MUMPRENUER

Tuesday’s Woman to Woman was all about the emergence of the ‘Mumpreneur’. Mum’s who want to engage their brains, have some independence and something just for them while working flexibly and therefore not compromising their role as a mother or time spent with their children. Sounds ideal doesn’t it? Well that’s because it is. In an era when the ‘Superwoman’ image who ‘has it all’ (i.e. does it all) is prevalent this is music to any mother’s ears. Because I don’t actually believe you can ‘have it all’ – at least not without some or all of the components you’re trying to juggle suffering. Maybe it is possible if you’re wealthy enough to have ‘hired help’ for childcare, household chores and entertaining the husband(!) but that isn’t realistic for most women and isn’t the point having time to ‘be there’ and do it yourself?!

Most mums experience an element of ‘baby brain’ (your brain basically turning to jelly and you can’t remember your name at times let alone what you were good at pre-baby days) after the birth of their child but inevitably at some point mums feel a certain loss of ‘self’ - or at least that their identity is wrapped up with being a mum and it can be difficult to tell who you are apart from this role. Some women are fine with this notion – or at least pretend to be! But, many want more. They want to be amazing mums but they also want to still feel like they are women too.

A good place to start rediscovering your identity as a woman when you’re a mum is to remember and list all the things you used to enjoy and were good at pre-baby. Not just work skills but hobbies and interests too. God gave you your gifts and talents and they are to be used – not hidden under a bushel or a baby!! Then it’s all about finding time (I know easier said than done) no matter how little, to do some of them again.

Then take it a step further and brainstorm whether any of your ideas and interests could turn into a business. Many of the best inventions and innovations have been created and started by mums because they are practical and adept at looking for and coming up with solutions – it’s what we do on a daily basis! I was certainly inspired and challenged by listening to Ruth Hill (www.morethanamumblog.wordpress.com ) and the other mums who contributed to the W2W phone in to re-engage my brain and do something for me again. After all as Ruth Hill said: “a happy mum equals a happy child!’”.

Jesus said he came to give us “life to the full” (John 10:10). Who knows you could be the next millionaire mumpreneur - start small but dream big!

13th January 2012

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

GIVING

2 Corinthians 8:11-14
"But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us—see that you also excel in this grace of giving. I am not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich. And here is my advice about what is best for you in this matter: Last year you were the first not only to give but also to have the desire to do so. Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means. For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have. Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. Then there will be equality,"

Above was the scripture of the week for the ‘Woman to Woman’ reaching the unreachable Christmas appeal’. In a climate where there is so much economic uncertainly and at a time when we’re fast approaching Christmas this verse for me put in perspective the objectives of Premier’s appeal.

What an encouragement it must have been to the believers of Corinth when Paul asserted that they already excel in faith, speech, knowledge, earnestness and love! However, he goes on to talk about his desire to ‘test’ the sincerity of their love. At first I was taken a back at the notion of being tested - as if the love needed ‘proving’ but then after some thought I realised this was exactly what Paul was saying and it was right. Love should be tested and when it’s the real thing it never fails! It is easy to ‘appear’ to have faith and love especially through our speech but how many of us have been caught out by insincere love - usually when we need it most?! Unfortunately it is all too common to hear someone utter the words ‘I found out who my friends were’ when going through a particularly difficult phrase!

As I listened to the output and the testimonies came pouring in of God using Premier radio in some way, shape or form to touch, inspire, encourage, heal, support, befriend, turnaround and love people from all walks of life – I was literally overwhelmed! What a privilege and blessing that we can have the Word of God spoken out in this nation freely over the airwaves where it can literally change lives!

Anyone can ‘give’ but not everyone has a ‘desire to do so’ and it sounds like this makes a difference according to Paul’s passage. Paul admonishes the Corinthians that their ‘eager willingness to do it (give a gift) may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means’.

I also love that scripture does not ask us to give ‘beyond’ our means – like many Christians feel they need to in order to make a point or to be blessed etc. etc. – but all that is asked is that we do give and according to our means, willingly and cheerfully. Now that I can do!!

25th November 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

NATIONAL ADOPTION WEEK

This week is National Adoption Week. To mark it, Woman to Woman were revisiting the age old debate of Nature V Nurture but in the context of adoption. The discussion was fascinating with three well informed ladies. They were; Dr Caroline Berry, a retired clinical geneticist, Katharine Hill, a former family lawyer who now works for well-known family charity – Care for the family – and Helena Megson, a post-adoption team social worker. All are also mothers.

When we have children, or adopt, we hope and believe environmental forces i.e. parenting, above all else excels a greater force on our children than nature. That their personality will be shaped by love and discipline. But is it really?

