shame | No Fear, Just Hope

Motherhood

SORRY FOR BEING JUDGMENTAL.

October 14, 2020

I looked at her and judged her. It was not the first time I was judging a fellow mom or woman whom I did not even know.

This past Sunday, I was driving to the supermarket and at the stop-lights, I saw this pregnant woman with her cute bump. I smiled until I saw the cigarette in her hands, then my smile quickly faded. I thought to myself “how could she?”.

I continued on and as I tried to find a parking spot, my eyes locked with this African lady at the entrance of the supermarket. My first impression was, “gorgeous lady with beautiful hair”.I am always fascinated by African hairstyles when I see one, especially here in Maastricht where we have limited hairstylist options.

I walked to the entrance and just before I smiled and nodded my head, she raised her other hand to smoke. It was obvious how quickly my smile faded again. I thought to myself again “Why is she doing that?”. It wasn’t the first time I was seeing a woman smoke, but I think it’s the thought of seeing an African smoke that got to me.

There are so many instances I could mention. One time, I was delivering food to one of the single mothers our church supports, and each time I came in, the kids were either eating plain french fries or candy. She on the other hand was smoking, the house was awful and at that time, she was expecting another child. I thought to myself, if I was the one, I would at least use that little money to cook healthy inexpensive meals.

Why do we do this really? Judge people from our high chairs. The judging continues among mothers or women raising kids. It is like we are in a contest for the best and perfect mom in the world. I do not know where perfect moms exist but I do know that loving moms very much present.

Every mother believes they are doing the best they can for their families and children. If you ask them, they will also tell you that their kids are the best and the most gorgeous. Let’s honest, as outsiders, we are often the ones who see others through the filters of our own standards and that’s when we see their faults and where they fall short.

For example, when I was expecting my eldest daughter, the midwife asked me several times whether I was going to breastfeed. I found it shocking that choosing not to breastfeed was even an option.

Later that year, a friend had a baby and she struggled to breastfeed as she did not have milk, even though she wanted to do it. Another friend had less milk production but the baby had a tied lip so the milk dried up. My younger sister was the same, she did not have milk with her eldest son and tried many things like lactation cookies but nothing worked. With her second born, she had more than plenty and even had to freeze some.

We also hear of mothers who do not wish to breastfeed. One friend of mine also chose not to breastfeed and requested for the medicine to stop the milk production. I could not imagine it!. I thought ” how does a mother with milk refuse to breastfeed her child”?

Fast forward 3 years later when my youngest had the worst case of eczema and I battled with the decision of whether to stop breastfeeding or continue. I was not sure whether it was my milk that she was reacting to and I did not want to see her suffer.

So when I finally made the decision to stop, I wanted a quick fix and I could not handle expressing the milk and pouring it away, so I went to the doctor for the medicine, only to be told that they stopped giving it a few years back. I was crushed!

I now was left with the traditional way of stopping milk production which was not for the faint-hearted. It brought back painful memories of when I was producing so much milk after I had given birth to my angel baby. At that time, I had the milk but no baby to feed it to. But now, I had both the milk and the baby but did not know if my milk was hurting her.

Later on, when the dermatologist found out I had stopped breastfeeding, he was disappointed. So you see, I was the same one who thought I would always breastfeed my kids until the milk ran out on its own but here I was stopping just before six months and was even considering medication.

This is the same thing I judged most mothers for opting for. Producing breast milk is not a given when you have a baby, it is not automatic like we have often imagined and we should not take it for granted. Nowadays I tell pregnant mothers those am close to, “ Please take care of yourself, breastfeed as much, and as long you can or feel comfortable to do and if you do not want to do it, do not beat yourself about it”.

BEING JUDGMENTAL – Picture by Kelli-mcclintock.

In Dare to Lead, Brené Brown said “I know my life is better when I work from the assumption that everyone is doing the best they can.” When we all believe that each person is doing the best they can, we will choose to be kind and patient with them.

We need to stop judging parents who choose to formula feed their children. We may never know whether they struggled from one lactation class to the other and the numerous lactation cookies they ate like my sister. Bottom line is, we were not there when they were struggling, so who are we to judge.

