Not Wonder Woman

Last week I had a bit of a mommy meltdown.  The funny part is I can't even remember what started it, but I'm pretty sure it was one kid complaining about being asked to do something and then maybe another one grumbling about something else.  It wasn't anything big, but for whatever reason I had had it.  For the next few minutes those kids heard my frustrations and they knew they had crossed the line.  Once everyone had calmed down, including me, we had a debrief.  

It came down to this - I like being a happy mom.  They like me when I am happy.  They don't like doing work, but they know they'll eventually have to do it, so why not do it right away?  I'm happy when they obey, so why not just obey?  It's Romans 7....and I paraphrase, "For I do not do what I want to do and I what I don't want to do I keep on doing!  O wretched man am I!"

The thing that saved the whole situation was Numbers 11.  I had literally just been reading and writing about that chapter for a devotional for the homeschool group.  I may as well have substituted the Israelites for my children.  In that chapter all the Israelites do is complain, grumble and push Moses to the brink of insanity, which is how I felt that night with my own kids.   Read how the Israelites behave:

And the people complained in the hearing of the Lord about their misfortunes, and when the Lord heard it, his anger was kindled, and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some outlying parts of the camp. 2 Then the people cried out to Moses, and Moses prayed to the Lord, and the fire died down. 3 So the name of that place was called Taberah,[a] because the fire of the Lord burned among them.

4 Now the rabble that was among them had a strong craving. And the people of Israel also wept again and said, “Oh that we had meat to eat! 5 We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. 6 But now our strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.”

So they were mad about "their misfortunes", read: chores.  Then they were mad about what they were fed, read:  my kids and whatever I feed them for a meal or a snack.  They were mad about their boring life, eating manna day in and day out, read:  lockdown, can't go anywhere, blah, blah, blah.  The Israelites had such nerve.  They wanted their old life.  Yeah, well, sorry, don't we all.  My own kids want it to be how it was, but that just isn't going to happen.  They want summer when it is winter.  They want winter when it is summer.  They want to see people when all they have are siblings.  They want a new house when all they have is an old house.  The list goes on and on.  And, not unlike the Israelites who have seen so many mind-boggling miracles, we, too, have COUNTLESS examples of how God has provided and worked in our lives.  We have been reading the blog/book that my sister had printed out for my birthday.  It has recorded stories that I had even forgotten about.  We have had actual miracles over the last ten years that would blow anyone away.  To read them again is amazing.  But if we forget, I guess it makes sense that the Israelites forgot, too.  Just this month we have had a really unique miracle, not unlike the Israelites and their manna.  For years we've had oatmeal for breakfast.  The kids have gotten tired of it, so with all the eggs from our chickens, I've shaken it up a bit and made more interesting breakfasts lately, but still, all they want are bagels and cereal.  I refuse to buy cereal.  I just can't get my head around how awful it is for them to eat, so if I do buy it, it is on a birthday, maybe.  Bagels are their favourite though, but again, they go through them so fast, so when I buy them they are gone.  A few weeks ago I got a text from a friend asking I wanted to get some baked goods, like bagels and muffins, from a bakery that had leftovers at the end of the day.  Uh, sure?  On literally Christmas Eve, someone dropped a bag of baked goods off and they were amazing....and free!  Now, every week, I get two bags of these free baked goods.  I still don't know how this all came about.  It is another amazing story of God's provision as far as I'm concerned.  How do the kids not see this?!   The irony, bagels kind of make me think of manna.  The Israelites got sick of manna.  My kids got sick of oatmeal and so God gives them bagels, which are kind of like manna in my mind.  Hopefully they won't get sick of bagels,  But, nevertheless, the Israelites did forget and my kids forget.  So what happens next is almost funny.  

