On Being a Mom

On the bookshelf I glimpsed the corner of a journal I started writing the day I found out I was expecting. It had been awhile and I love reading my account of being a mom. The book has pictures, drawings, songs and on every page, various degrees of emotion expressed such as excitement, fear and love. Of course this was not the time to read it. The dishwasher needed to be loaded, I had brought home work to do and the lunches still needed to be made.  Maybe I could read just a page or two; it had been a long day. 

Right away I opened to a photo of me looking like I swallowed a watermelon whole. It always makes me smile to think I carried that 10 + pound child and there was no getting him out. I remember trying to sleep, rolling over, tossing, turning, numb from the hips down. I would walk for hours thinking this would help the process. It didn’t. My sister teased that my child would be born on her birthday which was two weeks past the due date. I vehemently swore there was no way he was staying in there that long. He did, she was ecstatic. I wasn’t.

I fast forwarded to toddler Tyler and was reminded of how busy he was – virtually into everything. I was amazed at how quickly he learned despite the fact that he was always so sick. I cannot differentiate whether the empathy I feel for the then single mother was because I could feel it through her writing or, because I lived it. Surgeries came and went and we got through it. He kept growing and learning and growing. My daughter joined our family when she was 14 and Ty was 3. I remember the connection I felt between the three of us and reflected on how important that would be in the years to come. As all 14 year olds, she had her struggles and she got through them. I watched her in the same way I watched Ty. She was always learning and growing. Ty is now eight and Tash is 19 and we have all travelled far, physically and emotionally since those early journal days.

I put the book down and smiled while doing the menial tasks I wanted to avoid in the first place. The work I brought home had lost it's urgency. I reflected; despite the uncertainty involved in being a parent, (children don’t come with manuals) the thing that never fails to amaze me is the bond and connection that is always present through every stage of their development. Becoming a parent means that a million times over you will watch your heart walk around the room and in return you silently commit to being the best parent you can be. For me, this magic is undoubtedly the most endearing benefit of being called Mom.