When my daughter had eczema and cried all night, we had to co-sleep with her for some time so she felt that warmth and was not alone. Before this, I had a list of do’s and do not and co-sleeping was one of the practices I raised my eyebrows for. Nowadays, I say ” make sure baby is safe and no extra blankets and pillows on the bed and you are good to go”.

The same candy I saw the single mother stuff her kids with was the same lollipop my youngest was sucking on at 15 months after her sister had made her taste it and was now was rubbing it in her face refusing to give her. I had vowed not to give her candy until she was in preschool but here I was shouting “ give it to her’’! because, I was making dinner and did not have the time to console a 15-month-old baby who had just tasted candy for the first time and realized this is something we had been keeping from her.

When I had my eldest daughter, I was a busy full-time student and worked 2 jobs but I still vowed to make her healthy home cooked meals. I did this for a year until she could eat with us. When I saw people buying the ready meal jars, I always wondered why they didn’t create time and make food for their kids.

Yesterday during my lunch break, I decided to go get diapers. When I reached the shop, I see ready made meals from this brand I know is good and they have several items on a massive discount. What did I do? I took 20 meals and threw in some exotic fruit jars as well. I walked back to the office proud but also mesmerized by my transformation and how I had changed. What happened to my ‘healthy home made meals’?

I thought loudly. I think the last time I made her own baby food was 6 months ago. Now she either eats with us or I get the baby food the same ones, I could not bring myself to buy whenever we are having french fries or pizza ourselves for dinner.

We all know that not all children are the same, and none is born to the same kind of mother. Each mother has her own sets of skills and character. We have those who are patient, good listeners but we also know those who get angry quickly and those who are overwhelmed and grumpy.

What we miss and fail to know is that the mother who just snapped at her child at the playground or supermarket is usually the calmest mother around. However, on that said day, she lost it due to being up all night with a sick child or because she worrying where the next meal will come from.

I remember when Amirah had extreme eczema and she was up all night scratching until I started putting colored bed sheets on her bed instead of white ones because the white became all red when you picked her up in the morning. For several nights she cried and I also cried with her.

I remember the night when I found myself talking to myself and also shouting at her “ please sleep!” “stop crying, am tired” as if she could understand me. My shouting at her or when I complain about some petty thing that my kids did, does not in any way mean that I do not love my children or that I am not grateful for them.

The same goes for all other women, we are just overstretched, overwhelmed but still very grateful mothers in need of a break. Give us that break and we will be the same ones running home having missed those little rascals.

As a full-time working away from home mom, I need to be gracious to the stay at home mom who was home all day and her home is untidy and kids unkempt. I love to clean and can clean even in my sleep. When I only had one child, I had trouble understanding people with unkempt houses, I thought to myself “do they see the mess”?

For me, cleaning my house came naturally and it was something that had to be done. Fast forward years later, I have a younger daughter who feels like she is in a Montessori setting everywhere she is. She loves picking different items, objects, and toys and dropping them anywhere in the house as she goes around the space. So picking after her becomes a challenging task.

Now my motto is, it can be unkempt with things scattered so long as floors are not sticky. For those staying at home or those at work but with older children, please do not judge those of us who work full-time, away from our kids, or have to leave work early on days the daycare calls us.

We love our kids dearly as well and mummy guilt is already playing the mind game with us. The other areas where we women tend to judge other mothers is regarding discipline and those who choose not to discipline and say ” it is ok, they are just children and will outgrow this behavior”.

Let us also not judge those mothers that choose to breastfeed their toddlers especially in public or have four year old walking with pacifiers in their mouths on the streets as they talk. We do know where they are coming from and who are we to judge them by only having a small preview of that little moment in their life.

In the world now of social media and screen times, we are quick to judge parents who allow lots of screen time to their kids. During schools days, I do not allow TV (cartoon time) in the morning, unless the kids woke up too early. However, on some days, I am running late and I just needed 10 minutes to get ready.

So, what do I do is, I put TV on and tell my eldest to watch the youngest while I got ready and she distracts her. If you walked in, you would wonder “ why are kids watching TV instead of heading to school?’’. However, that is the perfect example of all us, we only have a small window into people’s lives, yet we judge them in full measure.

