many more words before arriving at my name.

I'm not sure why this is, but during that time span, I noticed how much the older generation of mothers like to pick at the younger generation of mothers.  I'm not sure what that is motivated by...perhaps its generational?  Perhaps women really are that against each other in our fallen nature?  I don't know, and that's not the point of this post, but repeatedly being the recipient of the odd social norm that permits being picked on in public by other women you don't know, led me to learn something profound about myself and my relationship with Lorien.

You see, one day in the grocery store (these interactions almost always happened at the grocery store) a random middle aged woman started commenting on how verbal Lorien was for being such a young age.  I agreed with her, and then the woman said that she could bet I was already getting tired of hearing "mama, mama, mama" all the time.  I told her, as I had told many, many other inquiring women, that she didn't say mama yet.  Yes, she could say ball, man, book, doggie etc, but no mama.  The woman turned from Lorien and looked sharply at me, "Well, she must not care for you very much then, huh?"  That was by far the most directly any woman had antagonized me before, and I found myself answering out loud the questions I had been wondering about Lorien's 'mama silence' for a couple of months. "No, I don't think that's it at all.  I think, well, I think that I am so in synch with her needs, and anticipating them, that she just doesn't have any reason to say my name."  The woman had no idea what to say to that, and she walked away with a stunned and superior looking expression on her face.

I spent most of the rest of the afternoon contemplating and fleshing out what I had said to her.  I'm sure it sounded arrogant or presumptuous, but I said it to her in a very calm manner and I discovered it was true as I was saying it.  That child really didn't need to say my name. I think using the parent directed feeding method really succeeded in making me in tune with her, and for many many months I pretty much anticipated her needs before she even had the chance to request anything.  I realized that she didn't say any verbs whatsoever, only nouns.  I had been wondering why she would never use her sign language to say "more", and I finally realized it was because I always gave her more before she ever needed to ask.  She didn't start saying more until I told her that I wouldn't give her anymore unless she asked for things.

And the beautiful thing about this, to me, was that this anticipation of her needs came naturally and in a very healthy way for me.  I was not and am not an attachment parenting mom.  Both my children have done their fair share of crying it out when I know that it is for their best interest and long term good.  I love being their mama, and I love loving them and meeting their needs.  And I stand amazed at the mama instincts that I had no idea I have that have allowed me to predetermine and meet needs so well that my firstborn didn't even need to say my name.

This, however, is proving difficult with two children.  I read once, on a blog of a woman who is a mother of eight, about how hard it is to learn that you cannot always meet all of your children's needs all of the time.  Sometimes, you just can't.  There isn't enough mama to go around (especially with 8 kids!).  I am already finding this to be true, and it is so hard not to be weighed down with guilt when you are actively very busy meeting the basic physical needs of your 2 month old (i.e. feeding her) while the two year old is crying hysterically in her bedroom for some unknown reason, or you're busy making and supervising lunch and starting the nap time routine for the older one and the baby starts sobbing in her crib.  Sometimes, you just can't be two places at once, no matter how badly you long to be!

I have spent a number of hours frustrated and condemned by this in the past couple of weeks, and finally, in all my praying that the Lord would help each child to be content long enough for me to meet the needs of all of them, I finally had the revelation that what I should be praying for is the wisdom, grace, and new strategy to parent two children as best as I can to the glory of God, and not trying to parent as if I am just parenting one child anymore.  It is me who needs to grow, not necessarily either one of them who needs to change.  Brighton -- she is going to wake up 45 minutes into her nap and cry sometimes.  It's just life.  And Lorien -- she is going be occasionally jealous and rebellious as she adjusts to no longer being the center of attention and will sometimes get a boo boo that I can't give all my attention to because I am nursing her little sister.  And that is ok.

I get to learn to parent two children to the best of my ability, and learn to entrust my children to God's care when I cannot help.  Sometimes Lorien will cry alone in her room, afraid of who knows what, or perhaps just mad that she knows I'm leaving her to her nap to go get Brighton up.  And I won't be able to soothe those fears as immediately as I'd like, but I can and do pray for the Holy Spirit to be her Comforter, and for His voice to speak more loudly than any emotion she feels or lie she may be believing.  Moreover, sometimes Brighton will cry longer in her bed than I would have ever have allowed Lorien to cry in bed because I am in the middle of putting Lorien down for her nap, or cleaning up a boo boo, or consoling her.  And all of this is ok because I am doing all that I can for both of my girls to the best of my ability (and beyond that by God's grace and strength!).

I have spent too many moments feeling frantic inside, that I'm not doing enough, and not doing it well enough.  And finally, I quiet myself long enough to stop praying and just listen to Him.  And the voice of truth speaks into my life and bring timely truth and peace.  I'm guessing I'll hear "mama" a lot earlier on from this little one than I did from Lorien.  But that is more than OK, because I get to be mama to both of these wonderful and precious girls. And I would never trade one for the other.

Note to self:  I've got to learn to anticipate and pray about the internal changes in me that come with new seasons of life. Being prepared to the hilt for the externals of change (marriage, moving, job changes, babies) doesn't do a whole lot of good for me if I've not considered how these external things will effect me on the inside.  Please stop learning this the hard way! :)