Heart of Wisdom Academy

 

 

"How is it possible that a mother can despise her own child? Despise means to undervalue. As much as adults may delight in children, we do tend to have a low opinion of them. How else is it possible for a mother to leave her precious children in the care of unconscientious care-givers during their most crucial years? Every act a child sees, or word he hears, leaves an impression in his mind in the same way that light leaves a permanent image on a roll of film. It isn't that a nurse [or daycare or babysitter?] is totally bad for a child; it is not always good for educated people to have their children around constantly. That might be too stimulating for the child, and the mother is more refreshed if she can enjoy time with other people, discussing things unrelated to children from time to time. But children should have their mother's best; her freshest, most alert time of day. The mother should also choose care-givers carefully, train them herself, and be vigilant about knowing what goes on while her children are in the care of someone else."
Charlotte Mason Volume I in Modern English

Reminds me of a quote I heard; "God bless the children, but keep them far from us!"

I'm not condemning working mothers or women who have chosen barrenness; I'm condemning our cultural attitude about children. I'm condemning a culture that thrives on devaluing what God values, and valuing what He abhors.

Isaiah 5:20-Woe to those who call evil good and good evil....

If our value system were Godly, we would value what the Lord values. Just one of the things that God values are children. He called them a blessing. Do you tell your children they are blessings from God?

Valuing our children affects how we interact with them. Most of us value our credit or debit card. It is valuable to us so we keep it in a safe place, we don't lend it out to strangers for hours at a time, or let friends and family take turns keeping it for a while. Our car is valuable. We keep in a garage to protect it from the elements, we don't let strangers test drive it, we don't rotate it amongst our friends and family.

Our culture has defined what is valuable.Things are valuable, people are not, and children are completely worthless. In the modern mind, children have absolutely no worth. Anyone will tell you that the only reason people had an average of 6-10 children a hundred years ago is because children were free labor. Children 100 years ago had a worth. But today, children have no worth. We don't "need" them. Abortion is rampant, legal, and communicates to our culture where children fit in the world. Children are optional, invaluable, and disposable.

We don't think it worthwhile to even raise them. We think that strangers (professionals) could do as good a job if not better, and we commit tiny children into the care of perfect strangers out of our eyesight for 8 and 10 hours a day. And we value children? We don't even do that to our car, let a lone our debit card! But we do it to our children.

One day when my children are teenagers, I'll be in the fellowship and hear about a mom who is at home nursing her many sick little ones, and my heart will sympathize for her and I'll want to rush over to her house and relieve her; I'll want to let her sleep or bring her a meal, or do her laundry, because I'll remember all the many many days I've needed to stay home and nurse the children and I'll miss those days. I'm so grateful to my mom and all the Saints that glory in helping take care of all of our needs. There is no end to my gratitude. I want to remember these sick days fondly. Yes my house is messy, and the laundry pile is higher than usual; but my husbands needs are taken care of and the children's needs are taken care of. Everyone is happy and relatively healthy. One day when my children are all older I'll miss the warmth,cuddlinessness and unpredictability of sick days. I'll miss the late night feedings and cool rags. I'm sure to miss the Motrin, nebulizer treatments, and endless doctor appointments. I'll miss everyone piled up in bed with me reading books and listening to music. One day down the road, when that mom is missing from the fellowship because she is caring for her family, I'll say a prayer for her that she rejoices in ministering to her family in that way. I am tired and weary, but I am grateful to be home, taking care of my family. I am thankful beyond words that I get to care for their needs and not someone else. I remember when I worked outside of the home when my oldest was two. Working moms can't afford for their kids to be sick, literally. The boss has an attitude because you miss work, you have an attitude because you miss work. Most of the time the child can never completely heal before they have to go back to daycare because mom can't take off that long. I'm thankful that when I stay up all night, I don't have to be dressed and out of the house by 6am. I'm thankful that I don't have to rush their recovery and send them out of the house before they're ready. A company in my city actually pays a nurse to come to your home to care for your sick child so that you don't miss work. A day care across the street from the one I worked at, was a sick care center. Sick kids went there so that their parents didn't have to take off, and they stayed there until they were well enough for regular day care. I know these programs are lifesavers to the single mom who has no option, and I sympathize for them. All of these reminders fill my heart with gratefulness as I take care of Kason who has pneumonia and has I prepare to care of Kyle who will have a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy next month, and as I care for my husband who's come down with the flu.

