Truth in Encouragement

A truth:

“Don’t wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what. Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.” -Mark Victor Hansen

I always find it interesting that when my husband and I were contemplating when to add a second child under our roof, people often told us, “There’s no perfect time.” It’s true, of course. If you wait for the perfect time to have a child or add another one to your family, you’ll be waiting forever. In fact, two months after we conceived our younger son, our older son started throwing horrible tantrums (never having done so before). We thought, “OH NO! What did we DO?!”

What’s more interesting, however, is that no one gave me that quote when I found myself unexpectedly pregnant with the Munchkin. It was, quite obviously, not the perfect time for two lines to appear on that stick. Life was hard. I was young. The father didn’t want to be involved and was quite angry with me at the time. I was scared. And then my health went down the tubes. “Not the perfect time” may be a slight understatement. It may be a huge understatement.

But no one gave me those comforting, encouraging words.

Everyone talked about giving her a better life, more than I had. I realize that these two particular situations are, to the naked eye, vastly different. With the decision to add another child to our family, my husband and I were financially secure, living in a home that we owned and, well, married. The last point is why I think people weren’t so quick to offer this bit of encouragement when I was pregnant with the Munchkin.

We can pretend we’re a civilization that embraces the single mother, one that celebrates her when she chooses to carry a pregnancy to term. But unless she has a ring on her finger, the celebration is short-lived. We still want to push it under the rug. We look away or we shoot daggers. I know we do those things. I was the recipient of nasty glares and, from others, the inability to make eye contact; eyes darting from my belly to my left ring finger and back again. Prior to finding myself wearing shoes that fit too tightly due to swollen ankles and feet, I had given those looks, avoided eye contact and generally passed the same judgment. Life is funny. I learned my lesson. Will society?

I find pleasure in telling young and not-so-young expectant mothers this quote, this bit of encouragement. There is no perfect time. You can always pull yourself up by your maternity pants and make the most of a difficult situation. It’s the truth. I wish more people were spreading that truth.