For Mothers of Young Children
I Thought I Couldn’t Talk about My Challenges Because Someone Else “Had It Worse”
Did expressing difficulties with my pregnancy make me ungrateful?
Morning sickness hit me around week five of my pregnancy. Except it wasn’t just in the morning.
It was constant. The only relief I had was in sleep.
But almost as bad as the physical mountain I was climbing was the mental battle raging in my head.
Did feeling miserable and unhappy make me ungrateful for the baby growing inside me? Was I allowed to want my suffering to end when other women I knew couldn’t even have children or had suffered loss?
I felt guilty for expressing any feelings of pain, struggle, or distress—physical or emotional—when I compared my challenges to others.
But I soon realized that I was understanding things all wrong.
The Loneliness in Comparison
One of the hardest things about being a mother these days is the constant pressure of perfection, leading us to compare ourselves to each other. Competing voices from media, neighbors, or family can lead us to question our worth or potential as mothers, see ourselves as inferior because we don’t measure up to another’s standards, and ultimately devalue the love and effort we invest in motherhood.
But I have to believe this is not what our divine Creator desires for us.
President Jeffrey R. Holland, Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, reminded us, “We are not in a race against each other to see who is the wealthiest or the most talented or the most beautiful or even the most blessed.”
We are also not in a competition to see who has it the worst! During the lonely hours of my pregnancy, I felt I could express only happiness and positivity to those whose struggles I had judged to be worse than mine. In reality, I was feeling depressed and hopeless, wondering if I was strong enough to be a mother. This comparison made me even lonelier.
But as Elder Claudio D. Zivic of the Seventy said: “Life is different for each of us. We all have a time of trials, a time for happiness, a time for making decisions, a time for overcoming obstacles, and a time for taking advantage of opportunities.”
Our experiences are different and therefore hard in different ways. We can acknowledge the difficulty of our situation and others’ without measuring them against each other.
You Can Feel Both
I decided to discuss my feelings with a therapist, and she taught me a life-changing truth about emotions:
We can feel multiple emotions at the same time.
After witnessing wars and contention between the Nephites and Lamanites, the prophet Alma wrote, “And thus we see the great reason of sorrow, and also of rejoicing—sorrow because of death and destruction among men, and joy because of the light of Christ unto life” (Alma 28:14).
The Nephites were experiencing feelings of sorrow and joy.
I realized it was possible for me to feel upset about my trials while also feeling grateful that I was pregnant.
Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles taught:
“When we are grateful to God in our circumstances, we can experience gentle peace in the midst of tribulation. In grief, we can still lift up our hearts in praise. In pain, we can glory in Christ’s Atonement. …
“Being grateful in times of distress does not mean that we are pleased with our circumstances. It does mean that through the eyes of faith we look beyond our present-day challenges.”
We can let ourselves feel all our emotions as we also express gratitude to God for His blessings and mercy.
The Savior Suffered for All of Us
When the Savior suffered during His Atonement, He did not sift through all the trials and experiences we would all go through, pick what He thought was the worst, and suffer only for those. He bore all of them.
This includes, as Elder Zivic said, “our sins, pains, depression, anguish, infirmities, and fears, and so He knows how to help us, how to inspire us, how to comfort us, and how to strengthen us so that we may endure and obtain the crown that is reserved for those who are not defeated.”
The Atonement of Jesus Christ is infinite. As we wade through life’s tribulations and the highs and lows of motherhood, let us express endless gratitude to our Savior, whether tearfully or with joy, and lift each other up.