Daily Dose of Mama: Hope

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Hope

Hope is a funny thing. As a mother, I feel like it is my job to have hope and optimism for my child and my family. However, as a person, I worry that hope will ultimately lead to having my heart crushed.

It's happened before. Infertility makes hope a pretty dirty word. I still cringe when I hear it.

Faith is different. I am getting pretty good at keeping faith for my family. I have faith that Little Bug will continue to grow and develop and be the best he can be. I have faith our family will weather whatever storms we face (not that we are currently really facing any). I have faith in Appa and I as parents. I have faith in our choice to adopt Little Bro.

But hope....hope scares me. I don't have total faith in hope.

Hope can buffer your heart from so much pain and sadness, but that buffer isn't based on anything other than abstract hope. There will come a time when the thing that is hoped for either does or doesn't materialize, and when that time comes, if it doesn't swing hope's way, the blow is devastating.

I never want to feel it again if I can help it.

Adoption is all about faith and hope. I'm really good at one and really crappy at the other. I've found myself feeling alienated by those who chose to hope for the impossible. I find myself unable to even entertain the idea of hope, even when it is dangled before me in a precarious half-official way.

I'm not better off for it, but it's the only way my mind works now.

So I struggle to pair my faith that things will work out, even if I don't like the way they go about working out, with my lack of hope in anything extraordinary. I try to remember that many of the extraordinary things I chose not to hope for actually DO happen. Hope would have been rewarded.

I want to raise my children to have faith and hope. I can only do that through example.

So today I am trying something new. A teeny bit of hope has sprouted in my heart. Hope that something extraordinary could possibly, just maybe happen. I'll only share this secret hope with Appa, and he can nurture it to.

And we'll see....

3 comments:

KaraOctober 6, 2010 at 12:41 PM
Wow! What a great post. I never thought of it exactly that way, but I feel the same way. Hope and faith are definitely two very different concepts that are often linked. I "hope" that your hope is rewarded:).
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KristiOctober 6, 2010 at 3:49 PM
I think the difference between faith and hope is a beautiful concept. I think faith can give you such amazing peace. But hope, hope can give you happiness in what is to come as well as what already is. I loved your post. Have I mentioned you are my hero!
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JoJoOctober 7, 2010 at 6:45 AM
Heavy post, Mama. But after reading it twice, you're totally right. I got sick of having 'hope' rammed down my throat. But 'faith'...I never lost her.
I'm curious to this new hope though...
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Thanks for your daily dose of you....

Everyday Mama

I'm a 32-year-old everyday mama. My husband (Appa) and I adopted our first son Little Bug (at 10 months old) from Korea in September 2008. We adopted our second son, Little Bro, from Korea in April 2011 at age 21 months. We adopted our third son,Little Moon, at age 3 in November 2013. I've wanted to be a mama for a long time, but I'm still trying to figure out the reality of it all and take time to enjoy the delicate beauty of the highs and the lows.

I worked full time as an editor, which I loved; but I made the bittersweet decision to stay home with my children after Little Bro came home. I'm now clumsily finding my footing in a new world of housekeeping, menu planning, budgeting, cooking, cleaning, and rainy-day activities, as well as navigating the world of IEPs, parent advocacy, and special needs education (spoiler: I suck at house work). My husband is hot and smart and quiet and loyal, and I think (know) my sons are the cutest, happiest little boys in the world.

I also struggle at times with mild depression, anxiety, post-adoption depression, my husband's constant absence due to his stressful and super time-consuming job, the challenges of helping my older son with his sometimes exhausting special needs, and our transition to a family of three little boys with just 19 and 14 months between them. I worry way too much about what people think of me, hate talking on the phone, and I am trying to trust myself more.

Oh yeah, I'm unable to give birth to children; love books, writing, traveling, and the color brown; hate to clean, cook, craft, or do laundry; allergic to pretty much everything but food (thank God); and think camping in anything but a tent is lame.

I needed somewhere to drop my daily mama thoughts and musings on toddler poop to avoid massive clutter and ramblings on our private family blog. Writing it down on paper is so '90s.

This is my everyday "blournal" as I navigate through my life as a first-time (or is it third-time now?) mama and long-time me. So....hi.

You can contact me at daily.dose.of.mama (at) gmail.com.

THE CONTENT OF THIS BLOG IS COPYRIGHT PROTECTED.

As an editor, I deal with people on a regular basis who think images or content on the internet (whether it does or does not have a copyright designation) are "fair use." Your lesson for the day is that anything someone writes or creates that is published on the internet is copyright protected, whether he or she spells it out or not. Although I doubt anyone wants to steal my riveting posts on toddler poop, it doesn't hurt to educate the world about the wonderful magic of online copyright law.