Letter from Virginia Rawe

Light, a symbol of joy, shines on a stone church and the cross.

Photo by Chelsey Shortman

Dear sisters in Christ,

Growing up, I was the youngest of four girls and I was always the one who had a doll in my arms with a bottle, a blanket and anything else that I thought my baby needed. All my dreams of growing up were of being a mom. It was all I ever wanted: to get married, start a family and be a stay-at-home mom.

Then my dreams started coming true, I got married, and very quickly my husband, Matthew, and I got pregnant. It was a somewhat challenging pregnancy physically and having to wake up and go to work every morning was rough. But the morning sickness only lasted a few months and then it was pretty much back to normal. Being my first, it felt like it took forever to start showing a baby bump. I wanted one right away! Finally, baby started to show, and Matthew and I counted down the days until the due date. We decided that I would indeed stay at home and I dreamt about how glorious it would be.

I had so many people tell me so many things while expecting our first. "You'll fall in love with your baby right away." "All it will take is one look and your heart will increase like you never thought it could." "Enjoy the time when they're young, because it goes so fast."

Then I gave birth to our beautiful daughter, Emma, after a long, stressful labor and everything changed. But not how I imagined.

I felt alone, afraid and ashamed. My labor and delivery did not go as I had planned, and I felt deep shame in that. Afraid that somehow, I had let down my husband and family with things that I needed to have during that labor. I did not feel an instant bond with my baby, and I felt very alone in that. Nobody told me that they went through this. I must be different.

I was afraid that I was somehow messing everything up. How could I not be? I didn't feel this massive change in my heart for my baby, what kind of mom am I? Who does that? I must be a bad mom. I should leave. My baby would be better without me, since I don't feel this overwhelming love that I am told I should be feeling.

These are things that ran through my head every day as I rocked my baby girl in her nursery, while sometimes silently crying and sometimes calling out to God for help.

This is what I did for the first three months of my Emma's life. All these things I kept hidden from everyone around me, because I felt such shame. I just knew if I told anyone, they would never want to speak to me again. Everyone I talked to told me that this was "the best time of my life and I must be enjoying it so much." That they remembered with their firstborn what a "peaceful and beautiful time that was."

But they had no idea that every day I contemplated leaving my baby and my husband, because in my mind they were going to be better off without me.

Then one day, while reading a daily devotional, I came across the quote from St. John Paul ll, "Be messengers of joy.” Then I remembered back on something that I told myself as a 16-year-old girl: I would choose joy every day, no matter what was happening in my life. I remember grabbing a recipe card, flipping it over to the blank side and writing down that quote from St. John Paul II. I put it on our refrigerator, so I could look at it daily and remind myself that God made me to be joyful.

My dear sisters in Christ, God gives each of us the gift of joy. But we have to make the choice to accept that gift and bring it into our daily lives. Though it may be something you have to choose to accept multiple times in a day, maybe even every hour, we still have to make that choice. Personally, being joyful means doing the little things in my life with thanksgiving to God. To take the mundane tasks of life such as washing the dishes, preparing and cooking meals or folding the laundry and to find the joy in it. I will often gaze out of a window for a second and thank God for what I see before I begin. Then maybe listen to music, sing along with the songs or offer up that task cheerfully for someone I know who needs prayers. To stop grumbling about all the things I have to do and to start thanking God for them instead.

I knew that in order to start choosing the gift of God’s joy in my life, I had to start telling Matthew how I was feeling. Being so vulnerable by opening up and saying my struggles out loud to Matthew was terrifying. It took me many months to tell Matthew everything. I still felt such shame and was so afraid of him being angry with me. Never once was he angry with me, never once did he ever make me feel more ashamed or alone. It might be the love of a spouse, a sibling, or a friend, but when someone becomes vulnerable in that way and opens their heart to another, love can become a powerful thing. Slowly, I began to feel like a heavy burden was being lifted until all the feelings of loneliness and shame were gone.

Something I realized during my darkest days was that even with how I was feeling and what I was experiencing, God’s joy was always present for me to choose. The two can coexist. Joy is a way of life; it is not a fleeting feeling. At first it seemed impossible and at times I thought there was no way that I could do it. But I realized that God is with me in the darkness, and that because God is there, His joy must be there as well. It was and it is well worth seeking.

Looking and reflecting on this time in my life is not easy for me to do. It also is not something I generally want to do, but it is the time where I grew the most as a Catholic woman and a daughter of God. I grew in my faith, that God never leaves me even in times of great trial, in my hope, that it may feel impossible now, but better days are ahead, in my trust that God knows what is best for me, and in my strength, that I can do all things through Christ.

We are now expecting our fourth baby this spring and every postpartum has had its challenges for me, from depression to severe anxiety. I know this and I can always expect it. With every postpartum, it has been a little different and Matthew and I have had to figure out a new strategy to combat it. But always at the center of it, is my reminder that God created me to be a messenger of joy to my husband, my children, friends and strangers. God wants us all to be joyful. That is one reason He, in His goodness, has created us. I encourage you, my dear sisters in Christ, to accept this gift from God and to start your journey towards being a "Messenger of Joy."

Your sister in Christ,

Virginia