The following article was found on Americancatholic.org and illustrates the joys and sorrows through all stages of motherhood.
"Each stage of a child's life presents its own difficulties. None
of them is as difficult, as this mom discovered, as letting go.
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Photo
courtesy of Jacqueline Guidry
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Transitional labor is intense, contractions hard and fast,
one toppling over another. This physical pain is surely, I think, the
most difficult part of being a mother.
Push...push...push...and I have a daughter: Alison with tiny
hands, pearl-perfect fingernails, brown eyes open even as she is
being born.
Michael and I bring her home where her version of a normal infancy
lasts about a week before she develops colic and a sleep pattern
defying all the babycare books we had diligently memorized. She cries
nearly constantly. When she isn’t crying, she’s usually awake,
oblivious to her parents’ need for sleep.
Two o’clock in the morning of an unknown day. A black and white
movie flickers on television. My daughter’s eyes close. I
cautiously stand, ready to place her in the crib, myself in bed. Her
eyes open, then her mouth, but a wail doesn’t follow.
Instead, she watches, curious about what I’ll do next. I settle
back into the rocking chair, pull out a baby book and read her
paragraphs describing a newborn’s typical pattern, hours and hours
of blissful sleep interspersed with minutes of wakefulness. “Hear
that?” I ask. “Get it?”
Alison stares at a Mexican wall hanging, neither interested nor
impressed by anything Dr. Spock and his colleagues might have to say.
It is week after week of sleep deprivation. Had I once been
clear-headed, articulate? This total exhaustion is surely, I think,
the most difficult part of being a mother.
Overcoming
Fears
Alison outgrows colic, learns to walk, deigns to learn only a few
words, having found grunting and pointing to be satisfactory modes of
communication.
One late afternoon, I am preparing dinner while Michael sees to
one of the endless tasks the house demands. Both the front and back
doors stand open to invite a breeze. When my kitchen work is done, I
step into the dining room. “Where’s Alison?”
“I thought she was with you.”
“No.”
We both stare at the open front door. I run through the house
calling, “Alison, Alison!”
No answer.
I check the bedrooms and bath upstairs while my husband hits the
attic and basement. Nothing. We bolt out the door, me to the left,
him to the right. I run up the side street, frantically calling her
name. No response.
“Have you seen a little girl? Blue shirt with ducks.” Is that
what she was wearing? I can’t remember. “Red barrette?” Or
maybe blue or yellow or green. “Brown hair?”
The man shakes his head, but seems to feel sorry for me.
“She doesn’t talk much. Mainly points and grunts.” I reach
out a hand as if to demonstrate.
He takes a step back. He has not seen her and wants to be left
alone.
She’s been kidnapped, run over by a truck, mauled by a rabid
dog. I have been derelict in my duty, have not kept her safe.
“I found her!” my husband calls to me from the corner.
She is curled up on a pile of clean laundry I’d tossed on the
bed in the spare room. In my panicked flight through the house, I’d
missed her, camouflaged as she was by the bright colors and patterns
of a toddler’s wardrobe. This realization of how easily I could
fail my child is surely, I think, the most difficult part of being a
mother.
Dealing
With Heartaches
Alison is invited to an overnight party for a friend’s sixth
birthday. She chooses the nightgown she’ll wear, the stuffed
animals she’ll take along. Then the friend reneges, her mother
having decided four girls are too many, the friend having decided
Alison was the expendable one.
Alison cries while I brood, consider calling the mother, begging
an invitation or, if that fails, screaming about the insensitivity of
herself, her daughter, their entire family—immediate and
extended—pets too.
I take Alison for ice cream, read her favorite book seven times
without complaint. But my bribes do not coax disappointment from her
face. Watching that face, etched with sadness I am powerless to
erase, is surely, I think, the most difficult part of being a mother.
