Books and Parenting

I have an addiction. I am addicted to books. I am not addicted to novels or biographies or anything that can help me relax or escape from my life for a little, I wish that I were. I am addicted to self-help books. If you were to look at my bookshelves, you would probably get a good laugh at the various titles, most of them only half-read if even read at all.

When I became a parent, the addiction was easily fed. There are thousands of books on parenting and I was sure I needed to read them all. A moment came, when Grayson was in his second month of intense colic, that I realized my insane expectation of learning and knowing everything in those books. Grayson came out of the womb screaming and he didn’t stop for 3 1/2 months. In my mind, I could fix it. If I tried the right technique, ate the right foods, prayed the right way surely he would stop. The moment of turning back from my craziness came the day I went to the library to pick up the books I had requested. I tried to walk out of the library with Tyler at my side, the baby carrier in one hand and at least 8 large books in the other. The vision of all those books stacked on the counter was one I’ll never forget. How was I going to carry all those books out much less read them, and why? What was I really trying to accomplish?

Well, it’s been two years since then and God has revealed so much of what I really was trying to accomplish: control, appearance, success, significance, etc. Motherhood has rocked my world. It has revealed much of my sinful nature, it has brought out sides of me I didn’t know existed, and it has brought me to my knees in need of a Savior.

In future blogs I plan to talk more about what this journey has been and continues to be like for me. How God is revealing more of my need for him and how he is meeting me and my children in my weakness. The main theme has been this: God is God; I am not.

I never read all 8 of those books. It was a defining moment in my life when I put the first book down and rested in not knowing how to help my child, not knowing how to be the best mother, not knowing all the answers. I still struggle to gain control every day. Every day I fight the thoughts that tell me I’m failing as a mother. Every day I have to choose to believe that God is God over my children and that he will cover all my humanness and sin…and sometimes I can read a good book now with perspective.


-Kim Janous