Let us cut some slack the new mom at the office, who has to leave early each day or miss several days of work because of sick kids while we cover for her. If we only put ourselves in her feet, we would find out that each day after she drops the kids off at daycare, she comes to the office dreading each phone calls he receives, thinking it is the daycare calling her to pick up her kids.

Motherhood is tough and as women and mothers, we need to support each other and not seek recognition for the things we do better than other mothers.

In what ways have you found yourself judging other people? Please share.

Be kind to one another.

Nelly.

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Faith over Fear Family Life & Marriage Motherhood Shame

ASSURANCE WHEN FEARFUL ~ AN ENCOURAGEMENT FOR SINGLE MOTHERS

June 10, 2020

As a single mother of four I wanted to invite you into my journey to shed some light on some of the challenges I have faced as a single mother, and to encourage us as I write from a place of strength but also to make everyone aware of how they may have wrongfully judged single parents who are just trying to make ends meet in a clean way.

My story is long but I want to share in bits the journey of raising children single-handedly especially in a community that regards single mums as lesser beings.

When the world gives you lemons word has it that you should make lemonade out of it and well the process of making lemonade for a single mom may be next to impossible. Facing the world around me sometimes can be so depressing as I can’t control what society thinks of me. I can’t have male friends and peace in the same basket.

My job as a designer for both male and female attires has made me work on projects for couples and delivered good results because I am passionate about what I do. However, in many instances, I have later lost clients the moment they realized that I am a single mom.

Work goes perfectly well and even during fitting you see the husbands openly appreciating my work but the next thing I hear is they are no longer interested and it is usually the women (wives) calling or texting to cancel. It is like they start feeling insecure and threatened. I feel like it is also how society perceives single mothers, it’s like if you succeed or are doing well and have no husband, people assume you are probably being helped by a certain man and he is probably married.

The society does not categories us as victors or people who can stand on their own. It is like we need man to be our anchor. On many occasions I have had to ask God where does that leave me? because to me, He is my only refuge, He has picked me up from a messy miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and if my work and results is seen as an opportunity to break marriages, my heart turns to Him for assurance that I can still hold my head high and use my gift to fend for my children.

On one instance, I remember someone commented on a friends photo how his shirt was was nicely done and my friend who had seen the post , knowing my work, tagged me. For me, seeing my work being loved and appreciated was something really motivating especially coming from the humble beginings where I was struggling to fully accept and walk in the abundance that I am gifted.

So I immediately connected with the guy and ended up having a business date. After the appointment for fitting and deciding designs, fabric, and all that stuff, I made him the first shirt and he loved it so much that he started placing orders of 4 shirts each month. He seemed to be a busy guy, so every time I was done, he just requested I post/deliver the shirts wherever he was.

I did this faithfully until his wife called me one time. To my surprise, she had been discussing me with a relative of mine with whom they were friends and their plan was to attack me and they actually did this, saying all manner of things and calling me names.

I have seen this a lot in my circle of single mothers in businesses that involve them be of service to men whether married or not. It is very difficult to convince other people that one can be single at an age like mine and still be a virtuous woman. That you can have male friends in your circle as a single mom and still maintain respect.

The wives harshly judge and put me in a box labeled “ husband snatcher’ just because I am single. I can not blame those who have been hurt because of single business women who instead of offering professional services, they instead went ahead and made advances on the client’s husbands.

However, it is wrong to judge and talk ill about single mothers who are struggling and working hard to get clean business deals so they can make a living. In most cases, even when it was the only project at hand, I decided to save my name and I chose myself. I always choose and love myself. God has been faithful to always come through for me and my children in such moments when I had to let a project go.

Jeremiah 147:3 is clear that he heals the broken-hearted and binds their wounds. This has always been my encouragement word from the bible. No matter how much people hurt me out there, no matter what they say about me, there is that person who heals my broken heart. I pray that my heart and those of any other person going through this will be strongly rooted in Christ, so we can only believe His voice of truth and not easily be broken but what society says or judges.

My faith and knowing my identity in Christ has made me let those clients go in peace without fighting back, even if it meant seeing my children’s school fees walk out in my eyes. It is always interesting that after I have gone at lengths to refer them to other designers, they always end up coming back to me out of disappointments.

