When Mother's Day Feels Like Other's Day

We started watching a family-friendly TV series (which shall remain nameless in case you happen to love it) where the first episode begins on Mother’s Day. Parents with five adult kids, their partners, and some grandchildren are gathered in a beautiful backyard on a perfectly lovely day. They’re all perfectly gorgeous. They’ve just finished a delicious brunch. It’s not clear who cooked the meal, but I bet it wasn’t Mom.

Now it’s time for Mom to open her perfectly chosen gifts. She receives a necklace she loves, earrings to match, a sweater that fits, a scarf to go with it, and a gift card for an evening out with Dad (the doctor who adores her and tells her how much she deserves it all). Everybody expresses their love and appreciation to Mom, with the obligatory sibling competitiveness thrown in to keep it real. They make plans for their next family dinner in a week.

So heartwarming I wanted to throw up.

Just me?

Granted, the show then delved into some pretty heavy family problems and I understand that over the course of the series, each offspring takes their turn to face a personal crisis that affects the whole family. The show is probably designed to model for viewers (or readers of the novels it’s based on) how tough circumstances can be handled in healthier ways. That’s never a bad thing.

I just wonder how many people feel represented by these characters. I hate to sound like a bitter old woman, but first of all, how do you raise five children and convince them all to live within come-for-brunch distance? How does no one have to work that day? How is no one sick? How is there not at least one individual at odds with another, refusing to attend? How do they coordinate the food and have everyone bring what they said they’d bring, and on time?

How do they all have money for gifts? How do they communicate so well that they can coordinate said gifts? How do they even think of it in time to have a gift purchased, wrapped, and ready by brunch time?

Some of the kids are mothers themselves. How do they prefer brunch with their parents and siblings over a restaurant with their spouse? Some of them have mothers-in-law. How do they not need to spend time with her? Is there a grandmother in the equation, sitting home alone and forgotten?

So many questions. I suppose that’s why they call it fiction.

The setup in this story well represents the ideal picture that a mother of grown children might imagine if she allowed herself to dream. If she had magically managed to raise such thoughtful, organized, wealthy people. If life hadn’t taught her to lower her expectations so that even a text or phone call on Mother’s Day provides cause for celebration. If she’d learned not to beat herself up as a failure when her picture-perfect Mother’s Day doesn’t materialize.

If you’ve come to expect a Mother’s Day that won’t result in Facebook-worthy family photos of smiling faces, flowers, and food, you are not alone. You won’t be the only one scrolling social media, wishing your day looked more like someone else’s or trying to feel genuinely happy for your friends.

But you’re also not the only one who loves her kids more than life. Motherhood has taught you more about love than a million perfect Mother’s Days ever could. You walk around in a body that has spent itself to give others life and nourishment. You carry inside you a heart that beats grace a thousand times every day, lungs that breathe hope and healing for your children all their lives long, a spirit that prays for them unceasingly. These gifts may not come wrapped in pretty paper, but they are gifts. They’re yours to cherish and use with gratitude and joy in this perfectly imperfect world.

Happy Mother’s Day.

A Word to Expectant Parents

On the day my eldest child arrived, I already felt like a failure as a mother.

Like every expectant mom, I wanted to do everything right. Hubby and I had signed up for weekly childbirth classes with a reputable instructor. A fan of natural childbirth, this woman had recently birthed her fifth child at home, drug-free. She’d served as a midwife for others. Clearly, she’d walked the talk.

As classes progressed, confidence grew that we’d handle the birth without drugs or unnecessary intervention. With a little support from extended family, we may have opted for a home birth ourselves. Our instructor not only made home births sound better for everyone, but she also convinced us of the intrusiveness of hospital births—especially surgical delivery. 

