This Sunday will be my first Mother's Day without my mom. I've been living without her for 18 years, but this year, my first as a mother myself, is different. I'm only just beginning to understand my own role as a mother. I'm only just beginning to comprehend the depth and breadth of her love for me.
When she was my age, she had three daughters. I was twelve and my sisters were 7 and 6. I remember a lot about how she was then. My dad was in the Navy, away from home at least 6 months of the year. When he was home, he was distant and quick to anger much of the time. So my mom had to be a single parent.
She was so good at it. It's beyond amazing to me as an adult, and now a mother myself, to think about the strength, love, patience and sheer endurance it would have taken to raise three children, one with special needs, while physically alone half the time and left with no emotional support from her husband.
She maintained a household, two dogs a cat and a full time job. She never complained, or broke down or skimped on mothering us. She was independent and self-sufficient and funny and energetic and kind.
When I think about the amount of grief I must have caused her when I was twelve and she was 35, it makes me sad. I wish I could tell her now how sorry I am for being such a sarcastic brat, for mouthing off, for telling her I hater her that time that haunts me to this day.
But what I'm beginning to understand is that I don't need to apologize for breaking her heart and causing her pain, because that's what motherhood is. You love unconditionally. You open your heart and lay it bare to emotion so ferocious it has the power to forgive all hurts and make them seem tiny in the grand scheme of things.
On the day my mom died, she was in and out of lucidity. In literally the last words that she spoke before drifting into a coma, she asked about her children, that they be taken care of. I consider it one of the greatest gifts of my life that I was there on that day holding her hand and that I heard her request.
This Mother's Day, as I hold Myles and look into his eyes, I feel closer to my mom than I ever have. She was an amazing woman and I can only hope that I will find those same reserves of patience, strength and unconditional love as I embark on my own journey as a mother.
Now I understand. I used to feel sad that my mom wouldn't be in my life to help me when I became a mother. But the lessons she gave me in the time she was in my life are still with me. They'll live on forever.
That is what makes a mother.
This post is part of the first annual Blog Blast sponsored by the Parent Bloggers Network and Light Iris. Anyone can participate and enter to win a $100 Spa Finder gift certificate by writing on the topic "What Makes You A Mother" and posting it on Friday, May 11.
When my mother died I wept bitterly because I knew NO ONE would ever love me that way again. Most of the love we get in our life is conditional.
I ache for that acceptance.
And to call what we feel for our children "love" almost seems wrong. The feeling I have for them is visceral, primal. I can't tease it out as an emotion and analyze it. It just IS.
Posted by: V-Grrrl | May 11, 2007 at 08:23 AM
Thanks for sharing that, TB. Beautiful.
Posted by: Chris | May 11, 2007 at 10:43 AM
Just lovely -- and to think I wrote about poop...
Posted by: mayberry | May 11, 2007 at 11:14 AM
Great post. Happy Mother's Day!
Posted by: Jen M. | May 11, 2007 at 01:18 PM
Beautiful post. You made me cry. I hope as a mother I can be as loving as yours.
Posted by: boogiemum | May 11, 2007 at 01:23 PM
As always, the only words I can muster (through my tears) to describe this post...beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.
Happy Mother's Day, Teebs.
Posted by: Bobita | May 11, 2007 at 03:07 PM
It does give us a unique appreciation for what our own mothers did for us, doesn't it?
I wish you a joyous Mother's Day, this year and every year!
Posted by: mothergoosemouse | May 11, 2007 at 07:57 PM
There is no "YOU WILL BE A FANTASTIC MOTHER". You already ARE one. Happy First Mother's Day.
Posted by: wordgirl | May 11, 2007 at 11:50 PM
Happy Mother's Day, New Mom! Myles is a very lucky boy.
Posted by: Ortizzle | May 12, 2007 at 07:04 PM
That's exactly what it is.
Welcome to the club.
Posted by: Her Bad Mother | May 12, 2007 at 09:14 PM
Happy Mother's Day, Tammie.
Posted by: jen from boston | May 13, 2007 at 12:01 PM
This is, I think, one of my favourite posts of yours. Beautiful, Teebs.
Posted by: mamatulip | May 13, 2007 at 05:08 PM
Happy first Mother's Day!
Posted by: Elizabeth | May 13, 2007 at 05:10 PM
Oh, TB, that is so lovely. And I am so glad that you get to celebrate Mother's Day as a mother this year.
Posted by: Sueb0b | May 13, 2007 at 07:19 PM
That was beautiful. I love how you are able to write exactly how I feel. I just loved this.
Posted by: RGLHM | May 26, 2007 at 02:03 AM
waaaaah. that was amazing.
Posted by: tracey | June 03, 2007 at 11:28 PM