Moses loses it.   This made me feel a little bit better as he is a solid guy, but he simply had his fill.  What he says is actually really amusing:

Moses heard the people weeping throughout their clans, everyone at the door of his tent. And the anger of the Lord blazed hotly, and Moses was displeased. 11 Moses said to the Lord, “Why have you dealt ill with your servant? And why have I not found favor in your sight, that you lay the burden of all this people on me? 12 Did I conceive all this people? Did I give them birth, that you should say to me, ‘Carry them in your bosom, as a nurse carries a nursing child,’ to the land that you swore to give their fathers? 13 Where am I to get meat to give to all this people? For they weep before me and say, ‘Give us meat, that we may eat.’ 14 I am not able to carry all this people alone; the burden is too heavy for me. 15 If you will treat me like this, kill me at once, if I find favor in your sight, that I may not see my wretchedness.”

He is basically saying, "Hey, it's not like they are actually MY children, right?  I didn't conceive them or anything, so I guess I don't really have any responsibility for their behaviour.  I want out of this contract.  All they do is complain.  I have no way to give them what they want.  I can't satisfy any of their dumb cravings.  I'm out.  This is too much for me.  I'm feeling suicidal thoughts - take me now."  That sounds like a major meltdown to me.  The ironic part of his tantrum is that he says, "Did I conceive all this people?  Did I give them birth...?"  Ha!  No, he did not, but I DID!!!!  So, technically, he could have gotten out of his contract, but I do NOT have that option!  I laughed.  I was not on the brink of suicide, but emotionally, perhaps I felt like Moses did.  Kids cannot see what they are doing to their mom until it's too late sometimes.  My kids crossed the line that day.

So, that night, we literally talked about how me and Moses were one and the same.  I told them how they were just like the Israelites, complaining, being "rabble" as the Bible describes them, which according to a definition I looked up means "a disorderly mob".  Yup, that's about it.  I told them how it was so similar to the way it was described in Numbers, "the anger of the Lord blazed hotly and Moses was displeased".  My anger blazed hotly for sure and I was also so displeased.  But Moses showed us all what to do - cry out to the Lord.  That's what he did, so we cried out to the Lord, too.  For forgiveness for our complaining and grumbling spirit, for literally being "rabble", for pushing Mom to the brink, just like Moses.  

In Numbers, after crying out God tells Moses what to do.  There is in fact a solution to his woes, "Get help!"

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Gather for me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and officers over them, and bring them to the tent of meeting, and let them take their stand there with you. 17 And I will come down and talk with you there. And I will take some of the Spirit that is on you and put it on them, and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, so that you may not bear it yourself alone.

I told the kids, these tasks they are given aren't as a punishment.  They are so we help mom, to keep her sane!  I am not meant to "Bear it alone".  The children are gifts to me and are not unlike the "seventy men" that God sends to Moses.  Some of the spirit of Mom can be passed on to the children so that the burden of housework, etc., can be on them as well.  All of us had our eyes opened to how amazing Scripture is, how incredibly applicable it is to us.  It is just so incredible to me that I was reading and writing on that passage literally hours earlier and then to have it come so alive to me and to all of us in that moment.

This is the thing....meltdowns are never good, however, in this case, my kids saw that I was having a hard time.  I think their eyes were opened up to the fact they were the cause or at least the trigger.  I think they actually felt remorse and that they wanted to not have that happen again.  What I noticed over the course of the next few days is that they started to catch themselves in their pattern of complaining and grumbling, towards everything, school, chores, food, wanting to go somewhere or buy something....it turns out they complain more than they realized!  As soon as it would start I would quickly remind them, "No more complaining", "We're getting rid of the grumbling spirit in our home", "remember the Israelites".  The complaining would start and then would quickly stop.  They knew they didn't want a mommy meltdown again.  They knew it was within their power to help me or harm me and I think for the first time they realized it was just a bad pattern, a bad habit, this complaining.  It is hardly perfect, but we are well on our way to new behaviours.  I didn't love the whole experience, but it showed the kids that I am human, not Wonder Woman, and that I desperately need their help, good attitudes, less complaining and more contentment, so for that, I am grateful for the experience.  And, again, I'm so grateful for Moses, for the fact this story was even recorded in Scripture.  I swear it was written just for me..