The DNA of Motherhood

I've decided that somethings changes in the DNA of a woman when she becomes a mother. One doesn't have to give birth to be a mother...it can be through adoption, foster care etc. but something happens that changes the intrinsic make up of a woman when she becomes "mama".

This change doesn't mean you give up your identity or your goals. It doesn't mean you stay home with your kids and give up your career or that you trade reading the newspaper for "Pat the Bunny". You don't have to become a happy homemaker and love cleaning, cooking and laundry. It's not about those sorts of changes.

"Making the decision to have a child — it's momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body." - Elizabeth Stone

It is about the subtle changes...they way a crying newborn makes your heart melt. It's how the word sacrifice takes on a whole new meaning. It's love strong enough to die for and gentle enough to nurture. It's dying to self in a way that no other relationship requires...and being more than okay with that.

There is no way to explain this phenomenon to those who aren't mothers. No way to try and describe for another the gigantic force that overtakes you when you behold the reality of motherhood for the first time. I guess that seems exclusive...and I don't mean for it to be that way. I have just never met someone without children who can relate in the slightest way to the feelings I have as a mother. I don't care if they are a nanny, aunt, honorary grandma, or whatever else. This isn't a shortcoming on their part, it is just reality. And with every day I am a mother I feel more and more strongly that, in a large sense, this is what I was created for. This is what God intended when he knit me together in my mother's womb. I have never felt more in the center of God's purpose for my life - and that is something I have searched for...for years and years.