Failed

I make plans for myself and my family. Sometimes those plans are verbalized. Often they are unwritten subtleties, unconscious expectations.

These are my enemies-these silent objectives.

They taunt me when unmet. They use names like unworthy and inadequate. On occasion they whip out the really powerful adjectives to titles I already claim: bad mother, loser wife.

Unspoken goals have powerful voices.

All too often I agree. I add my own label: failure. I claim that name for myself, worrying that my husband is disappointed and angry and that my children are being scarred beyond recognition. I carry that weight with me day in and day out till I can no longer stand under the burden.

I cry.

I seek out my husband asking if I am the failure I believe I am. I don't believe his answer.
I ask if he is disappointed in me, angry with my performance. I don't believe his answer.
I question my mothering listing all the times I could have done things differently. I don't believe his answer.

I pray that this burden be lifted, that I be forgiven for being less that everything, that I be made a wife and a mother worthy of these dear ones in my family. And I read:

Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves,
but our adequacy comes from God.
2 Corinthians 3:5

And He speaks.

And I rest assured that in spite of my shortcomings, in spite of my weaknesses, in spite of my inadequacy, He will care for my family. For He loves them more than I ever could. He created them just as He created me. He knows that we together are but dust. In His love for all of us--husband, wife, children--He will make me adequate for this call to motherhood.