Statistics for Caesarean deliveries were rapidly bypassing other births at the hospital we toured. The reason, she told us, was that C-sections were much more lucrative for doctors. They were also quicker and easier for staff—especially when scheduled. Meanwhile, recovery for the mother was slower and more problematic. Babies missed out on the needed stimulation and hormone infusions that occur with labor. Only rarely, she said, as a last resort, would any ethical doctor perform a Caesarean. She felt the same about any sort of drugs used in childbirth. Bad for baby. Unnecessary for mom.

So this was the mindset we both held when my water broke on Friday evening of the May long weekend in 1981. Determined to stay home as long as possible, we finally left for the hospital the next day around five pm, expecting to deliver that evening. First-time parents don’t know that if you can still play cards between contractions, you’ve got a long way to go. We were disappointed when we arrived to learn labor had not progressed very far, but we kept up our spirits. For a while.

Nurses ended their shifts and new ones came. The night dragged on. Other mothers came, delivered, and left. Staff injected Pitocin to speed things along. Daylight came. Nurses returned for another shift with disheartening words of surprise: “You’re still here!”

By noon, the dreaded C-word was being tossed around. Our doctor assumed we’d feel relief at the suggestion. We did not. Determined we could somehow make this baby come out, we fought to keep trying. Eventually, our doctor made the call and delivered our son by Caesarean section at three o’clock Sunday afternoon—about 40 hours after my water broke and contractions began. You could say we both missed the birth since I was under general anesthetic. You could also say it imparted a whole new meaning to the term “long weekend.”

Photo from Canva

In the months that followed, I mourned because I “hadn’t done it right.” I’m embarrassed now to admit I felt angry and cheated, though I knew I should feel nothing but gratitude. Had it occurred fifty years earlier, my son and I would probably have died. Knowing this only added to my guilt. It would take years—and two subsequent natural deliveries—to help me realize how ridiculous we’d been. We had a beautiful, healthy baby—a privilege denied to many through no fault of their own.

In hindsight, I suspect my tumbling emotions were common to most mothers. I simply chalked them all up to the delivery method. Sure, the childbirth instructor was partly to blame. But she was merely sharing her own experiences and beliefs.

I share this now, all these Mother’s Days later, because, if you are an expectant parent, others will bombard you with stories and opinions. The internet will flood you with articles about the danger or safety of certain practices or drugs. Hopefully, you’ll receive the clear message that there’s more than one right way to give birth. That bringing a new human into the world is always beautiful. That you’re allowed to make it less difficult. And that your tears are best reserved for expressions of joy and gratitude.

Happy Mother’s Day!

 

Motherhood Doesn’t Stop for a Pandemic

While executing my carefully planned grocery shopping, I observed a young mother look up from her produce selections just in time to run after her toddler who blissfully maneuvered the shopping cart ahead, heedless of obstructions or social distancing. Motherhood in every stage looks different right now.

To those women who have given birth during the pandemic, congratulations! I understand the joy a newborn brings into a home but can only imagine the pain of being unable to introduce him to extended family and friends. You can’t leave the baby with grandma for a few hours’ respite. You can’t receive the hands-on help others might normally provide. Your hormones are on overdrive and your body is weary during an already emotionally exhausting time.

To those chasing preschoolers who don’t understand why they can’t see their friends or go to the playground or visit Grandma, wow! How do you even attempt to explain it? How can you convey the seriousness of it without causing undue fear? How do you keep them busy without driving yourself mad? It takes everything in you and more.

To the many moms at home with school-age children. You never aspired to teach because you knew you weren’t cut out for it. Now you’re “crisis schooling,” trying to help your child navigate technology, learn stuff you forgot long ago or may have never learned. Receiving back talk or worse. And when they’re not working on studies, they’re fighting, hungry, bored. You’re told to make this time memorable because one day your kids will look back on it. You’re afraid they’ll remember only chaos.

Perhaps you’re performing your regular job from home and with constant interruptions from your kids. It feels impossible. Or you work in essential services, putting your own life and health on the line every day and worried you’ll bring disease home to your family.