This debate is one I’ve revisited time and again particularly since I became a parent. The discussion on W2W was pretty balanced with differing views that also overlapped in a lot of areas. Dr Caroline Berry, the geneticist, understandably argued that there is a limit to what good parenting can do as genes do affect behaviour characteristics. However, she added we are never programmed fully by our genes. Ironically, Helena Megson (the social worker) had done a thesis on nature V nurture years ago and concluded that nurture was the prevailing factor. However, after years of social work she admitted her view has changed somewhat and now believes a lot is down to nature. Katharine Hill ( ex-family lawyer and charity worker) felt, like the other two ladies, that in the early years there is a key opportunity – in particular the first year and continuing until age 5 - when good parenting and a lot of love can have a profound effect.

My problem with this debate is there are very strong arguments on both sides. There is no doubt certain traits and characteristics are passed down through our genealogy and we only need do a case study of our own familes to see it. But, I also believe our environment and circumstances (in this case love and good parenting) can go a long way in shaping the people our children will become. Our genes do affect who we are but the bit I’m interested in is, are we a slave to them or can bad genes be overcome with good parenting for example? How much of children’s behaviour is due to parenting and how much is due to their innate character?

Studies suggest that many temperamental and behavioural tendencies are ultimately 30 to 50 per cent genetic and five major personality traits are identified which show the strongest influence called the Big 5: Extroversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, conscientiousness and openness to experience. Others with a significant genetic legacy include altruism, shyness, accident-proneness and even self-esteem.

I guess we could all frantically go through this list and analyse our children trying to see if they have that same ‘look’ in their eye that mad uncle George had and end up paranoid and fearful. However, it was in fact the geneticist who pointed out in the interview that although good parenting goes a very long way indeed it is helpful to acknowledge that genes play a part because despite our best efforts sometimes our children do go off the rails and parents are the first to feel guilty and ask the question ‘Where did I go wrong?’

The saving grace is as Christian parents we can add a whole new, life-changing dimension to this – God! He specialises in new creations, demanding we ‘forget the former things’ and instead ‘see He is doing a new thing’. Thank God – literally – that He gives beauty for ashes, uses the foolish things of this world and makes a way where there is no way.

4th November 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

HALLOWEEN

Sitting in the crèche of a church I sometimes attend, I listened to a conversation between the mums about Halloween. My church background has always taught it is a celebration of evil and to be avoided, boycotted and condemned at every opportunity. I didn’t grow up in a Christian family so it wasn’t such a big deal for me. The biggest scare I ever had was going to a friend’s Halloween party at aged 13 and throwing a cushion at a boy, it missing and hitting (and smashing) her mum’s anniversary vase – I still cringe at the thought!

What was interesting about the conversation I was eavesdropping on was the varied responses. One mum described how this year was the first she had decided to let her children go ‘trick or treating’ as in her tight-knit local community each year the mums take it in turns to take all the kids and her daughter had been devastated to be left out the previous year. Another felt the innocent image behind kids dressing up was belittling the power of evil. Yet another (American) mum explained how Christians in the States, who have pretty strict hang ups about all sorts of things, just don’t see a problem with kids dressing up for Halloween. It’s a big deal over there, billed for fun and celebration and one Christians for the most part embrace.

It got me thinking about whether we UK Christians have done to Halloween what American and some European Christians have done to drinking alcohol and even certain music – taken a negative notion/side to the issue and taken it to the extreme making it an issue where perhaps there is none. I remember when I was a very young Christian one of the girls in the youth group was rebuked for holding a Body Shop Aromatherapy party – I mean really??

If it’s the pagan festival idea we have a problem with then really we need to also have an issue with Christmas as we all know the date was adopted from one too.

Too be truthful I love to play devil’s advocate (no pun intended) and the jury is still out with me as to whether we should or should not take part in Halloween festivities, but, my big issue is the way Christians write things off entirely or judge them wrongly without doing any research whatsoever themselves.

A few facts on Halloween for you:

Historian Nicholas Rogers, exploring the origins of Halloween, notes that while "some folklorists have detected its origins in the Roman feast of Pomona, the goddess of fruits and seeds, or in the festival of the dead called Parentalia, it is more typically linked to the Celtic festival of Samhain, whose original spelling was Samuin (pronounced sow-an or sow-in)". The name of the festival historically kept by the Gaels and Celts in the British Isles is derived from Old Irish and means roughly "summer's end".

According to the Oxford Dictionary of English folk lore: "Certainly Samhain was a time for festive gatherings, and medieval Irish texts and later Irish, Welsh, and Scottish folklore use it as a setting for supernatural encounters, but there is no evidence that it was connected with the dead in pre-Christian times, or that pagan religious ceremonies were held."

