Finding My Path to Motherhood

–by Ginger C. Hanson, PhD

As a genXer, growing up in an active LDS family, I struggled with the seemingly contradictory messages I heard about the role of women in society. My parents and church leaders encouraged me to pursue an education. The messages I heard outside the church, and even within my home, encouraged me to believe that I could be anything I wanted to be. Yet as a girl in the church, I easily absorbed a checklist of expected steps to move along the straight and narrow path: baptism, temple marriage, and motherhood; before 30 if you are on the fast track. And, only if there was a financial necessity should a mother work outside the home. In my mind, I pieced together these competing ideas something like this, “you can do anything you set your mind to, until you become a mother, and then that is all you should do.” As a good LDS girl I was reconciled to adhere to this prescription as strictly as circumstances allowed, but I secretly hoped there would be more to life than motherhood for me. I craved intellectual stimulation and opportunities for personal development.  I am so grateful for a Heavenly Father who knows me, and what I needed, and helped guide me through all of these confusing messages down a path that would work for my family and me.

At fifteen I met a very handsome and sweet young man at a tri-stake youth conference. For the next 6 years we continued a long distance romance that included countless hours on the phone, in person dates (after I turned 16), and weekly letters while he was on his mission. While he was in the mission field, I started college. When he returned, we resumed our relationship. At twenty-one, I began preparations to turn in my mission papers. I was head over heels in love with my boyfriend, and after six years together I knew we were reaching that point in our relationship when it was time to move  to the next level, yet something was holding me back. He wasn’t mentioning the M-word, and I certainly wasn’t going to mention it. While all of my friends seemed to be excited at the prospect of marriage, I found myself strangely trying to avoid the thought of it. I had always wanted to go on a mission, so I busied myself making preparations. When I had the interview with the bishop before turning in my papers, he asked me if I had prayed about the decision to go on a mission. I told him that I had, but the more I prayed about it, the more confused I got, so I had stopped praying. He then opened his scriptures to D&C 9:9, “But if it be not right. . .you shall have a stupor of thought.” “Does that describe what you are feeling” he asked? I decided to hold onto my papers for another week and pray about it again. The next day, over a special picnic lunch my boyfriend had prepared, complete with adorable heart shaped sandwiches, he proposed. I was terrified; I ran from the park to my nearby apartment, shut the door and burst into tears, a reaction that surprised even me. When my boyfriend found me, he asked me what was wrong. I told him I was scared. I didn’t want to have to give up all of my hopes and dreams to be a wife and mother. We talked more. I don’t remember our exact conversation, but I remember that he was very supportive and assured me that he would support me in pursuing my education and a career if that was what I wanted. I felt at peace. He even struck a deal with me that he would do all of the cooking; how could I refuse? We were married in the Portland, Oregon temple that summer. He didn’t tell me that he had no idea how to cook, but that is another story. He has always supported me in whatever life endeavors I have wanted to pursue. I am deeply grateful for his understanding, love and support throughout our life together.  

Shortly after we were married, the Proclamation on the Family came out. What little space I had allowed myself in understanding my possible futures as a faithful LDS woman seemed to become vanishingly small. It stated that God’s commandment for his children was to “multiple and replenish the earth,” and that mothers were “primarily responsible for the nurture of their children.” I wanted to follow the counsel of the first presidency and I thought this meant that I had to choose between motherhood or a career. The thought of giving up my desire to have a fulfilling career was like shutting my heart away in a closet. Unlike many of my LDS friends, I did not have the desire to have children. When I compared my apathy about motherhood to some friends’ seemingly singular desire to be a mother, I was haunted by the worry that perhaps I was not cut out to nurture another human being, and would be a dismal failure at motherhood. I was full of so much turmoil over the topic that I couldn’t make a conscious decision about how I wanted to move forward in life. While my husband wanted children, he was not in a hurry and did not push me on the issue. After some tremendous mental struggle over the matter we decided to put our faith in Heavenly Father; forgoing birth control, we would have a child when, and if, our Heavenly Father thought it was right for us. Throughout this early period, when the subject of motherhood came up, I felt a peaceful reassurance that our path would become clearer in time.

In the meantime, I continued to work and pursue my education. I was completing my bachelor’s degree in psychology. Through my coursework, I discovered that I had a passion for research and statistics, and I excelled at them. I found it very fulfilling to master new statistics and apply them on research projects with my professors. The mentoring relationships that developed with these professors were also very rewarding. They gave me challenging assignments that allowed me to develop new skills, and provided opportunities for me to present at conferences. They encouraged me to pursue graduate school. When I was not sure which type of graduate programs to apply to, one of my professors suggested I look through some of the top tier journals for topics that interested me. It may not come as a surprise, given my struggle with motherhood, that I found research on work-family integration to be most interesting. This was a burgeoning area in Industrial/Organizational psychology. I began the arduous process of taking the GRE and applying to graduate schools. I was extended an offer to attend the PhD program at Portland State University (PSU), which was near our extended families. I would have two faculty advisors, one a statistician, and one a work-family researcher. It was a perfect fit, but it would mean that we would have to move. My husband had just taken a new job. It was a tough decision, and we were praying for guidance. Then my husband was laid off and it seemed like Heavenly Father was opening the way for me to embrace this opportunity.

