The Mom's Hour

My routine has been the same for years: babies, toddlers, teenagers, homeschool, homemaking. Rinse and repeat. With seven children, there’s always someone, or several, in all those age brackets. Two kids have cystic fibrosis, so there are extra health chores daily and two-week hospitalizations occasionally that add to the mix. I have always been honored to be known as my husband’s wife and my children’s mother; it is not a loss of my identity but a flowering of it. So when feelings of discontent began whispering to me in my forty-fifth year, I was shaken and embarrassed. I wondered if I should get a job, complete a degree, or send the kids off to school. Am I boring? Am I useless? Am I fulfilled? I made a list of the pros and cons for each possibility and could not live with any of the cons. How to transform myself?

I spent a morning alone at a local cafe to relax and think, with an attractive, expensive cup of coffee and a delicious, tiny slice of biscotti. I decided to take baby

steps; or more accurately, one baby step: in the middle of the day, every single Howell at home was going to be silent for one hour. The small ones could rest and the older ones could read or draw. Separately was the key. I told them they were going to be alone with themselves. I promised myself not to clean or cook or help with lessons, but to simply be with me. I would use that hour to nap, read a book, learn to crochet, write a letter, or relearn how to play the piano -- something to stretch my mind and heart.



I'm pretty sure I see a positive boon for myself and our entire household order. It is both exciting and grounding. My next plan is to sign up for one college class online. We are getting used to Mom’s Hour and I am confident that some of those hours will be perfect for working through an anthropology or literature course.

 

I did not have to give up or reinvent what defines me --my home and family-- in order to fulfill something new welling up within me. A bit of balance is coming with one baby step, one hour, one day at a time. I look forward to my next year, one Mom’s Hour at a time.


Now to start filling out forms ...
Love, Allison