More Than Enough
She’s Got a Story: Abigail
Playing with her three-year-old daughter, goats frolicking around her, Abigail looks happy and content as she shows me around her family’s farmstead, Compton Family Farm. There’s something incredibly beautiful about a woman who is doing what she feels like she was made to do.
As a goat chewed on my pocket and I marveled at autumn painted across the farm’s trees, Abigail shared some of her challenges. Honestly, I don’t know a woman who hasn’t struggled with feeling like she is enough in some capacity. (Or in all capacities) Abigail opened up about her struggles with conceiving, fertility treatments, giving birth, nursing, and more, and it was easy to see how she used those feelings of inadequacy.
“I never felt enough as a person, as a woman, and I think that also drives me. I had fertility issues. We tried and tried and tried to get pregnant. Couldn’t get pregnant. I went through fertility treatments and got pregnant with my oldest, and couldn’t have him naturally. I wanted to have a natural, vaginal birth. It didn’t happen. I pushed for two hours, and he didn’t make it past zero station. I was induced with him because my husband was deploying. I ended up with a c-section. Baby number two also needed fertility meds. I also struggled with nursing – my body didn’t produce enough. So, I never felt enough as what you think you are supposed to be as a woman. And I don’t think it’s talked about enough.”
Abigail talks easily about feeling like she has lived two different lives. She married at 19, and her husband was stationed in Jacksonville, NC. During his service, Abigail’s husband was wounded and, eventually, medically retired.
“The military community and overall perseverance are like none other. Because we did not grow up like this – figuring it out, moving forward – that has been extremely helpful attribute I have gained along the way. I don’t know if I would have the same perseverance if I had not lived that life with my husband. It gave me the grit to finish school, too. Doing it with four kids. I’m 38, I’ll be 39. I’m the PTO president at Emerald Hill. I figure I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”
Abigail dreams of the days when her farm will be self-sustaining. She’s got big plans. “I’d love for the farm to self-sustain so that we could support military and local NP with food, skills, and workshops. Passing on what I have learned so others can help support themselves. Doing things like hosting goat yoga for military spouses/local mothers for Mother’s Day or a meat bird butchering workshop where they could go home with an couple of chickens, they butchered would be a dream.”
We talked about balancing mom life and school life, the struggles to find enough hours in the day to get it all done, and the educational process, which is reaping its own rewards as Abigail has discovered her love of learning.
I didn’t like school when I was in school. I liked the social aspect, and I played sports, but I didn’t like actual school. As I get older, I have really enjoyed nourishing my brain, not just my body. I get to do both things here at the farm. I get to nourish my body with the things I am nourishing my brain with, and learn how to better produce food for our family and our community. Learning about what is going on in the food industry around us. I would say I am passionate about evolving myself. If that means academically, mentally, or here learning new skills. I never thought I’d learn to drive a tractor. That is one of the coolest things ever.”
When it was time to take some final photos, I asked Abigail to drive the tractor. There was a moment shared between her and her daughter. This magical moment of smiles and giggles, and Abigail shined. Our time together reminded me there’s something beautiful about a woman who is doing what she’s meant to do. In any one facet of Abigail’s life, she is more than enough. Truly, she excels.
Abigail was right; we don’t talk enough about all the ways life can rob us of a sense of security in our own bodies, of feeling we are enough. It’s inspired me to take that on in another post. Do you struggle with being enough? When? What causes those feelings?