I thank God because it is clear that what He brings my way, no matter what society thinks, remains my portion of His providence in my life. He continues to look out for me in the midst of the noises and misjudgments. Therefore, I will not be discouraged by what someone else thinks of me. I will not give up on my talent for mere talk and noise made to distract me from walking my journey and using my talent to bless others.

In the middle of all these, through Christ’s strength and grace, I have also learned to come home with my head lifted up no matter what stigma comes with being single. As single parents especially mothers, we still have a long way to go. As God fights the noises for us, let us learn to mind our own business, seek His wisdom, discernment and clarity on what assignments to take and those to pass. I have learned to be quick in listening rather than responding in anger. If I have to talk then I must be mindful of what I would say so it doesn’t hurt another person.

I have had to ask for God’s ‘green light’ when I sensed that a certain project would face objection, He has always come through for me, sometimes I do not even need to turn them down, they just all of a sudden give an excuse that something came up ~ it is just God’s way of clearing the path for me. As He sys in His word Isaiah 45:2 ‘.I will go before you And make the crooked places straight; I will break in pieces the gates of bronze And cut the bars of iron.’’

I just want to tell the married women and those who have fallen into this, I would like to just say to you my fellow women, single moms also deserve respect. Some of us are single by circumstances, be it death, divorce, separation, estranged husband, parenting outside of wed-lock, by choice or whatever the case may be.

In the beginning of my single parent journey, this bothered me a lot because I was dealing with a lot of other loads of baggage. However, today am more stronger than ever with my head lifted high because am a virtuous woman and I know who God says I am. We are not virtuous because of our actions. God knows I have had my own share of mistakes and falling short. However, God has made us virtuous because of the Holly Spirit living in our hearts, nudging us to show grace, love deeper, forgive graciously , accept forgiveness without shame or condemnation because we are not perfect but we push harder every single day making our lives worthy of the sacrifice that He gave for us. This is how we get our badges of virtuous women.

I daily seek God to have a clean virtuous badge, that He can see me worthy and call me ‘good and faithful servant’.

I lean on His promises and HIs voice of truth. So, to you mama who is just starting this journey and all your lady friends do not want to hung out with you when they are with their husbands or have cut you out of those previous house gatherings and brunches, know that it gets better and it might be a great time for you to start thanking God for them revealing their character as friends, because a friend would not do that. Learn to put your trust in God, He who started the good work in you (yes, even the heart ache that does not look good) will see it to completion. Hold on, He is there with you every step of the way.

To every single mom out there, your greatest inspiration on earth is your child/children, be the best for them, be positive for them, for every child is a plan of God and every heart break is a sweet music.

Remember, at every cock crow at dawn, please shake the bitterness off and get out there and do what you do best in everything you do especially, raising your children to be the best versions of themselves, as your kids are cheerleading for you even when it doesn’t feel like it. You are everything they have.

You may be single moms today but we all aspire to raise the best future wives and husbands in our children and no one is helping you out, the stigma is unbearable, the society scandalizes you but it’s all about us, how we deal with these lemons, becauseto be honest, our integrity is alwaysat stake.

We cannot stoop low to their level of ignorance /misinformation/ insecurity and mis-judging, instead we rise above that. Let us remember that we are special in God’s eyes and he has our backs. Open wide your ears to listen and not to fight back in hurtful words, all the obstacles in your path are just corner stones to build you up to greatness. Your greatest achievement is raising a great person. Never ever give up. Never ever be bitter, never ever fight back. God has your back. Just be a virtuous woman and Much love.

My prayer for those women blessed to be in relationships is, for them to look up to God upon whom our identity is founded upon. Your identity is not built on mortal beings but on the one who has called you to be like Him and to love others as you love yourself. In doing this, you will find assurance when fearful.

Much love,

Eva Oguna.

ASSURANCE WHEN FEARFUL — Eva Oguna is a single mother of 3 boys and one girl. She loves singing and is passionate about training other single women to be economically stable.

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Emotions Motherhood Shame

Episode 3 : behavior and experiences influence on parenting.

