By Sarah J. Hauser @sarah.j.hauser “I love being a mom!”  I hear other women say, beaming  with pride as they dote  on a freshly bathed baby. And I wonder … do I?  Do I love being a mom?  Motherhood has broken me open,  three times just below my waist  with scars to show for it,  a thousand times in my chest. Do I love being a mom?  Each day is a lesson in sacrifice,  in how to tend to those who climb on me,  those who need me,  those who don’t always understand the potency  of careless words  of complaint,  of defianc ..read more

By Molly Flinkman @molly_flinkman Please fill out the following questionnaire. Answer all questions as completely and honestly as possible. 1.) What new things is your child doing? How much time do you have? He got a sandbox digger for his birthday—the kind you sit on and operate with both hands. It took him very little time to figure it out, and now he can often be found making worksites, houses, or just your basic “big, big, BIG hole.” He drives the pontoon boat with his dad sometimes—yes, he always wears a life jacket—and didn’t even cry when he got a buzz cut last week. He is pretty much ..read more

By Simone Griffin @sincerelysimoneg Will you remember hearing my voice greet you upon waking each day? Good morning, my baby. Will you remember hearing my voice rise and roar impatiently, tongue spewing out reprimands that ended in repentance? Mommy loses her temper too. I’m sorry, baby. Or the steady tempo of my voice pleading prayers at your bedside? God, I thank you for this blessing. God, cover and protect him. Will you remember tasting love in the meals I cooked at the end of long days when I had nothing left to give? Will your tongue crave my Friday morning French toast and the strawber ..read more

By Melanie Dale @melanierdale  “Ah! Hi!” I squeal as my fingers trace the wiry hair springing from the part between my chemo curls. I peer at it in the mirror to make sure it’s really what I think it is and not just a trick of the light. My first gray hair. “You are welcome here. I am not afraid of you,” I say, patting it with my index finger. I pull away from the mirror, the bathroom tilts around me, and I grab the counter. Some parts of aging are easier than others. The gray hair is welcome. The dizziness is not. I’ve been dizzy since last summer, when I started having weird bouts of v ..read more

By Jennifer Floyd @juniper.and.blush   “I have seen the sun break through to illuminate a small field for a while, and gone my way and forgotten it. But that was the pearl of great price, the one field that had treasure in it. I realise now that I must give all that I have to possess it. Life is not hurrying on to a receding future, nor hankering after an imagined past. It is the turning aside like Moses to the miracle of the lit bush, to a brightness that seemed as transitory as your youth once, but is the eternity that awaits you.” — The Bright Field, R. S. Thomas Photo Essay by Jenni ..read more

By Rachel Nevergall @rachelnevergall Step 1. Quit your job. This isn’t how you want to start. But this is what happens. The thing is, you always believed you could be a working mom. After all, your mom was, and her mom before her. They leaned in, showed up, so of course you would, too. In fact, you chose a career that would allow for this flexibility. A therapist can set her own hours, and you know how important it is for moms to have control. Bless your heart.  With your approaching due date, you set your preparations into motion. You plan the perfect maternity leave. (You will do nothi ..read more

By Michelle Windsor @michellevwindsor I am already full when he interrupts me. I have over-consumed again. Binged  on the latest horror stories until my stomach hurts and my heart aches. What happened, mama? he asks, and offers me crumbs of concern, crusts of empathy. I am not hungry. I am jealous of his innocence of his freedom of not knowing of the lightness of his heart and mind. I pull him into my lap. Press my face  into what is left of the baby fat on his cheek. Feed him something  that is more fiction than truth. Satisfied, he escapes into a tent made of blankets and ima ..read more

By Rebecca Smyth @rebsmyth At first, I don’t hear the question.  I’m sitting in a sticky leather chair, one hand bearing the full weight of the baby at my breast and the other releasing a toddler’s curls from the clutches of two tween girls. The noise level of a group of three-year-old boys playing cars rivals the Belfast traffic outside. It’s my turn to volunteer in the church creche and there’s no other way to describe the scene in front of me except absolutely feral.  Eventually I realize one of the tween girls has asked me a question. “How long have you been friends with her bro ..read more

By Jenna Brack @jennabrackwriting I stand at the edge of a gravel parking lot and stare across an open field of green grass, sparsely dotted with clover. The flat earth stretches out, unhindered, until it meets a small farm: wooden barns with low rooflines, a cluster of cows moving their heads up and down, a tractor connected to a red plow. To my right, a line of wind turbines slowly rotates against a gray sky, the clouds heavy with rain. The scene feels strangely familiar—it has an almost, but not quite quality—as though if I squint and pull myself back in time, this seamlessly flat earth an ..read more

By Sophie Smith @sophiesmithphotography Artist Note: There is magic in the mundane, if you know where to look. Taking photos of my children helped me find it. When I have my camera in my hand, I notice the details: the way my daughter’s ringlets curl and bounce in the light, the way the water droplets catch the sun all around her in the harsh summer sun. We stop and see the insects and the snails. Autumn light shifts and hits the walls a little earlier each day and my boy makes dragon shadows on the walls. Another winter meal-making becomes magical as late afternoon sunshine shines in and ma ..read more