The Irish myths which mention Samhain were written in the 10th and 11th centuries by Christian monks. This is around 200 years after the Catholic church inaugurated All Saints Day and at least 400 years after Ireland became Christian.

Origin of name
The word Halloween is first attested in the 16th century and represents a Scottish variant of the fuller All-Hallows-Even ("evening"), that is, the night before All Hallows Day. Although the phrase All Hallows is found in Old English (ealra hālgena mæssedæg, mass-day of all saints), All-Hallows-Even is itself not attested until 1556.

You can still have your opinion but at least now you’re a little more informed!

2nd November 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

SEXUALITY

It was so refreshing to hear Rachel Gardiner, Olave Snelling and Miranda Suit speak so openly and frankly on the subject of women’s sexuality on Woman to Woman today - even venturing into previously taboo subjects such as female masturbation and porn addiction!

The panel of three, along with presenter Maria Rodrigues-Toth, couldn’t be more diverse from each other but, all were united in their passion to preach freedom with a desire to discuss the truth about this subject that the church so often shies away from.

Rachel in particular was a breath of fresh air when she admitted having struggled with masturbation in the past and occasionally wishing for bigger boobs!

Sometimes in the Church we don’t mind talking about ‘difficult’ subjects if it is in a past tense: we can speak to the ex-drug addict or prostitute with the life changing testimony but what about help for those who love the Lord but still struggle daily with issues such as porn and masturbation and still have a long way to go. Don’t they need support even more so? The W2W panel seemed to think so.

As the show progressed it was interesting to hear more and more listeners get in touch not only admitting they too struggle with many of the same issues but also thanking Maria and Premier for tackling the subject in such depth. The advice dispensed was practical, wise, empathetic and not judgemental in the least.

What was particularly sad and also shocking was the fact that recent studies have found that overexposure of young people to porn can lead them to have a distorted image of what true sexuality is. This leaves teens thinking the roles they see in pornography are ‘normal’ and what is required of their sexual relationships. The result has meant the exploitation, disrespect and often violence in porn is then emulated in their own relationships.

It took me back to my school days when you almost become aware of your sexuality overnight – usually through having it pointed out to you by a boy if you’re a girl and vice versa. Those confusing, anxious and exhilarating years have enough troubles of their own without the added stress of taking on new unreachable and unrealistic behaviours that only cause, hurt, disappointment and damage in the end.

But are we any less affected as adults? How many of us feel unattractive just because we don’t like the image we see staring back at us from the mirror? More disturbingly, how many women are more affected by what other women may think of us then the men in our lives? Having said this I personally feel more comfortable in my skin the older I get – or maybe that’s just me caring less!

Many adults stressed by life say they wish they could go back to their school days when life was simple but, I wouldn’t wish to be a teenager today for anything. The unwritten rules, pressures and decisions they have to negotiate is at an unprecedented level compared to what I endured at school and quite frankly I’d rather sit back and relax in my big knickers and old greying bra drinking a hot chocolate and feel incredibly sexy while doing so!

12th October 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

RETREATS

Last week Ali Herbert talked about retreats on W2W. It got me thinking how my Nan would have been utterly baffled at any woman who deemed herself worthy, let alone wanting, of a retreat. It would have been a luxury reserved for those a bit (in her words) ‘Lardy-dar’. She seemed to glow with pride when she told us of the 3 or 4 jobs she would hold down at a time during the Second World War including scrubbing steps of the large houses in London’s Belgrave Square. Were women more able in the past, stronger, harder workers perhaps? Or did they have simpler lives with not as many conflicting roles and responsibilities? Whatever the reason, depression and stress are endemic among modern women today.

"The rise in the pace of life, stress levels & burnout mean there is increasingly a need for retreats for Christian women. Women in the past may have argued the idea of a retreat was self-indulgent but, perhaps they did not face the multi-level pressures that modern women face today!"

Why do we find it so hard to simply rest? And furthermore why do we feel so guilty when we do? Looking around at Christian women I feel inclined to argue that, if we let it, the pressure on us can be even greater than our non-Christian counterparts if we add ministry to the already long list of a woman’s responsibilities. But, I was careful here to say ‘if we let it’ because our heavenly Father commands us ‘not to worry’ (Matt 6:34 & Phil.4:6), he tells us to cast our problems on to him (Psalm 55:22) and insists his burden for us is ‘light’ (Matt 11:30). What a relief!

I remember an ex-workaholic friend of mine who described a time when they knew God was suggesting to them that they learned to say ‘no’ and had a rest (they are a worship leader) and then God gave them RSI in their hand so they couldn’t play at all. They commented how never before had they more understood the line ‘he MAKES me lie down in green pastures’ from Psalm 23 (v.2).

