{"id":6692,"date":"2018-03-12T00:02:43","date_gmt":"2018-03-12T06:02:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.mops.org\/?p=6692"},"modified":"2018-03-12T00:02:43","modified_gmt":"2018-03-12T06:02:43","slug":"the-routine-of-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/the-routine-of-family\/","title":{"rendered":"The Routine of Family"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been a single parent for almost 13 years and have learned a thing or two about creating time for my daughter during a busy schedule. When she was 8 years old, I was a full-time graduate student, working two and a half part-time jobs, actively writing for my blog, and trying to stay connected to a thriving church community as a member of the worship and arts team. There would be times where we would leave home for school and work in the morning and not return until 9 p.m. My daughter would find herself nestled under my on-campus work desk, eating her fair share of Goldfish snacks (which would often serve as \u201cdinner\u201d) doing homework. Her sporadic, inquisitive interruptions, \u201cAre we going home, yet?\u201d would disrupt the busyness of my life and remind me that I needed to give as much attention to her as I did everything and everybody else.<\/p>\n

In this weird way, I thought that being together in the same space \u2013 even with piles of books between us \u2013 was \u201cspending time together.\u201d We lived together, rode in the same car together every morning and evening, shared spaces, meals and everything else \u2013 but it was always filled with the demands of the day. While my daughter was (and still is) very resilient, forgiving and flexible, she began craving one-on-one, uninterrupted time that allowed her to have all of my attention. So, we began a routine of spending time together. It would be the only way a busy mom of one could make this happen.<\/p>\n

On days where dinner would be a quick meal from Chick-Fil-A, we\u2019d sit on a park bench and eat the meal together. No cell phones, no books, just me and her, chicken nuggets and all the wiles of a third grader\u2019s day. When the weekend rolled around, we\u2019d pick a board or card game to play in the morning and an outside activity to do in the afternoon. In between I\u2019d do some work (eek!), but those times were exclusively hers.<\/p>\n

Even though during this shift I often felt like a toddler learning to walk on new legs, these scheduled times together began to feel a part of our rhythm, a part of who we were as a family unit. Eventually, these moments moved from \u201cjust another part of my schedule\u201d to something that took precedence over things on a growing to-do list. The unsaid fear I had that these tasks wouldn\u2019t get done if I didn\u2019t give them my attention turned out to be a fallacy; the more time I gave my daughter, the more time I seemed to have to efficiently work. There was some kind of supernatural grace bestowed on me when I expanded my time for my daughter, both a priority to God and me.<\/p>\n

Now, the \u201croutine\u201d is just a part of who we are as a family. By learning that creating space for family creates more space for us to complete the \u201ctasks of life,\u201d I no longer hesitate to give attention when needed. We go for walks in Central Park, I let her do my makeup, play Uno, cook meals together, or sometimes it\u2019s simply being willing to look up from my phone or computer to watch a new dance she\u2019s choreographed. The opportunities for single parents to spend time with their children are endless when we remember that God has equipped us with the grace to be more than we imagined we could be. It\u2019s the \u201cgive and it shall be given unto you\u201d rule in full effect: the more time we create for our children (even when the pressures of single parenthood are present), the more time we find God gives us to manage it all. It\u2019s a win-win for everyone.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Alisha<\/a>Rev. Alisha L. Gordon, M.Div. is a writer, teacher, scholar activist and public theologian. She marries social justice work and spiritual growth to the prophetic call of the church to help women see their full potential in a social and political landscape. Alisha has a 13-year-old daughter and lives in the New York City area.<\/p>\n

\n

This article currently appears in the Winter 2018 issue of\u00a0The MOPS Magazine.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been a single parent for almost 13 years and have learned a thing or two about creating time for my daughter during a busy schedule. When she was 8 years old, I was a full-time graduate student, working two and a half part-time jobs, actively writing for my blog, and trying to stay connected […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":6694,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"schedule","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[100,102],"tags":[54,55,1248,56,101,797,1365],"class_list":["post-6692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faith","category-relationships","tag-mama","tag-mom","tag-mops-magazine","tag-motherhood","tag-parenting","tag-routine","tag-single-mom"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6692\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}