So, I started going to a new gym recently. It has locks on the lockers already, pretty cool huh, one less thing you have to remember to bring. The only thing is, the other day, I locked myself out. I didn’t lock myself out when I was in my workout clothes, no, that would be too easy. I locked myself out after that after I came back from the showers in nothing but a towel.
Yeah. So, I was pretty embarrassed I’m standing there in a towel that barely covers all of my important parts, trying to see if I could jimmy my way into the locker. I mean in the movies you can break into anything with only a towel on so why couldn’t I?
Yeah, so after my towel nearly fell off I walked around the locker room looking for someone who worked there. I went to the bathroom. I tried to look like I knew what I was doing because I was so embarrassed to be stuck in a towel in this stupid locker room! Finally, I decided to try to call the front desk because no way in heck was I leaving this locker room in a towel.
The phone didn’t connect. I could feel my face getting red. I was alone. I was in the midst of perfectly fit women, and my hot mess self couldn’t figure out how to even work the flippin locker. I was calling myself all sorts of names in my head. Finally, I broke down; I asked another woman if she could get someone to let me into my locker.
She did, she didn’t even laugh at me. Instead, she told me she did the same thing earlier. Then another woman around the corner said that she had just done the same thing the day before.
I still felt embarrassed, but ya know what, it helped to know that I wasn’t alone.
See, that’s where the devil wants us, especially us Mama’s who are raising the next generation. He wants us thinking that we are alone, that we are isolated, and that we carry shame all on our own.
That’s not what God wants from us though. God calls us for fellowship, hospitality, and to love one another. We need people around us to not only keep us on the path of righteousness but to keep us from thinking that we are alone on this journey.
Isolation is one of the best tools the devil uses to try to devour his prey.
Let’s be really real here; this Motherhood stuff can be hard. We love with all our hearts these little humans that also drive us so crazy we are ready to pull our hair out. I’ve heard it said that “Motherhood isn’t for the faint of heart.” I feel like that statement is the understatement of the year.
Every kid, typical or special needs have their own challenges. Every mother no matter what her circumstances have her own set of challenges. I feel like some of us get lost there though. We realize that we have it hard, we realize that our life is difficult, and we think no one else can understand. We don’t want anyone else to think that we don’t love our kids as much as we do. Maybe we don’t want people to know that our children aren’t perfect.
So we don’t share our struggle. So we keep it all inside. So we put on a front for the whole world and let no one in. I’ve got news for you, no one’s kid is perfect. Even the family that seems so put together, even that family has struggled. One of their struggles may be is that no one takes them seriously when they are trying to share their struggle.
Isolation is so easy to fall into when you enter Motherhood.
You can be a mother who thinks she has it all together or at least one who wants everyone else to think she has it all together, so you get your info from the internet instead of asking a friend that has maybe already walked down a similar path. You may be the mother who feels like she’s never good enough and is just ashamed of how much she feels she’s messing up, so you won’t dare ask anyone for help, for fear of judgment. You could be a mother anywhere in between those two, just afraid of someone thinking less, so you isolate yourself.
I wrote about my struggle for asking for help in my book “They Call Me Mom” in a chapter about never asking for help.It’s important that every single one of you reading this know that you are not meant to do this alone. No matter how much you think your life is hard or that no one will understand, God meant us for fellowship. We all must find someone who we can trust.
Don’t fall into the lie that you are the only one in this circumstance.
Read Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
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