Hostile Territory

When I became pregnant with our oldest child a month after getting married at the beginning of my junior year of college, I had to fight for her life. Not physically, but verbally. I had to fight for her right to life, for recognition of the beauty her new life was. Surprisingly, some of her biggest critics were students and professors at my small Christian school. From snide comments about a “rush wedding” (I would hardly call a wedding planned a year in advance “rushed”) to questions asking me “Just how many days pregnant are you, anyway? And how many days have you been married?” I began dreading people finding out about my pregnancy.

I recall one professor late in my pregnancy asking me when my due date was. When I told him, he looked at me and told me about a young couple he knew who had gotten pregnant immediately following their wedding day. Their baby was born a month early with a normal birth weight, and everyone wondered if the couple had lied about the actual due date to cover up their sin. He then lowered his glasses, looked me straight in the eye, and, raising one eyebrow, told me that he hoped our baby didn’t show up early because “you know what everyone is going to think!”

I became a bit of a scandal on campus, with those not knowing me assuming I was pregnant and not married (“*gasp* Did you hear we have a pregnant class president?!” “Really?! Why hasn’t the administration kicked her out?!”—true conversation overheard) and those marginally knowing me wondering a) had I gotten pregnant before we got married and b) why was I throwing my life and career away by having a baby so soon after marriage—and still in school?!

The focus on the potential negative aspects of my pregnancy came as a shock to me. For one thing, I was at a conservative Christian college where children are purportedly celebrated. Secondly, even if the timing wasn’t ideal, why was there so much focus and insinuation rather than support or encouragement?

The negativity from students and professors didn’t stop with my pregnancy, however, or with believers. Soon after giving birth, hormones amuck and me struggling to figure out the world of caring for a child, I would venture out in public and be stopped by all manner of people. Strangers would comment on how beautiful she was and then warn me, “Enjoy it now—it won’t last and soon you’ll be wishing she was a newborn again!” or “You think it’s hard now—just wait until it really gets hard.” When she started talking and I posted about it on Facebook, rather than excited comments, I received ones saying, “Just wait a little bit longer and you’ll be wishing she would STOP talking” and “Trust me—it won’t be long and you won’t be quite so excited!!”

As a mom in the middle of the night, sleep-deprived, baby tugging at me and husband sleeping across the room, I recall sobbing as I remembered several old-time mothers who told me to “Cherish every moment. Before you know it, your baby is grown up and out of the house and you are left all alone.” Yikes! Already highly emotional and wrapping my exhausted mind around the fact that I had a child, I was picturing her going away to college…getting married…having children…and then me standing there at her gravesite. I know that some of those moms were trying to be helpful and encourage me to not let other things get in the way over prioritizing my children, but the strenuous nature in which they told me their own stories and emphasized how fast life goes and how much regret you have later only served to deepen my post-partum despair and guilt.

Since that point I have had another live child (now a healthy almost-two-year-old) and two miscarriages at 5 weeks and a baby boy at 16 weeks.  I have grown hesitant to post things on Facebook and think critically about every general status I post regarding my children, wondering warily, “Is there someone who is going to tell me, “Just wait until….”? (I can’t even count the number of people who have told me some variant of, “Just wait until they’re teenagers and then you’ll wish they had never been born.”)

 Similarly, there is a mommies’ group that I am a part of where I have grown careful about what I post. Many moms post funny stories from their day, but the few times I have or the many times I have read another mom’s post, rather than fellow mothers commenting with laughter or funny tie-ins of their own, many post unsolicited advice or tell you that “You know you don’t really have to do _________ that way.” Where is the encouragement? The camaraderie? The rejoicing with those who rejoice? Why all this judgment and negativity?

Rachel Jankovic succinctly states, "Everywhere you go, people want to talk about your children. Why you shouldn’t have had them, how you could have prevented them, and why they would never do what you have done. They want to make sure you know that you won’t be smiling anymore when they are teenagers. All this at the grocery store, in line, while your children listen."

I understand the secular world taking issue with my children. I understand that I come from a different place in how I view the gift of my girls. I don’t understand believers’ negativity, and I don’t understand believers’ discouragement towards other mothers. Yes, sometimes your experiences can help another mother. Sometimes you need to share the ugly details. Life isn’t all picnics and dessert. But I can see very few situations where it is okay to throw out your own “Just wait until…” that detracts from a new mother’s delight in her children. Celebrate with her, rejoice with her. Encourage her. Very possibly yours might be the only outside source of encouragement she receives all day.

This author, in an article well-worth the read, summarizes my thoughts marvelously—much more succinctly and prettily than I could possibly. She includes quotes from several other women—my favourite being from Rachel Jankovic: “Christian mothers carry their children in hostile territory. When you are in public with them, you are standing with, and defending, the objects of cultural dislike. You are publicly testifying that you value what God values, and that you refuse to value what the world values. You stand with the defenseless and in front of the needy. You represent everything that our culture hates, because you represent laying down your life for another—and laying down your life for another represents the gospel.”