NewMom’s dairy: Church services are not for me anymore.
I used to love Sunday services before I became a mother, but these days, not so much. I literally dread it. Asides from the fact that I get to wake up earlier than usual, I also have to contend with Lee, as I prepare for the Sunday service.
For all the services I have attended in the past three months, I can barely recollect the title of the sermon. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't listen, but it just so happens that I don't pay so much attention while the sermon is going on. It's either Lee is super active and playing this minute or the next minute he is crying and I am forced to be on my toes--standing, dancing, swaying from left to right, patting him on the back just to calm him. All of these activities makes it near impossible to focus on the sermon or any other thing at that.
If it's not Lee, it's his friend sitting to my right or the one to my left.
Let me describe the nursing mothers/babies section of my church. It’s a big room filled with chairs and TV set for transmission of the service. So we (nursing mothers and babies) get to watch the service proceedings from a screen. At any given Sunday, there are no less than 50+ babies in that room. You can imagine the multiple crying.
Sometimes we have 5 babies or more crying at the same time, sometimes we have the ones crawling to where you are to touch your bag and need cheerleaders to encourage them with the crawling and I am usually this cheerleader. Sometimes I'm a cheerleader for the ones learning to stand and also to those learning to walk.
Sometimes I have to cheer the ones who just discovered that they can clap with their hands or even to those who recently discovered their voice and they wouldn’t spare anything but scream.
Sometimes I am trying to calm a crying child who is seated just beside me. Talk about being the mother of the children.
Lee is unpredictable, some Sundays he watches other kids be kids, some Sundays he takes the stage and they watch him be Lee, other times they join him in the distracting match.
In all of these times, I usually forget that I am in church. And before I know, the sermon is over. Other times, I unconsciously pray for things to round up ASAP...because I am confused and don't know how to cope anymore.
I have no control over how my Sunday services will turn out these days. Lee practically sets the tone and dictate’s the pace...I take solace in the fact that I get to share the fellowship grace with other mums after service. It’s still a part of worship and other times, I feel like I am just putting up an appearance in church with Lee every Sunday.
At the end of the day, our children bring us inexplicable joy and this is the real reward.
I will love to hear from you. Feel free to drop your comments.
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