My husband quickly found a job in Portland and we moved downtown near the university. We learned that we had two choices of LDS congregations to attend, our regular family ward or the Market Street Branch. The Branch was a bit unusual in that its boundaries overlapped with several other wards. You can get to the Branch from almost anywhere in town via public transportation, and it has evolved to serve various populations without cars. I am embarrassed now to admit that I was quite put off by the Branch the first week we attended there. The nuclear family (mother, father, and children) was almost none existent in the branch. Instead, it had a rich mixture of unique people. There were college students, young urban couples, elderly women, and a surprisingly large number of people living with mental illnesses or learning disabilities. Many members were struggling to get by on social services; some were even homeless. There were women, including the branch president’s wife, who would regularly wear pants, PANTS, to church! I did not want to attend there at first, but my husband seemed to find it charming, and convinced me to give it a try. There were MANY opportunities to serve; so much so that wives were invited to participate as home teaching companions with their husbands. We were sometimes assigned as many as five households. It was a small congregation, and through all this service we were able to forge very close relationships. I grew to love each and every member of that branch. They taught me so much about love and humanity. Only my Heavenly Father could have known how much I would need the wonderfully unique members in that Branch during the next several years.

Graduate school was hard work, but it was stimulating and fulfilling too, and I was enjoying myself. My second year of graduate school, I was offered a research assistant position with a statistician at another university and I took it despite the discouragement from my department chair. I was really going against the grain, but I have never regretted it. It was a great opportunity and my boss turned out to be an amazing mentor who I continue to work with today. Working ended up prolonging graduate school longer than I had anticipated, and I had a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that I needed to confront the confusion I had about motherhood and either commit to fertility treatment or reconcile myself with the possibility that children were not in my future. I struggled with these thoughts for several years vacillating back and forth about whether or not to pour our money and emotional energy into having a child. Whenever I heard someone talk about a woman’s divine calling to be a mother, I felt ashamed at my lack of desire to enter into that role. I stopped coming to church on Mother’s Day. Luckily, these instances were rare in the branch where everyone was extremely aware, and sensitive about the many unique paths life can take. I met a couple of other sisters who were pursuing graduate degrees too. One particular sister seemed as apathetic about motherhood as I was, and she had another wonderful gift; she had a disarming ability to express her thoughts and feelings in a very candid yet approachable way. We talked about school, careers and our apprehensions about motherhood. She was an answer to the prayers of my heart. I will always be grateful for her courage. Since then I have met many other women with the courage to follow their own path; I am so grateful for their example and the courage it has given to me.

At the same time, I was having experiences at work and graduate school that were changing my perspective too. I worked as a research analyst at the School of Nursing. What a wonderful experience it was to be surrounded by so many hard working and intelligent female role models. Many of them had children, and in contrast to what I had grown up believing, their children were turning out just fine. In fact, they were better than fine, they were studying hard, doing volunteer work, and getting into good colleges. Through my studies, I was learning that although being a working parent could be stressful, there were also benefits. In fact, this was the topic of my thesis. Some of these benefits include greater vitality, more resources, a larger social support network, and a more complex self-identity. I began to feel that perhaps it was okay to be a mother, have a career, and be a faithful LDS woman.

With that hope, my husband and I finally decided to commit to fertility treatment. After a surgery and three rounds of IUI, we were pregnant. There were three other women in the Branch all pregnant at the same time. I would over hear them talking about morning sickness, expanding waistlines, and maternity clothes. I remember telling myself, “I am not going to be one of those women who gets pregnant and is suddenly so consumed by everything baby that she loses who she is.” I laugh thinking about it now, as if I could escape the inevitable. Having a baby was life altering. And so as my waistline expanded to did my self-identity. I was going to be a mom. As it sunk in, a little of that fear turned into excitement, I was going to get to join that exclusive club, the motherhood club. The miracle of that, after 12 years of infertility, was not lost on me.

I was still uncertain about whether I should try to manage work, school, and an infant all at the same time. I was still struggling with some guilt and unsure if putting my baby in daycare was the right thing to do. I was in the office of my dissertation chair handing off the first complete draft of my dissertation proposal. She asked me if I knew what I was going to do for childcare after my maternity leave. I told her that I had picked out a childcare center and planned to go back to work after my maternity leave but I was feeling a little unsure about my decision. Perhaps a shocking revelation between graduate student and advisor, but then I always have been entirely too open. She gave me some of the best advice I have ever gotten about work-family choices. She said, “You don’t have to decide for the rest of your child’s life. Just try something out and see how it works for your family.   If it is not working, adjust.” How grateful I am to have had such a smart advisor, not just for my dissertation but also for my life.

I will not say that I instantly loved motherhood. My daughter was extremely colicky. I found maternity to be an endless drudgery of rocking, bouncing, nursing, diaper changing and laundry. At times, I felt very incompetent, and longed for social and intellectual stimulation. To be candid, I was really looking forward to going back to work. Yet through all of this, I was developing a deep love for my daughter. Over time, I began to grow into my role as a mother. Now I am a mother of two. While I can’t honestly say I loved the baby phase, I am enjoying motherhood more and more as my kids grow.

I have moved past some of the unhelpful limitations and assumptions of my youth. My children not only survived daycare, they loved it and thrived there. I can still remember when my husband and I toured my daughter’s future childcare center; we walked out the door practically giddy. We knew that our daughter would be well taken care of and have so many rich opportunities that we, without training in early childhood education, could not provide on our own. I too have become a better parent through learning from my kids’ teachers; swaddling, sleep training, potty training, positive discipline, conflict resolution, fostering learning through play, and much, much more. I am so grateful for the wonderful community of friends and teachers that have made my children’s early childhood so rich. In addition, my employment has also been a great relief to my husband and me during periods of instability in his career.

It has been a difficult journey, and I know there is much, much more to come. But, as I reflect back, it is clear to me that my Father in Heaven has been there to comfort and guide me throughout. I feel that he loves me, and that I have individual worth to him. I am truly grateful for his love and guidance.