Fertility // Esther // Calling
The quarter life crisis.
This is the year I turn 25 years old. A quarter century. While most of my peers are going through quarter life crises about dreams unfulfilled, I have the quandary of what if the dreams I had weren't fulfilling.
For as long as I can remember, I have been obsessed with the concept of conception. I dreamt of becoming a mother. I wrote fiction in middle school and high school about pregnancy and motherhood because my romanticized version of raising children was my dream profession. People often asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I responded with a profession. I wanted to be a doctor that helped women bring babies into the world. When I was asked to write a persuasive essay in seventh grade I was automatically drawn towards the controversy of conception. By the time I enrolled in college, I had a strong vision of my future and of right and wrong. I was positive that I was right. The first month I was on campus I joined the pro-life club and by the time I was a sophomore I was a fellow with Texas Right to Life's Joseph Graham Fellowship and president of the Pro-Life club on campus. I was certain that I was created for one thing: to speak up for those who could not speak for themselves.
It was finals week of my sophomore year in college. My roommates were having a pancake breakfast with some classmates from a Christianity class or maybe it was a Christian fellowship. I quietly slinked out of my room and into the bathroom. It had to be first thing in the morning because I didn't want to have a false negative. I sat in the bathroom alone while college life went on without me, around me. For the next few years, this is how it would feel. I would feel isolated from my peers while they took traditional routes to success and adulthood. The insulation of early motherhood is a protective cocoon at times and suffocating at other times. As the mother of young children still, I am more well equipped to deal with this than I was at 19, when I began my journey in motherhood.
Five year later, looking back at those moments and my passions, I see the pull God put on my heart. As my passions change, and the call on my life becomes more clear, I have come to realize that God molds our hearts for His glory. I look at my passion for motherhood as a saving grace, not only for me personally, but for my family as a whole. Without God laying down the foundational passion for children and the call on my heart to be a mother, I don't think I would have the family that I have today. Esther 4:14 says, "And who knows perhaps you came to this... position for such a time as this". Perhaps, God put this call on my heart for such a time as that.
Not everyone has the privilege that I did. I was in a relationship with a good man. I had a supportive family. I had loving friends. Not everyone's moment of crisis is adoption or parenting. Five years ago, I was so insulated at my private Christian school that it didn't even really occur to me that there were other options. I was too busy picketing and praying outside Planned Parenthood to even consider patronizing them. Houston has the largest Planned Parenthood in America.
But my crisis is no longer parenting or adoption and that call to motherhood isn't the same as it was. Honestly, some days, I don't enjoy mothering. I do see breastfeeding as sacrificing my body. I see cuddles as energy suckers. I love my children and being a stay at home mother is a privilege that I appreciate, but I also recognize within myself my desire to work outside my home. I look back at my life trajectory and I see the blessing of the ingrained desire to be a stay at home mother, but I can't help but wondering if that call on my life served its purpose.
This is the year I turn 25 years old. A quarter century. While most of my peers are going through quarter life crises about dreams unfulfilled, I have the quandary of what if the dreams I had weren't fulfilling.
For as long as I can remember, I have been obsessed with the concept of conception. I dreamt of becoming a mother. I wrote fiction in middle school and high school about pregnancy and motherhood because my romanticized version of raising children was my dream profession. People often asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I responded with a profession. I wanted to be a doctor that helped women bring babies into the world. When I was asked to write a persuasive essay in seventh grade I was automatically drawn towards the controversy of conception. By the time I enrolled in college, I had a strong vision of my future and of right and wrong. I was positive that I was right. The first month I was on campus I joined the pro-life club and by the time I was a sophomore I was a fellow with Texas Right to Life's Joseph Graham Fellowship and president of the Pro-Life club on campus. I was certain that I was created for one thing: to speak up for those who could not speak for themselves.
It was finals week of my sophomore year in college. My roommates were having a pancake breakfast with some classmates from a Christianity class or maybe it was a Christian fellowship. I quietly slinked out of my room and into the bathroom. It had to be first thing in the morning because I didn't want to have a false negative. I sat in the bathroom alone while college life went on without me, around me. For the next few years, this is how it would feel. I would feel isolated from my peers while they took traditional routes to success and adulthood. The insulation of early motherhood is a protective cocoon at times and suffocating at other times. As the mother of young children still, I am more well equipped to deal with this than I was at 19, when I began my journey in motherhood.
Five year later, looking back at those moments and my passions, I see the pull God put on my heart. As my passions change, and the call on my life becomes more clear, I have come to realize that God molds our hearts for His glory. I look at my passion for motherhood as a saving grace, not only for me personally, but for my family as a whole. Without God laying down the foundational passion for children and the call on my heart to be a mother, I don't think I would have the family that I have today. Esther 4:14 says, "And who knows perhaps you came to this... position for such a time as this". Perhaps, God put this call on my heart for such a time as that.
Not everyone has the privilege that I did. I was in a relationship with a good man. I had a supportive family. I had loving friends. Not everyone's moment of crisis is adoption or parenting. Five years ago, I was so insulated at my private Christian school that it didn't even really occur to me that there were other options. I was too busy picketing and praying outside Planned Parenthood to even consider patronizing them. Houston has the largest Planned Parenthood in America.
But my crisis is no longer parenting or adoption and that call to motherhood isn't the same as it was. Honestly, some days, I don't enjoy mothering. I do see breastfeeding as sacrificing my body. I see cuddles as energy suckers. I love my children and being a stay at home mother is a privilege that I appreciate, but I also recognize within myself my desire to work outside my home. I look back at my life trajectory and I see the blessing of the ingrained desire to be a stay at home mother, but I can't help but wondering if that call on my life served its purpose.
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