Danielle Bean’s latest book, Giving Thanks and Letting Go: Reflections on the Gift of Motherhood is a gem worth adding to any mom’s home library. Upon entering into the parenting journey, we naturally build a collection of books instructing us moms on how to care for children throughout the dependent baby years, the temperamental toddler years, and the struggling teen years. But who tells us how to transition when our children reach their adult years?
Giving Thanks at the Season’s End
Bean sits with you as a fellow mom on the journey and assures you that this is not the end of your motherhood, but it is the end of a season. You will no longer be involved in serving regular meals and folding laundry for your children, but they will still come to you for counsel and comfort. You will still be an integral part of what they seek when they return to visit home.
“This wasn’t the end of all the things, but it was the end of many things, and in that moment [when I was saying goodbye to my college-bound daughter] I was left to wonder if all that I had said and done was enough.”
Danielle Bean
The Sting of Letting Go
Danielle Bean shares stories of her lessons learned during her years of growing independent and the wisdom she has gained while stepping into the mother role. Where at first, she wondered why her mother didn’t just request that she spend her last evening at home, she came to realize with her own grown-up kids that it’s their presence is a much-desired gift that is eagerly hoped for but not demanded.
“[Now] I know the ache of wanting grown kids to spend time with us, but not wanting to demand that they do it. Wanting them to choose it. And I know the sting when they don’t.”
Danielle Bean
Danielle Bean, A Fellow Mom on the Journey
Motherhood is a continuous series of decision making regarding what is best for those who depend most upon us. We decide from their very earliest formation…what prenatal vitamins to take, what baby food to introduce first, what education program to enroll them in. We choose when to let our children watch TV and when to encourage them to play outside.
We choose how to relate to them on a daily basis—whether or not we stop what we are doing and look at them when they first step into the kitchen in the mornings. And we choose too how to release them and patiently wait for them to reach out to us with a letter, a call, a visit home.
Readers have found great comfort in the chapters of Giving Thanks and Letting Go.
“More than anything, I just found comfort knowing that I’m not the only mother out there who feels the sting of missing her babies while also feeling the pride of seeing them become adults out there in the big world. Danielle reminds her readers that in this stage, just as in every other stage of motherhood, we should work to stay close to God and to understand His plan in our lives….”
Christine Johnson (Amazon review)
Motherhood is difficult in that it is always presenting new decisions, new challenges, new territory. You may have many years of mothering under your belt but perhaps you are mothering a high school graduate for the first time. His needs are changing, and he still needs your help but in a very different way.
It’s helpful to have e fellow mom on the journey.
“This book is a beautiful testament to motherhood—the joys, the challenges, and the everyday experiences that make up each day. Danielle Bean captures each season of child raising with such a sincere heart.”
Novak (Amazon review)
Embracing God’s Present Gifts
Danielle Bean offers insight into how we busy moms may find moments of joy. So often these small treasures are not produced by our planned activities but rather occur just by being present in our kids’ lives and listening.
“If only I can remember to pause, to look, to listen to the people in my life and be open to the ways in which they invite me to be part of their world, I find joy….It’s seeing each other and connecting. Communion.”
Danielle Bean
Regarding the shifting seasons of motherhood, in the book Giving Thanks and Letting Go, Bean encourages all moms that giving thanks and letting go is the best way to ease a difficult transition. We are privileged with the role of motherhood. In giving thanks, we do honor to what once was. In letting go, we do honor to what is yet to come.
