Rather listen? I’ve recorded this post for you!
I left my firstborn for four (maybe five?) days when he was eleven months to go on an impulsive trip to California with my husband.
We had been married less than two years and we were young and desiring adventure. The young adults at our church were going to a conference and the pastors leading the trip had two extra tickets that were waiting to be scooped up.
We didn’t count the cost of this. We may have had the money, but that was the least expensive part.
I was still breastfeeding quite a bit and decided I would just pump at the conference and we could carry on as normal when we got home.
Fast forward to me in the bathroom at the conference crying because my milk wasn’t coming in without that soft baby boy snuggled up to me and his sweet smell releasing the needed hormones.
I was anxious and feeling sick from being miles away from my little one and unable to get back to him until the appointed return flight.
When we landed back home I practically ran off that plane, my entire body aching desperately for that little guy who was designed to need me at his age, and found him burning up with a fever. A few hours later he was obviously struggling with a terrible ear infection.
Between my engorgement and his pain, nursing didn’t go well.
I was awake with him nearly the whole night trying to get him to nurse again, but to no avail.
My little trip turned into a premature weaning.
To make matters worse, I had packed my schedule so tight that I had to be up early the next morning to be the matron of honour in my friends wedding. I would have to be away from him again!
My heart was in shreds.
The cost of that trip wasn’t worth it. My baby had needed me. Our attachment had been damaged, and this became something I never would risk again with any of my babies.
Most of the voices in my life at that time were echoing a damaging lie: We deserved this trip.
But the only one in the situation who deserved anything was my baby. He deserved his mama in the flesh, doing what was best for him every day. I had succumbed to self centred entitlement, and it had taken away something very precious.
Some of the women who have made the greatest impact in my life have not told me what they did well, they have shared some of their deepest regrets.
They have told me with tears in their eyes that they should have been more available for their kids.
That they wish they wouldn’t have lived as though they had something to prove.
If only motherhood could have been enough.
Those stories carry me through the days I want to pack it in.
I have never met a mama who says she should have given their kids less of themselves.
But I have met a lot of mamas too scared to voice their mistakes or give words to their regrets. Every chance I get I urge these mothers to share their stories because we are a generation of women who desperately need to hear wisdom from the hind sight from the ones before us.
Fear tries to whisper to us that if we admit what we’ve done no one will respect us, or worse they will judge our intentions. And yet the most redemptive thing is that by allowing our regrets to be spoken it turns them instantly from a mistake into wisdom.
I have found it is healing to stare my regret straight on and say: you don’t own me, God will turn this around.
It’s like Jospeh standing before his brothers after all that he had gone through and being able to say “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” (Genesis 50:20).
We can look at our regret head on and declare that the shame and pain of it will not harm us anymore, and that God will use it for the saving of many lives!
It is so important that young moms who are deciding how they will spend their precious time, know the vital importance of their role in shaping their child’s heart and mind.
You know what else is extremely important? That we don’t let our own regrets stop us from championing these young moms.
We can’t allow the shame of our own mistakes to harden our hearts and stop us from speaking freely and encouraging others to do things differently.
If you wish you had done things more purposefully, encouraging someone else to go down the same path and repeat the same errors isn’t helping anyone! It’s only compounding hurt.
Use your story for the saving of many lives.
When God gets our regrets he can turn them into something beautiful. He can use them for his glory. He can save other people from going down the same path. He redeems our ashes and turns them into a thing of beauty.
Isaiah 61:3 NLT
To all who mourn in Israel, he will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the Lord has planted for his own glory.
Lord Jesus, you know all our mistakes and all the things we wish we could change. The words we would rather have never said and the decisions that we’d give almost anything to undo. And yet somehow you are bigger than all those things and you can use them for your glory and for the saving of many lives. Take our regrets. You get them Lord. Thank you for transforming these ashes into something beautiful. Give us courage to speak out our stories and see them transformed into wisdom. In your mighty name. Amen.
Beautiful, and oh so true for mothers and other relationships as well. They enemy loves to weigh us down with guilt and regret, but the Father wants the exact opposite!! Freedom and restoration are what we can embrace and enjoy when we give it all to Him. So thankful ❤️