sometimes i don't know what i was thinking

Can I say this? I know it's completely horrible.

Sometimes I don't know what I was thinking having all these kids.

There is such a guilt that comes in even forming the words in my head. Such shame in thinking it. I'm guessing, hoping maybe, that I'm not alone. Please don't get me wrong. I love these children. I wouldn't trade a single one for a single day for all the chocolate in Hershey, PA! Really.

But good grief!

If I have to listen to one more, "but he was being mean" and therefore had to be hit over the head with a two by four.

If I have to clean up one for craft or experiment gone awry, because who doesn't love trying to clean Bag Balm out of hair?

If one more child rolls their eyes at me.

If I find one more apple core behind the couch.

If anyone else tries to pee off the upstairs landing onto the downstairs carpet.

If that butter has fingerprints in it again.

If one more child gets out of their bed.

If I find folded laundry in the basket of dirty laundry, dampened by towels, even one more time.

If someone puts an empty milk carton back in the fridge again.

If they make a pool in their room again.

If somebody tells me they didn't know that <insert something completely obvious, like they shouldn't pee off the upstairs landing> was wrong, because I never told them not to do it.

And heaven help them if my Reese's Peanut Butter cups have disappeared from their top secret hiding place.

Because I can't even. I just can't. I love them, but some days? Some days I stand outside of my car in the rain in the parking lot at Walmart, because I just need a moment.

A moment to hear my own breathing. A moment to remind myself that this is a calling, a holy work, not of my own. A moment to remember that it's not all about me and it's not all about them either. A moment to reflect on the God who deemed me fit to be their mother, who knows me better than I know myself and who never fails to strengthen me to get back in there in these moments of weakness when everything in my earthly body tells me to tuck and roll. A moment to come to grips with how blessed I am by that racket happening in the 15 passenger van with the red stripe painted across the front.

We live in a culture that tells us to follow our hearts, get some "me time" everyday and do what it takes to make all your dreams come true. I'm not even going to comment on society here, but let me just say that if I did that, I'd be sitting on a beach somewhere with an endless supply of peanut butter Oreos. At least until my dream changed and I tired of "me time". That's the problem, I have a fickle heart. I wanted and continue to want each one of these children. They are a gift, a blessing. But sometimes my overtired, fickle, sick of having to touch poop heart would tell me otherwise. I need God's firm foundation, eternal perspective and His strength to get me back in that van with 8 kids, to drive them home and find a way to not just get through to bed time, but to pour at least a little into them, to let them see me take that moment and be strengthened beyond my own ability by a God who gets it.