May 20, 2020

Unmasking Gods’ grace.

#Recap We have seen that we need to let go of perfectionism and instead we can strive for excellence and high standards.

Remember that you are enough, you’ve got what it takes and you are God’s workmanship created for all good works.

Christ came to make is perfect by taking our sins and imperfections. We went ahead and dug deeper to see the root of perfectionism. Mine came from the physical and emotional torture (abuse) from high school and being brought up in an environment where punishments were the order of the day. It made one grow up to assume that violence =good results. We should not spare the rod, but lets find our ways to discipline our children without humiliating them.

behavior and experiences influence on parenting

Let’s remember that our personalities and our up bringing definitely influences how we relate to our children and also triggerstheir behaviour. The only way of punishment I knew was corporal punishment and spanking.

It was humiliating and brought shame, fear of criticism and disappointing others or failing. Knowing this, why do I automatically want to do it to my children , to get their attention? I have done it twice and after the last one, I don’t think I will do it again.

God’s grace is sufficient for me. All I have to do is 1st forgive myself and all those who punished me and didn’t relate the consequences or punishment with the misbehaviour, which makes one shut down and feel like its about them failing and not having made a bad decision.

Going forward, I pray we all find disciplinary actions that are full of empathy. Forgive yourself if you chose the ‘wrong ‘ way. We all know when we did that. That high yelling we did..etc.

Please share your views on what has worked for your family. My husband was raised in a culture where everything is brought to the table and openly discussed. I on the other hand, never had dialogue with an adult and violence was used to get our attention but also, assumed to equate good behaviour.

Let’s help each other.
God bless
Nelly.
#Shame #doesspankinghelp #TheAdultOrTheChild #IsSpankingAbuse Or #Violence #WhatDoYouDo. I still do not understand how kids are sent to their rooms as punishment, same way one might be surprised why I have spanked my child a few times.

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Shame

Cont: Esd 2 ~ Healing from Shame : Roots of perfectionism.

May 20, 2020

Cont.~ Unmasking God’s Grace:

Where Does Your Perfectionism Stem From ? {shame, fear of failing, making mistakes and disappointing people, not meeting people’s expectations……}

In the 1st video, I talked about perfectionism and how it is unhealthy because , it is only Christ who came for the imperfect us , to make us perfect. If He found us perfect, where would that leave His son?.

We saw how perfectionism is unattainable , it makes you feel you have it all figured out but in the end , what we get is an exhausted person and unhealthy destructive self talk. We are instead called to live a life worthy of His sacrifice and it may look like having high standards for doing stuff but not perfectionism, our word for that session was, 2Cor 12:9 His grace is sufficient for you, his power is made perfect in weakness.

Today, I figured, it wasn’t fair just to brush off perfectionism without looking deeper and seeing where it stems from.

This might be a longer continuation of last episode but its important.

I mentioned, I will try to share most things and emotions that I have worked through so you can meet me at a place of strength but this one, is bigger than me, I have worked through the most important part and thus feel ready and wise to share this.

If you suffer from perfectionism, try to look deeper and see where is comes from.

Healing from Shame

But before we go to that.

Have you ever thought that you are enough? That you’ve got what it takes? and its not in terms of achievements, because that would mean, being satisfied with even mediocre work, saying “hey I don’t need to do anything” but its more than this. It is about your feeling of belonging, worth and value.

For me, it began when I started high school. I started to learn that the students with good grades were valued more. They were certainly treated differently by teachers. Therefore, in the four years of high school, the shame, fear of failing, making mistakes and disappointing people, not meeting people’s expectations begun in my life.

I have found myself saying yes to many things because I did not want others to criticize my under performance. Which means, I hate confrontations, if something does not go against my principles, I will let you win the discussion or argument.

Unmasking God’s Grace part 2: Healing from SHAME:

Please take a look for yourself what shame means.
“shame is an unpleasant self-conscious emotion typically associated with a negative evaluation of the self; withdrawal motivations; and feelings of distress, exposure, mistrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness.”

But many of us will say, it is more than just a feeling because you live it. You are in the front seat of it, so it cant be a feeling.

It took me being part of some therapy and writing a biography about my life for me to finally see it.

