Hope for the Mom Who Feels Like a Failure

Guest Post by Crystal Parenteau

Have you ever felt like a complete failure as a mom?

“The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the Lord delivereth him out of them all. He keepeth all his bones: not one of them is broken.” (‭‭Psalms‬ ‭34:18-20‬ ‭KJV‬‬)

Motherhood fills us with more love and joy than we ever thought possible, doesn’t it? The sweet kisses from our children, the excitement of milestones achieved, and the satisfaction that comes with being needed fills us with purpose and worth.

But what about when life is hard as a mom and we experience the not so pleasant side effects of parenting?

The ways we fail our children be it with impatience or inaction.

The sleepless nights and unexpected health issues that stretch us thin.

The loneliness, self-sacrifice, doubt, and fears dwelling where hope once lived.

No one will deny that parenting comes with challenges..

Like me, you may have a child figuring out how to navigate a mental health issue. Or perhaps chronic illness, be it for yourself or your child, adds a layer of toughness to your life. There is, of course, the day to day trials to endure as well—bickering, tantrums, never-ending housework, questions about parenting moves we make.

But here’s the thing I’m starting to understand about being a mom:

The biggest parenting challenge we face is losing hope. Without hope, we allow our failures, our sin, and our inadequacy to break us from the inside out.

Without hope we listen to the lie that we achieve our worth rather than receive our worth. #StoriesOfHope #Truth #Worthiness via @faithatthefoot Share on X

When you feel like a failure as a mom, it can be hard to find hope in God.

For years, I attempted to find my worth inside a dark room that I shared with parenting missteps, mom guilt, and unmet expectations. I felt trapped inside of walls I desperately wanted to break through.

I put my son in timeouts and took away privileges, yet he didn’t behave.

I wept as I prayed about my impatience and I still screamed at my children.

I lived inside a head that told me my worth as a mom came from my parenting wins.

Somewhere in between the smiles, hugs, and child firsts, I lost myself in the failures. And as I searched for a way out of the despair, hopelessness crept in because you see:

Hopelessness sneaks in when we focus on our failures rather than our Heavenly Father. It imprisons us in darkness when we should be breaking free to the light. #StoriesOfHope #Motherhood via @faithatthefoot Share on X

All I could see were mistakes and flaws. The judgement from others made me feel unworthy to be a mom. My children’s sin shattered me because I made their actions a reflection of me. But worst of all, my own faults and failure as a mom and a believer in Christ tore me apart.

I misplaced the worth God gave me long before I existed and I lost hope in Him.

Sadly, I allowed myself to become so broken on the inside that I started breaking myself on the outside.

Sometimes finding hope comes during the breaking.

I’ll never forget the sleepless night God used my mom brokenness to transform me.

My 18-month-old at the time broke his leg and hadn’t slept through the night in weeks while my later to be diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder son waged war on any and everyone with whom he came into contact. I felt busted all over. I needed a way out of the exhaustion, out of the sorrow, out of my broken world.

I remember the fury thrumming inside me in the predawn hours as my son screamed when he should have been sleeping. I wanted to blow up, burst out the stress of parenting and hopelessness into the world.

So, shamefully, I did.

My hand should have exploded through the wall when I hit it, but even though I was crumbling, the walls didn’t suffer the same fate.

The pain shot through my hand instantly and the throbbing numbed the deep ache of hopelessness inside of me. But only for a moment. Only until my bruised and battered heart pumped my iniquities back through me to relive over and over again.

I thought about how I was the mom who…

…yelled at her toddler to go back to bed when he kept her awake night after night.

…couldn’t effectively discipline her defiant, aggressive, and difficult child.

…criticized rather than encouraged her daughter when she didn’t understand her

  homework.

…punched a wall in a fit of rage because she somehow lost hope.

I sank into an all-time, Jonah in the belly of a whale, low. It was the type of brokenness that left me with only two choices: I could succumb to the emptiness of the world and be swallowed by it. Or, I could put my hope in a Savior who chose me even when I didn’t always choose Him.

Mom, if you feel like a failure, broken beyond repair, know that hope heals you.

It did for me once I realized I could leave the darkness. I didn’t have to live inside a room with my failures. I could seek the light—the light I forgot about when I focused on what breaks rather than who heals.

When I flicked the switch on, brightness filled the room and everything looked different.

I noticed the wall I struck first. To my surprise, it remained unharmed, my attack no match for the strong as rock wood behind it.

How was it that of all the places I chose to strike, I made contact with a section protected by wood?

It’s silly, I know, but that wall is what brought me back to hope in God. It reminded me that God never left me. I had left him.

If that wood could hold up walls, couldn’t the wood of Jesus’ cross hold me up too? Couldn’t the hope that seems hidden behind something but that is really always there heal my broken heart?

I may have broken my hand that night, but I learned that I serve a God who can never be broken.

And if our Almighty Creator made us in His image, delicately piecing us together so that we might be used to bring Him the glory, could we ever be broken beyond repair?

When you find hope in God, it frees you to live a life worth living.

The next few weeks were humbling to say the least. Me with my braced hand and my toddler son with a thigh-high cast. We received lots of stares that in the past would have broken me. Would have reminded me of yet another mom failure, another reason why God couldn’t possibly love me.

But God does love us. Even when we don’t love ourselves. #StoriesOfHope #GodsLove via @faithatthefoot Share on X

Through lots of prayer, bible study, and Godly counsel, I found the hope that hopelessness had stolen from me. It is a hope that frees me to live for a God that doesn’t love me because of my successes, but instead cherishes His child for who I am in Him.

When failure as a mom, or sin takes hold…When parenting struggles surround me…When I disappoint myself and others…I still have hope and you can too because…

The Lord is near, although we can’t always see Him.

The Lord saves us, even when we don’t deserve it.

The Lord delivers us from our afflictions and thus we are never truly broken.

The Lord is unbreakable and will hold us up for as long as we need.

Prayer:
Dear Heavenly Father, sometimes I fail my children. Sometimes there are days when I can’t seem to get anything right and the trials of life burden me to the core. Lord, when these times come, please help me to remember that I have hope in you. Thank you God for never leaving me or forsaking me. Thank you, Jesus, for loving me and restoring me through the storms of parenting and life. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.

To view all of the topics in this series, check out our Stories of Hope page, and discover how others have chosen to live a life of hope, despite life’s greatest challenges!

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Crystal Parenteau encourages Christian women to find, grow, and share faith with a humility that only comes when we kneel at the foot of the cross. She believes in the power of encouragement and edification to inspire and instruct believers in their walk with Christ. Crystal is a mom of three and wife of 13 years. She loves reading, lazy skiing, and kid-friendly hikes. Read more from Crystal at www.crystalparenteau.com or connect with her on Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

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