Being a Courageous Mother
Several weeks ago I was listening to a Time Out For Women talk given by Timothy Ballard entitled ‘Women Who Shine a Light on Darkness.’ In it he was describing a parenting experience his wife had with one of their sons. Timothy and his wife were on a date at a movie theater and all of the sudden in the middle of the movie his wife stood up and left abruptly. After several minutes she came back, when he asked what happened she said that everything was fine. After the movie, while driving home Timothy asked his wife what happened; she then proceeded to tell him that she had this overwhelming feeling that one of their son’s was about to make a terrible decision and that she needed to call him. She did call home to her son, did not mention anything about the prompting, just chatted with him and asked him how he was doing. Short time later, Timothy and his wife arrived home and everyone was asleep, other than this one son. He came running up to his wife with tears in his eyes and just squeezed her. They held each other for a long time and then their son began to tell them what almost happened. Turns out this one son was being tempted to look at pornography online and Timothy’s wife called at just the right moment to stop him. She didn’t say anything, she didn’t reprimand him, she didn’t cause him to feel guilty, she protected him and loved him.
That same day I was listening to that TOFW talk, I had an experience of my own. After listening to Timothy’s talk, I decided I wanted to live my life so I could easily listen to promptings that would enable me to protect my children/family just like Timothy’s wife did. I had an overwhelming desire to live a life of a ‘woman in the light’, like Timothy’s talk was centered around. I had never desired anything more, except to be sealed to Mr. Man. I thought about it and had a prayer in my heart all day with this strong desire.
Fast forward to that evening, Mr. Man took Bean and Keegs to their pack meeting for Cub Scouts while YoYo and I stayed home. On the way home from the pack meeting Keegs proceeds to tell Mr. Man how there are three different kinds of sex.
There is boy on boy sex, girl on girl sex, and naked kissing sex. Let me preface this by saying that we’ve begun talking with Bean and Keegs about ‘the talk’. We feel they need to hear the details from us; but at the same time, we had yet to divulge every intimate detail about sex to them. So it was quite a shock when Keegs stated the differences in sex to Mr. Man so casually. The boys arrived home from pack meeting and as the 3 amigos were getting ready for bed, Mr. Man begins to inform me about the conversation that happened in the car.
My heart immediately broke. Those intimate details were definitely not something I was prepared for any of my children to know about just yet. I wanted to be the one to inform the boys of details, at least myself and/or Mr. Man. I wanted to be able to control the flow and type of information they received at this age. I know that was naive of me, but what parent doesn’t want to protect their children for as long as possible from the world? Mr. Man and I immediately sat down with Keegs, privately, and began pulling information from him. We wanted to know how he came about the information, who told him and where it happened. We made it very clear he wasn’t in trouble and neither was the person who told him, we were just worried about where he heard it. Turns out he heard it at school, during recess from a fellow classmate.
The three of us talked for a while about what his classmate told him, we talked about how Heavenly Father loves everyone unconditionally regardless of their decisions and actions and that He has told us we too need to have that love and compassion for everyone. We told Keegs how we won’t agree with everyone’s lifestyle, for example we don’t smoke or drink, but that does not mean we should be mean or angry or judge them. I then asked him if it was OK that I inform his teacher about what his classmate told him on the playground. He was fine with it, so I did. I made it clear to his teacher that I was upset with the information, not with the classmate. In fact I felt like he was just as much of a victim as Keegs was.
After the boys were in bed, it was then I realized I had my own little opportunity to protect my child. It wasn’t quite like Timothy’s wife’s experience; but I was given the opportunity to show compassion and unconditional love to my own child. I broke down to Mr. Man and told him the details I was putting together right at that moment. I told him my overwhelming desire. I told him I couldn’t do it alone and that I need him and his spiritual guidance in supporting my desire. I told him how scared I am for our boys to grow and live in this world. I told him I needed/had to be the kind of ‘woman of light’ like Timothy’s wife is.
It’s been several weeks since that day, and every day has had some sort of struggle where Satan is pressuring me not to be the protector of my children. When one of them is upset with me or its 6pm and I just need them to go to bed…it is difficult for me to remember to be the ‘woman of light’ in their lives. Still, every time I look at their faces I am reminded of that day and the strongest desire to protect them. I know I won’t be able to protect them forever and there will definitely be times in their lives where they will have to rely on what they have been taught and listen to the Holy Ghost. I know that some day they will have ‘women of light’ in their own lives as eternal spouses. I know that they were sent to me to raise, protect, love and be an example to. And lastly, I know that my desire to protect them will never cease in this lifetime and the best thing I can do for them is to protect them and teach them so they can some day protect their children as well.
