Sweat dripped down my forehead and I rushed to the kitchen for a glass of water. The lump in my throat and gut seemed to have settled in permanently over the earlier weeks due to some personal struggles that our family was going through. I had scarcely ever felt as insecure as a mother as I did through that season, or even in the years since.
That night the feeling was palpable, almost audible, as if a malevolent figure stood behind me, hissing. “You’re not a good enough mother…your kids aren’t going to thrive…you’re going to lose at life, at family, at everything important to you…you are a failure…”
Somehow, as the same familiar discourse was playing in my ear and I could almost smell the stench of the deception, it hit me like a bayonet to the heart: I was in a war. Not against any person, but against that voice that wouldn’t leave, against the lies that whispered shame night after night, and against the tumultuous sea of emotions that were trying to gain ground in my heart, hitting me like a tidal wave threatening to take me out.
In that dark moment in the still of the night, my babies asleep in their beds, I stood my ground. I squared my shoulders. Something had to give and it couldn’t — could not — be me.
I had cried. I had tossed and turned. I had worried, with a nail-biting-sweat-inducing anxiety, for weeks.
Now something rose up in my heart and I spoke aloud into the darkness, “You can’t have me and you can’t have my children. I am going to win this battle — and this war! We are going to be okay!”
I drank my water, I went to bed and actually slept. The mom who awoke in the morning was a more positive and more present mother than I had been through most of the struggle.
Please don’t get me wrong, I AM NOT naturally brave or strong. The emotion, the “enemy”, that had worn me down so much during that season of life was Fear. My natural instinct is to protect my children and when something seems to threaten them, whether it’s disability, a bully, a tough emotion, or any other real threat, that thing rises up in me that does in most mama bears.
This time, it seemed so far out of my hands that I began to believe Fear’s lie that I couldn’t do it. If I couldn’t protect my cubs, despite my best efforts, well that felt…scary.
Fear is always a liar. He’s a nasty old man full of bitterness at his own failures, who masquerades as a terrible warrior coming for your family.
Listen to me: you are the warrior, and he is actually terrified of you. You have the power to stand and fight for your family. You are in the trenches, and if he takes you down he will move on to your children. You terrify Fear because he knows he can only gain ground if you give yours up. He can’t take you by his nefarious whispering. He can’t take you by lying in your ear in the still of the night. He can’t take you unless you let him shake you: and he knows it.
Which is what I had been doing, unintentionally. I let him rob my energy, which robbed time with my children. I let him rob my confidence, which made me less able to speak into them the good that I needed to. Oh, I was trying, but I was having my legs cut from under me by this villain I now know by name. This Fear.
Once upon another time, sitting in a clinic in Uganda with a little boy who was also fighting a battle of his own, some of the wisest words I ever heard came from that 12-year-old, and I have never forgotten. He said, “Sometimes life is hard but we just have to go through it. You will just go through it. I will just go through it.” We both came out the other side, as he predicted, not entirely unscathed, but maybe at least a little braver.
Back to that night in the kitchen: That defining moment in the midnight changed a lot about how I fight my battles. Have I ever slipped up again? Oh yes. Have I listened once in a while to those whispers and lies in the dark? Have I wrestled through sleepless nights? Yes, and yes. I’m still human. Life still ebbs and flows. But I learned something that night, even if I sometimes forget.
I learned that I have the upper hand, and when I play it, Fear shakes in his own dusty boots.
Here’s a short list of things that help me remember that:
- Getting out of my head and into my body — run, dance, jump, scream and shout. Anything to remind you that you are a force to be reckoned with.
- Journal it or speak it to an empty room. Getting your thoughts and feelings out and speaking affirmatons like, “We are going to get through this! I am going to win this battle for my kids!” is very powerful. You believe it a little more each time you say it, and some days that little more makes a big difference!
- Connect with your kids and with a warrior queen mama friend who gets it. Spending time with the ones we love who love us back affirms our purpose and reignites the passion and fire we need to stand our ground for them.
- Remember, there is hope. Every mountain, and I mean every mountain, has another side once you reach the precipice. It can seem like it’s taking forever, it can seem like relief is never coming. Hold on to your rope and press on, because you are closer than you think to that peak — and then it gets better.
Mamas, Daddies, you are in a battle every day. Whether you know it or not, whether you want to be or not. Fear is coming for our children. Will we fight for them? You bet!
Right now, we stand for them and by watching us stand they learn to stand for themselves.
Right now, we speak into the darkness on the sleepless nights, but they will have sleepless nights of their own. We teach them what to say to send Fear fleeing in the opposite direction.
Right now, we stand ground for our young ones. Someday they will need to stand their own ground.
Have we shown them the skills they need to stand in their hardest battles? Have we trained them to confidently win their wars?
This world won’t back down. A constant barrage of challenges are thrown our direction daily. Relational challenges, emotional challenges, financial, academic, career-related, spiritual challenges. We can feel like Fear won’t back down, so well…we can not back down either.
If we don’t give in when Fear comes calling, odds are in favor that our children won’t.
That, my friends, is how mama bear warriors win for their kids. Stay strong tonight, mama. You are a force to be reckoned with. Fear doesn’t stand a chance.
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