I hate to write this for it will be online forever, but it’s real life and if it can start a dialogue with other moms, I’m willing to take that risk. Even though I’m writing this in a public forum, it is also a very personal letter to you because it is from my heart. The deepest part of my heart to you, my Son.

Recently we have found that you are searching for porn on the Internet. It’s heartbreaking for me. I know you’re at the age when it is probably normal to go through this curiosity. Yet, I want to shield you from it taking a hold of your mind. I know enough about addiction and sexual addiction in particular that I get a little freaked out that you’re going to continue looking at it and needing harder and harder porn to satisfy your curiosity. This is not just stuff I made up. There are plenty of studies and true life stories to back me up. One of our friends who works with sexual predators says he sees this all the time, and the younger someone starts looking at porn the worse it gets as an adult.

One, I don’t want you to be enslaved to anything, but especially to sex. Your dad and I believe that God made sex to be beautiful. Believe me we have our own issues and we have to fight some of the shame we have carried from our past sexual choices. But the great thing about God is that he redeems, and he has helped both of us so much. I won’t go into more about sex and us because I KNOW that you do not want to think of your parents as sexual creatures. My mom and dad shared too much with me, and I could barf right now just thinking about it again.

All this to say, I pray for you today… I pray that you will not be chained to the desire to look at women that are not yours to look at. I could go into all the reasons those women aren’t real – they are airbrushed, paid to make you think they want you, etc., but the real issue is your integrity here. You’re so young to really consider making choices based on integrity, not to mention that you’re impulsive like me, but my prayer is that God will really convict your heart so that you can find other ways to fill the void that you’re trying to fill with the pictures you are seeing. 

Sometimes I wish I could think like a man, just for a day or two, so I could really understand how visual and easily aroused you creatures are. But I’m a woman and while I appreciate a good looking man, I think differently. So I pray. And I worry. And hopefully I remember to pray more than I worry. And on top of all of that I will love you. No matter what I will love you.

From my heart,

Mom

Today you wanted to stay home. You said you didn’t feel good and you moved like a sloth. Sometimes I get frustrated at how slowly you move in the mornings. It seems like it’s a sign of subtle disobedience. You still do what you are told, after the third request, but you do it so slowly and nearly make the rest of us late.

I’m not sure why you do this or what it really means. But more than this frustration, I wanted to write about the not feeling good part. You have often stayed home from school and really you’ve been fine. My new rule is that you have to have a fever or be throwing up to stay home. There may be some exceptions someday (God forbid: lice, serious coughing, pink eye, etc.), but with four of you someone is always saying they don’t feel well and when I let one of you stay home with just a cold, the others start to revolt.

I wish I could have let you stay home today. I would have loved to spend time with you, Sweet Boy. Of all of my children, you are the one I feel like needs me most. Three is very obvious about his needs. He follows me around and wants to be with me while I run errands. Four is still little enough that he needs my help to get him food or drinks. And One is a almost a teen so that explains that. But you, Two, you are complex. You cuddle when I’m sitting next to you, but you will not have me touch you at school or church. Sometimes I wish I could get into your head and really know what you’re thinking. I love you so much and think you are so beautiful – inside and out. I hope you know that.

So even though I didn’t let you stay home from school today, I wish somehow, in some way, as you’re sitting there in school you will feel loved and cared for despite the resistance you felt at home this morning. And when you get home, we can read that great book we’ve been reading and see what happens next to Paris.

Love,

Mom

I am starting your journals on this blog. I write the first post to explain the header picture. I chose it because I wanted to say something to you about giving you the world. Isn’t that what so many parents say, “I would give you the world, if I could.”

But I don’t want to give you the world. There’s too much to handle in the world. There are wars. People are starving. Men steal from one another. Women sell themselves for money. Children lose their parents through disease or divorce. There’s so much sadness and heartache that I  want to shield you from the world.

Instead, I want to give you your own space. Your own corner of the world, maybe. I want to give you only that part of the world that God calls you to. For I trust him more than I trust myself. Even though I love you with a fierce Mama Bear heart, I know God will give you what you need when you need it. And I also know he will never give you that which you cannot handle. 

So although that picture serves as a reminder of the beauty this world has to offer, I chose not to give you the world. I want so much more for you. 

Love,

Mom

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