Sometimes the responsibilities that come with my role as a mom of two special needs children feels overwhelming. So many people have told me that Josiah and Bethany Grace chose us as parents and that God must think a lot of us to give us two children with extra special needs. Some days I wonder what it would be like to have typical children without the special needs. But then I have just erased the most wonderful and beautiful aspects of my children and an opportunity to depend more on Jesus. My two children are precious and I love them very deeply just as they are. Yet, it still is a heavy load to bear some days….when I try to bear the responsibilities on my own strength. For a year after Bethany Grace came home from the NICU I tried desperately to do it all on my own strength. Pumping her breast milk for her feeding tube, being a nurse 24 hours a day 7 days a week, and coordinating all of her care with doctors, specialists, therapists, case managers, and supply and equipment companies. I quickly burnt out and did not spend enough time caring for myself.
Only recently I have experienced the freedom and joy in depending on God’s grace and help. About a month ago, exhausted and at the end of myself I threw up my hands and cried, “I cannot do this on my own strength anymore! I need you, Jesus!” The phrase, “God never gives you more than you can handle” really means “God never gives you more than you can handle when depending on His strength.” I need God’s help and strength in my daily life of caring for my two children. I am finally thankful for the incredible challenges I have been dealt with my family. For without them, I would have been able to keep going in my own strength and would not be experiencing the grace and the joy and the freedom and the rest that comes from receiving grace on a daily basis.
Whether you have typically-developing children or special needs children, do you ever feel like you try to be a mother in your own strength, not depending on God’s grace to give you strength and joy? I have learned that I miss out when I am stubborn and refuse God’s help—even when I might feel like I do not need it that day. I am now trying to remember to be thankful for my difficult circumstances, to ask God to come into my weakness with His grace and make me strong in His strength. When I am loving my children and caring for them through God’s love, I am a much better mom.
Kristin
Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Matthew 11:28-29
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