I'm thankful for Praise Her in the Gates: The Calling of Christian Motherhood by Nancy Wilson. The fourth chapter is titled-When the Kids are Sick.

"When children are ill, it is a wonderful opportunity for teaching. You can model patience and cheerfulness to them when you get upin the night to comfort and minister to them."

"Mothers do have the capacity to make illness a happy memory."

"Sickness is a good time to teach them about compassion and mercy, as well as about he frailty of life. Use all these times for spiritual profit."

"When you feel crumy, you ought to be home. This is simply the golden rule when you apply it to your child. Sick children do interrupt our plans; that is what they are supposed to do. And we are to be interrupted cheerfully, even if it means missing church."

I wrote a paper for school earlier this year titled Women and the Work Life Balance. It was a very interesting study. Here are snipets of my paper...

Women have a unique job. In addition to childbearing, childrearing, domestic, and familial duties; seventy two million women also work full time. (US Department of Labor, 2008) The demands of maintaining so many roles are often dizzying. Consequentially, there is an urgent need for balance in the lives of these women. The Work-Life balance describes the balancing act between work and personal life.

Angela Thomas-Jones advises women to be realistic about trying to achieve the work life balance. She asks women to accept the fact that they are not home for eight or nine hours and when they get home they can’t possibly compensate for those hours lost, that would equate to working two fulltime jobs. “At some point one (job) will need more attention than the other. If you realise this then you can decide about your career and family trajectories.”

The 20th century gave way to the Superwoman or what may be better known as the Superwoman myth. Women gained the right to work full time, but their childrearing and home keeping duties did not disappear. Instead women found that working full-time was in addition to marriage, childbearing, childrearing, cooking, cleaning, laundering, gardening, etc. Instead of women having one full-time job as wife and mother; women now have two full time jobs; wife/mother and career woman. This is the crux of the work-life balance; women and their pursuit of juggling two full-time jobs.

At the onset of the Women’s Liberation Movement women thought that “being successful required becoming a man…success was about the male definition of money and power…”(Belkin, 2003) Today, “when women talk about success they use words like satisfaction, balance, and sanity.” (Belkin, 2003) In fact, “seven out of ten working women tell pollsters they would stay home with their kids if they could…”(Bennett’s, 2007) Many women started asking, “What happened to all the self-fulfillment we were supposed to feel? …What’s wrong with me? I have everything! Why am I not happy? Why am I so tired?”(Carter, 1995) By the end of the eighties women began to understand, “we were being used. We were lawyers, doctors, judges…but we were still swabbing out the toilets at home!” (Carter, 1995) Women are the ones caring for sick children in the middle of the night and taking off from work the next day. Women still do almost all the housework and children’s homework. “None of this sounds much like real freedom…women seem more burdened and vulnerable than free.” (Bruno, 1998) “Women use phrases like “torn apart, ripped in two, to describe their lives…”. (Berg, 1986) What is there that makes combining a job and motherhood so terribly hard? (Berg, 1986) The answer according to Berg: “Guilt, the excoriating interface between our two roles…insistent guilt.”( Berg 1986) Working women feel guilty about working long hours, too tired for sex, too tired for housework, not spending enough time with children, missing important milestones in children, childcare arrangements, quality time vs. quantity time, etc. Working women are bombarded with guilt, and there is no end to all the things working women feel guilty about.

It was just fifty years ago that women coveted the role of working outside the home, yet today seventy percent of them would choose home. Not even a century later most women bemoan their positions and many women are opting out of the work-life balance for a semblance of balance. Now that women have it all, they are finding out that they don’t want it all and it isn’t worth it all.