Finding Myself

It all started when we went to see Frozen II.  It touched me much more deeply than I had anticipated and I cried more than I did when I first saw Brave.  The story of Elsa going into the "unknown" in search of who is behind the mysterious voice she keeps hearing and ultimately finding herself rocked me to my core.  That was when I first began to realize I had lost myself.  Then right after Christmas my husband and two older kids went on a two week trip to Thailand.  Literally the day they left (they had not even boarded the plane yet), I was in tears.  I told myself, "it's okay this will get easier, it's only the first day and right after Christmas, of course you miss them".  The next day was not any easier and it ended with me again, in tears and I started to ask myself  "what the hell is wrong with you that you are already falling apart?!" Then it hit me, I forgot who I am without them.  Sure I still had the two little ones at home with me who probably need me more when it comes to fulfilling needs on a daily basis.  I tried to break it down in my head and I think the bottom line was that this year, things have been very different.  I haven't always worked since we've had kids, there were usually months when we tried to get by on one income and eventually accepted that it wasn't going to work, so I would find a job and we went back to our usual "ships passing in the night" routine to save on child care.  When we lived in Michigan (before moving here to Iowa), I was the only one working so that Norm could finish Seminary.  I think that a part of me found my identity in being a wife and mother and another part of me found myself in my job.  I was able to care for my children, help provide for them and I found some of my worth in that.  It also didn't hurt that while I was at work I was able to engage in adult conversation.  So, during the time that Norm and the kids were gone I decided to finally get my goat soap shop up and running and although I haven't sold any since, I did make my first order!  I also did a few decorating things around the house because I really love doing that and tried to make it feel more like a home.  I admit that a large part of this was trying to keep myself busy so I wouldn't miss my family so much but it was also very fulfilling.

All of this still begs the question...who am I and where did I go?  I am a wife, mother, Pastor's wife (redundant but necessary), friend, volunteer, cook, cleaning lady and house keeper.  Though I find great joy in these things, it also sort of makes me cringe.  Is this all that I am?  Who was I before I got married and had kids?  When I think back to high school and college I think of a young girl who was a little bit obsessed with getting married someday and maybe should have calmed down and just lived a little.  What I also think of though, is a girl that was ON FIRE for Jesus.  Sure I wanted to get married and have kids and do youth ministry...but more than anything in the world, I loved my Lord.  I loved singing, being in nature, painting, laughing with my friends and going to concerts.  I was a deep thinker and felt everything. I loved learning and reading and studying with my friends.

Do I miss those early college days?  Hell yes.  Would I go back and change anything? Nope.  In the almost fifteen years that we have been married I have learned so much, grown as a person and adapted to so many life changes.  It has been the most difficult (as I just told my 11 year old son today) yet the most rewarding thing I've ever done.  I have had four amazing, different and beautiful children and I am blessed by them every day but somewhere along the line I think I lost my sense of who I am.  They are a part of me, I carried each of them inside my body but they are not all of me.  I am connected to and one with my husband, we share a deep and sacred bond but I am still an individual.

Maybe it's something about the early years when our children are babies and toddlers and in constant need of our attention/time/bodies.  Is it during those immensely beautiful and rewarding yet physically and emotionally draining years that we slowly lose ourselves bit by bit?  Do we think that it would be selfish to hold on to who we were before we had our kids?  As if by doing so we would be wishing we never did.  Another thing that I've been wrestling with is the thought that when my kids begin to move out I will completely fall apart.  That disgusts me. I do not want to put that kind of unhealthy pressure on them, as if they are meant to fulfill my deepest emotional needs.  My job is to love them unconditionally, help them learn to be functioning, kind and decent human beings and then send them out into the world.  Of course I will miss them terribly but life will go on!  I really hope and pray that it will not be like one of those movies where Norm and I will look at each other and say, "Oh hi, who are you?"  Maybe we will finally make that trip to Ireland or Israel and rediscover "us" in a whole new way.  Whatever the future holds there's one thing I know for sure, I have started a path to rediscovering who I am.  Who knew I would still be "finding myself" at 36?