I don't write nearly as much here on WBMW as I have in years past. Among various reasons for the decline is the time I spend hanging out with the contributors' and community of Mormon Women Stand (which I founded a little over a year ago) organizing and mentoring the work we do as a united voice of likeminded LDS women. It’s a different type of ‘mothering’ than being a mom – kind of. It’s a wonderful collaboration! These incredible women who daily inspire and teach me also mother me. I feel so blessed to be in this stage of my life with the perspective that only years of learning and experience can provide and with the ability to occasionally share my thoughts with all of you.

Today, I want to share a simple testimony about motherhood and what it means to me now, as it’s expanded over the years. Not necessarily my feelings about being a mother as I’ve long been blessed with a clear vision of the eternal significance of the decision I made in choosing to become a mom.

I’ve come to truly appreciate my divine nature as a female and the power that is embodied, literally, in motherhood. I treasure the doctrine taught in the Family Proclamation that gender is an essential characteristic of who we have always been, male or female, and always will be. I know, with full confidence, that I was female before I came to earth and that I will always be a woman, thus a mother. How grateful I am for this eternal truth, which centers my ability to understand the incessant attacks on gender today and clearly discern from where they emanate.

Choosing to bear children and mother is often minimized and has been as long as I can remember. I recall going to the grocery store with four children under five and getting the look,every mother in my same situation can relate to and that was over 30 years ago. We haven’t been living in the 50s for a long time, where everyone generally held mothers in high esteem.

Women of covenant must be firmly grounded in the doctrine of motherhood if we are to withstand the buffetings of the adversary. I wrote this article about, Mary, the Mother of Jesus, a few years ago relating to motherhood. Today, I published a more extensive article on Mormon Women Stand: Were Women Ordained to Motherhood Before Birth?

Is it possible that all women were ordained to the high and holy calling of motherhood before coming to earth? A “hood” is generally understood to be a covering, placed to shield and protect and is firmly mounted above that which it guards. Likewise, the female body is designed to shield, protect, and bring forth the physical body of a male or female infant into mortality; womanhood.

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