I remember, I once broke down at the office in front of my colleagues, and my boss mentionef that it may be seen as a sign of weakness. Coming from my culture, yes it is seen as weakness but knowing what I know now, I did not cry for weakness.

I broke down, because I had worked hard so much to produce ‘perfect’ results which wasn’t seen by someone who made a mistake and didn’t even care. I broke down as I felt sorry for that individual for not being able to see their fault and because it was like I had failed.

Before motherhood, my striving for perfectionism was a counter effect of coping against shame, judgement and blame. I wanted to prove that I can do better. Even though, those I was trying to prove myself to, were no where near my life. Its the continuous struggle to belong , feel noticed, to be good enough. I was trying to earn approval from external standards made by man.

After marriage, I did it because , I wanted to be the perfect wife and after motherhood, I did not want to be blamed for unruly kids, untidy house, untidy kids. For me, it reflected to me as having failed and not that my actions fell short. You feel like you have failed, just like how I was brought up, being a good kid meant helping out, saying yes, didn’t talk back, didn’t question authority and so on.

I was in a spiral and it took me losing my daughter 2 years ago and almost losing my life, to finally try and let go of all unhealthy expectations. Being hospitalized meant I wasn’t home to control how things were being done, or what conditioner my husband was using on I-J’s hair. Life happened and it did not take me lifting my finger but only God’s grace.

So, have you ever told your self that you are enough?

Remember, you’ve Got What It Takes. Our scripture for today is,

Ephesians 2:10 “10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them”.

God Bless you,
Nelly.

Below is some words, I have written about in the book, the rest, you will have to see in the book 😉

…Over the years, discussions have emerged on alumni pages on how most students have gone on to emotionally suffer from the mental torture if not physical torture that they experienced in high school. If I try hard, my justification for these actions would be,maybe they assumed that bringing up students in a very strict environment and asserting too much pressure on them caused them to excel in their studies.

Do not get me wrong; our high school scored really well on national level. The school has produced high professionals in top professions. On the other hand, it has also led to rebels, students who always found themselves on the wrong side of the law because they were guilty of petty mistakes yet tortured for it and not corrected or made to understand the nature of the mistake.

For example, those found walking on the school pavements instead of running to class were punished by kneeling on gravel in the scorching sun for a several hours, getting whipped on their behinds over and over or digging a trench on a rough terrain.

The bell would ring again, and it was assembly time. Those of us on the wrong side of the law would not know what mode of punishment awaited us. Could it be because of the chatting we were doing in class even if it meant asking questions to a classmate, or was it because I was wearing my socks to the ankle and not pulled up to the knee as it was supposed to be?

Assembly time was like facing the judge, where the accusers, the class or dormitory prefects, would call out your names and you would match forward; it was always a walk of shame with all teachers and whole school present. Most of the time, you would be belittled depending on which part of the country one came from, how well off your parents were or were not.

I remember how some of my classmates were belittled on how they would never amount anything because of their accents but have gone to become powerful attorneys in the country. In school, you were shamed for the things you did and not corrected for the mistakes. Therefore, no lesson was learned except not repeating the action again for the fear of being ridiculed. It only made you feel like a failure, doomed for nothing and not you just having made a bad decision.

This over-assertion of power on innocent students made me always be on guard, constantly checking myself and wanting to prove myself. I wanted my actions to be louder and to be seen. I do not even know why.

All I knew is that I wanted to deflect from the feeling of being shamed, and the only way of coping was to get attention by doing the opposite of what was asked. Being favoured or worthy meant pleasing students in power or teachers or even pretending so that you are seen as good and accepted. I wanted my own terms, and that landed me the title of arrogant and a position at the ‘able and unwilling’ group of students.

This meant that we were smart, capable, but not willing to put any effort in learning. Thinking of it now more than 15years later, I think this was sheer abuse of the highest order.

These are the same teachers given the mandate to bring us up and train us to be leaders of tomorrow, but here they were, shaming us and belittling us. When you did not learn the same method that was proposed or forced upon, you were seen as not trying enough. Forgetting that we all learn at different paces and pursuing different methods, one method does not fit all in any education system……..to be continued.

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