God is not impressed by us working so hard that we end up burning ourselves out. He longs for us to sit at his feet and simply spend time with him, to refresh ourselves and to simply ‘be’. I won’t use the somewhat over used Martha/Mary analogy, as I’m sure you know it well. It’s refreshing to realise his will for us is to find rest (Matt 11:28), peace (John 14:27) and to enjoy life (John 10:10).

Therefore, based on the evidence in the Bible, not only do us ladies not have to feel guilty for wanting some time-out but it seems Jesus would whole-heartedly approve of retreats.

So I’m off to the Spa!

6th October 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.

INFERTILITY

A little girl’s big dreams

In the history of all little girls, when life was blissfully simple, we planned our lives out confidently. There were some details we may have been unsure of; where we might live and what exactly our career might be, however, inevitably the factors we would have been convinced of would include meeting Mr. Right, getting married and having children. Again, we may have not been absolute on the circumstances surrounding these three events but that they would some day happen would not, at this stage, have cast a doubt in our young naïve minds.

Then, life happens. We grow up. We experience pain, rejection and betrayal even. Mr. Right may have turned out to be Mr. Right-for-someone-else or he maybe he just didn’t turn up at all! As Christian women the issue of the shortage of men in the church is an irritating and pressing one. As the depressing statistics emerge so does the quiet anxiety of any single women over the age of thirty. This is a whole topic within itself - one that W2W has covered many times.

So let’s say for arguments sake, we’ve met Mr. Right and had the big fat wedding complete with meringue style dress that even crystal-cut-Barbie would be envious of. As it’s 2011, let’s also say we’ve embarked on a promising career and then come to the point where we ‘decide’ with GH (Godly hubby) to have children. 18 months later we find ourselves still waiting for that decision to materialise. It is only then that we suddenly realise it has never before occurred to us that we may not be able to have children. After all, it’s our God-given right isn’t it? It’s what we’re made for? The injustice, feeling of failure and shame silences many women into voicing their disappointment at their unfulfilled longing.

I am humbly blessed to be a mum. A privilege I now cherish as nothing short of a miraculous gift. However, I must confess I was one of those frivolously arrogant women who ‘planned’ out their lives and I assumed I’d conveniently slot a baby in when I was ready. It was only when I began to have friends who were ‘deciding’ on having children but finding it wasn’t happening that the thought first entered my mind that perhaps this was not something I could control! I’d even planned the month I wanted the baby to be born! Needless to say although I did fall pregnant it took 11 months – not what I had in mind. I have to say the first few months of ‘trying’ (that concept and the etiquette of discussing it is another blog altogether!) I was almost relieved as I was still getting used to the idea but, as 3 months turned into 6 I had to face the niggling question that was trying to get my attention from the back of my mind – what if I couldn’t have children?

When facing this question square on and letting it form fully in my mind, I suddenly found myself wanting a baby more than ever. You have to know me to know how utterly un-maternal I was prior to this to appreciate the irony! The very notion that I would not be able to ‘choose’ whether I would be or mother or not made me determined all the more to have it. And it then hit me; it was never up to me if I had a baby or not in the first place. I’d been absolutely convinced that I was in charge of my life, wisely planning (in consultation with the Lord of course i.e. telling him what I wanted to do) my path. My own arrogance shocked me to the core as it dawned on me that this was one aspect of my life that I most definitely could not ‘decide’ and that it in fact had little to do with me as to whether I would be a mother or not. This most natural of all events that could happen to a woman was also entirely uncertain and in the hands only of my creator. This ugly exposure of my assumption of my ‘rights’ made me reexamine the many times when I’d taken back the reins of my life from God and assumed control for myself and it shamed me.

When I finally did fall pregnant I was humbled to an extent I’d never experienced at the gift that God had trusted me with and ‘allowed’ me to take part in – it turned out to be one of the most spiritual experiences of my life.

As I’ve seen close friends struggle to realise their dreams of motherhood I still can’t help feeling how cruel the denial of this is for us who alone, as women, are designed to do this. I do however, believe that God does make all things work together for the good of those who love him but the realisation of this can sometimes be painful to try to understand.

I also still believe every woman has the right to be a mother if she so desires but whether that be in the biological sense is where our creative God can bring in other wondrous ideas and options that ultimately fulfill his purpose and our desires. Rachel Gardener’s story of infertility and adoption is a testimony to this and Olave Snelling beautifully and sensitively described God bringing her to acceptance and peace when she was faced with potential infertility.

Rachel Gardener and Olave Snelling shared their stories with Maria Rodriguez on Woman to Woman on Wednesday 14th September. You can listen back to the interview via the Woman to Woman website: www.premier.org.uk/womantowoman

20th September 2011

This blog is written by an anonymous woman on behalf of Woman to Woman but does not necessarily reflect the views of Premier Christian Radio.