Since the moment I decided to have a third child after loosing my second there has been a whispering that could only be from the pit of hell. “Why would you want anymore children?” “I understand but that’s just too much kids.” “Your so brave I couldn’t do it!” These words did not come from a demon but out of the mouths of people that, if it were not for their parents they would not be here. It is those who are alive that seem to have such negative views about life. It amazes me how they can’t see the irony in this.

I am not brave. I am not a hero for wanting to have a big family. I was actually the opposite. I was not mothered or fathered. I wanted a huge family as a child but I had no idea how much the trauma of abuse and abandonment would one day affect me. Once I found out I thought to myself there is no way I could mother more than one child. How could I have the patience and with my mental illnesses, how could I do this? Once I had went through my first traumatic birth experience, I had decided I would have no more kids. I was full of fear and back then fear is what guided a lot of my life choices. But then like always the one who knows me best brought me across women who had large families. Women full of peace, love and gratitude for their children. God knows my heart and He knows that sometimes I need to see to hear and then come to understanding.

What people don’t know is that with each child I have had there is a story. A story of God’s faithfulness to me. His love for me. How He has delivered me and how He has made me. Without them my story would be different. It has been God’s will that I have these children because it has been through their conceptions, pregnancies, births and raising that He made me the woman I am still becoming. When I look at each of them I see me through them. And so when someone has the audacity to tell me or say to me selfish things about me having children, I feel bad for them.. Because it is then I realize that there is something so sad, dark and lonely that lives in them to have such negative views about children. And let me be real I am a feisty woman and sometimes it angers me. Because of the simple fact that they don’t know my story. They have no idea the pain, the heartbreak and rising from the ashes stories of each of those little children I have given birth to. They are my heart. Not one born on accident or by chance. But hand picked, chosen and named by the Father of all creation. They were created and born on purpose with purpose.

My full satisfaction was in Him and is in Him alone. And because He is so faithful to me I have never felt more victorious than I do right now from walking through this past pregnancy. The names of my daughter come from two great queens of whom I have admired for their tenacity and their resilience in their respective times. Through this sweet girl I have in so many ways become a stronger women in heart, mind and spirit and I have learned the simplicity of the love of God on a whole new level. Every year that passes He finds ways to raise me up and show me truly how fierce and amazing I really am. As a women, as a wife, as a mother and as a daughter of His.