Crash Landing on Planet Mom

Busy as a bee! That has been me this week! Today we kick-off our fall semester of MOPS and I'll be co-leading the group this year. I'm thrilled to be on a team with such great mama bears that are as passionate as I am about ministering to other mama bears.

Because I've been so busy (and that last post wore me out!), I've neglected the cyber den. I hope you'll forgive me!

Below is a piece I wrote for our MOPS newsletter. I wanted you Cyber Bears to get a peek into why I love this organization with such an awful name. Oh, and for those of you don't know, the MOPS International Theme this year is Life on Planet Mom (this will help explain my writing below!).

And if you just happen to be (or happen to know) a mama bear out there that feels right now how I felt back then - please, please, please find a MOPS group. I guarantee you'll be glad you did.

Crash Landing on Planet Mom...

A little under 6 years ago, I “crash landed” on Planet Mom when my first child was born. Literally, “crash landed.” Nothing went right. The birth and subsequent first weeks of motherhood were not at all what I had planned.

Then I changed my plan and didn’t go back to work. My closest friend either hadn’t yet had children, or went back to work. I very quickly found myself alone with no earthly idea what to do. I felt like I was on a whole other planet.

I decided to visit a MOPS meeting. I was so clueless, that when it was time to split up for discussion time, I thought the meeting was over. I went to get my child and didn’t realize my mistake until I was in the parking lot!

But what I did attend of that meeting was fantastic. I found a community of women who knew what I was going through and loved me for the crazy alien woman I had become. I made instant friends, and had a support network that I could always trust whether it was a family crisis or the birth of my second child.

It has now become my mission to make other moms feel welcome, included, and comfortable with their role as a mother – even if they don’t do it just like me.

I hope that this year, you get the opportunity to see how YOU are an integral part of Planet Mom. I hope that in our meetings you truly feel our theme verse: “For where two or three come together…there I am with them” (Matthew 18:20).

We are here. He is here.

Welcome.