Hard Is Not the Same Thing as Bad — Abbie Halberstadt, Mom of 10 Tells Us the Truth About Motherhood: EP 220

Okay.

So not only have you birthed 10 real babies, but you have birthed, I think it's three book babies? Yes.

Is that the right number?

Yes.

So what's funny is when you're an author in the traditional publishing world, if you keep writing books, there's kind of always something in the works.

So three books plus three study guides, which... are kind of birth book babies as well.

Like you have to do stuff for them to are out in the world.

So six trade books, if you include the study guides, and then my twin daughters and I just wrote a baking book and we literally just got, this is not going to air for a while, but we literally just got the physical book.

Cause as an author, you, you don't get a physical book.

Like you see mark mock-ups and like, um, other books that are wrapped in the cover so you can reveal the cover, but it's not the actual book until like two or three months before your book comes out.

So my girls and I wrote a baking book and we actually just got the physical book, the first look through today, which was really exciting.

So exciting.

What a big deal.

That's awesome.

So your first book was Emma's for Mama.

And, you know, that was a really big hit.

What, what do you feel like, what was your heart behind wanting to write that?

I saw a trend on social media that I found really disturbing, which was an idea that motherhood is taking more than it's giving to us, that it is a side gig to be added on to stuff that has real purpose.

that kids are not a blessing, like Psalm 127 tells us very clearly, but instead that they are more like a burden and a nuisance and a hindrance to real recognition and fulfillment and glory.

And that because that's the case, according to the internet and many secular moms, and sometimes even moms who claim Christ, that we should use them as a comedic punching bag and get all of our angst and our frustration and our overwhelm out on said children as if they're not going to one day get on the internet and see what we said.

And I really felt like there was this uprising of what I label mediocre motherhood in the book because the subtitle of M is for Mama is a rebellion against mediocre motherhood.

And some people don't like that phrase because they're like, oh, who are you to judge? And the point that I make in chapter one of that book is every single one of us is mediocre without Christ.

This is not, I'm excellent and you're mediocre.

I've got this figured out and you're flailing.

It's we all need Jesus.