The
Struggle to Keep Quiet
Now she is eight, a biking pro allowed to ride around two blocks
alone. I sit on the steps near the curb, watching her younger sister,
Anne, pedal back and forth on the sidewalk, and waiting for Alison to
reappear. She brakes in front of me. “Those boys make me mad.”
“What boys?”
She points to an apartment building a block away. “Every time I
pass, they say, ‘There goes your girlfriend, Mac.’” She screws
up her face, having reached the age when boys are more an object of
ridicule than romance. “Other mean things.”
“What things?”
But that is not the part she wants to share. She recounts how she
told them, “Your mothers must not know what they’re doing because
they’re sure raising rude boys.” One arm akimbo, long braids
jiggling, she waggles a finger at her imaginary foes. “Your mamas
must be ashamed of you.”
“What did those boys say then?”
“They laughed. They’re boys,” she says as if that explains
all.
“How many were there?”
“Four or five.”
“How old?” I try to keep my voice low and calm, not easy for a
woman who sees danger under every leaf.
“Teenagers.” She throws a leg over the bike. “I told them,
right, Mama?” She is proud, pleased.
“You sure told them,” I say.
“I’m going around one more time.”
“Again?” is the only word I allow myself when what I want to
say is:
Stay here, stay safe with me. But what would that tell
her about her ability to keep herself safe? Keeping quiet is surely,
I think, the most difficult part of being a mother.
Facing
Life's Difficulties, Injustices
In fifth grade, she is kept indoors for recess, reprimanded along
with the rest of her class for some misdeed. But, she protests, she
and Angela were in the hall when the trespass occurred. Why should
they receive the burden of punishment when they did not enjoy the sin
of misbehavior? Where was the justice in that? Trying to explain the
world’s injustices to a 10-year-old is surely, I think, the most
difficult part of being a mother.
Soon comes middle school, then high school with the complications
of adolescence, the pulling away followed by the drawing closer, all
of it going too quickly, our lives hurtling toward separation.
She struggles, emotionally, physically and intellectually, as she
labors toward adulthood. Standing available but unable to help her
bypass adolescent angst is surely, I think, the most difficult part
of being a mother.
Learning
to Let Go
Senior year brings college applications, acceptances, the need to
choose. Reaching a decision is difficult, but not impossible.
Here is what seems impossible: Emptying dear Alison’s bedroom.
Seeing her walls bare. Walking on uncluttered carpet shining brightly
from years of protection afforded by clothes strewn across the floor.
Packing possessions, driving to New Haven, leaving her while we
return to Kansas City, half a continent away.
How can I be sure I have taught her all the lessons she will need
for a full, happy life? I needed more time, did not realize the days
would speed by so swiftly. Surely, there are instructions I have not
given: Never mix your whites with your darks, no matter how desperate
you are for clean underwear. Know your mother and father and sister
will always love and treasure you. Eat your vegetables—even
broccoli. Remember the earth is populated mostly with good and kind
people who want to do the right thing. Check your oil regularly and
the air pressure in your tires. Open yourself to the whole world and
let your star shine brightly across the universe. Get enough sleep.
Strive for a balanced life—family and friends who love you, work
that challenges and inspires you, play that renews you.
I have loved you as best I could, taught you what I knew. Now I
can only hope you have learned, will learn from others what I could
not teach.
Saying good-bye. That is the most difficult part of being a
mother".
Jacqueline Guidry is a freelance author from Kansas City,
Missouri. She has had numerous articles published in various
publications, including
St. Anthony Messenger. Her novel
The
Year the Colored Sisters Came to Town (published by Welcome Rain,
now in paperback) received the Thorpe Menn Award for literary
excellence from the American Association of University Women.
Alison, from the site Oopsey Daisy, has made some adorable school packets to give your child a leg up on learning. Check out the great printables on her site. I can't wait to start using these with my little guys. The felt board activities will be a plus for the hot summer days. I have already printed them out. Now if I could just get them all laminated and ready to use.