Maybe your kids are teens or college-age. Adults stranded under your roof but not necessarily willing to live by the house rules. Or the government’s rules.

Or maybe you are painfully missing your adult kids. All the Zoom chats in the world can’t make up for a family dinner and a warm hug. Leaving treats on your grandchildren’s doorstep isn’t cutting it for you as a grandmother. Or maybe you’re the grandmother whose arms ache to hold your month-old grandchild whose newborn days are vanishing.

Perhaps you’re a great-grandmother, concerned for your own health risks while at the same time worrying how the fallout will affect your loved ones. Will they make it through financially? Will they still have work? Will the family stay intact?

Whatever stage you’re in, Mom, can I remind you of a few things?

You’re not alone. You never were, and you’re not now. You can call on God’s help from anywhere at anytime.

You may have been told to repeat to yourself, “I am enough.” That might be helpful for a while, but sister, I know I’m not enough. Never was, never will be. That’s okay, because your children can only receive true significance, security, and sufficiency from their Creator. That is not you. You participated in their creation for sure, just as you participate in their upbringing. But you cannot create a living, breathing human any more than you can sprout wings and fly.

It’s in that whole-hearted partnership with God that we become the mothers our children need. Lean into the only one who will always be enough, knowing you don’t need to understand him in order for the relationship to work. It’s enough that he understands you. He knows what you need. He’s got you. He can be trusted.

Take a deep breath and have a Mother’s Day you’ll never forget.

How to make a mother's day...

I’m eagerly anticipating spending Mother’s Day with my daughter in Calgary. The last time she and I spent Mother’s Day together was 2002. Seventeen years ago—nearly half her lifetime now—when she worked as a nanny in Switzerland.

There, it’s known as Muttertag and it’s still on record as my best Mother’s Day ever.

The day began with a bus ride through the breathtakingly beautiful Swiss countryside to Mindy’s church in Sursee where she had a big surprise for us. She was performing in a short drama with the church’s youth group! Though we couldn’t understand a word of Swiss German, it still melted this drama director’s heart.

The sermon that morning was lost on us, too, but it didn’t matter. If the drama hadn’t been enough, the music more than lifted my heart. Although the songs were unfamiliar, we tried to follow along with the German words on the overhead screen. As we joined in praise to God as best we could, I was struck with a brief glimpse of how it will look when we gather around the throne of God in heaven, every tribe and tongue worshiping together—but without stumbling over foreign words. I looked around and saw faces of people who clearly knew Jesus as an intimate friend, not the distant and lifeless icon portrayed in some of the historical churches we had toured. 

Then they sang a song we knew, first in German, then in English. The familiar tune and words brought tears to my eyes as we sang along wholeheartedly: “God will make a way, where there seems to be no way. He works in ways we cannot see, He will make a way for me. He will be my guide, hold me closely to His side. With love and strength for each new day, He will make a way.”

God had indeed made a way for Mindy to find Christian brothers and sisters thousands of miles from home. He had made a way for us to visit her and share this experience. He’d made a way to show me his children are family, regardless of language, customs, or geography. My heart was full.

After the service, all the mothers received little tin buckets with live roses in them. My bucket still sits on my dresser.

At McDonald’s for lunch, they were giving away free coffee and cookies to all the mothers—and if you know anything about European coffee, you know it got me through the rest of that busy day. We spent a delightful afternoon walking around looking at the abundant flowers. We laughed at a sign that said, “Do you like to know how your English is? Ask for Linguaskill and we will tell you!”

Hubby and I called our mothers, neither of whom had ever received a phone call from Switzerland.

We capped off the beautiful day with a delicious dinner at a lovely restaurant with a family Mindy had grown close to. The other mom and I enjoyed complementary dessert.

I don’t expect to experience such an exotic Mother’s Day this year, but I’ll have something far better. My girl is now a mother herself, and I’ll get to spend time with two little boys I haven’t seen for seventeen months. Thanks to modern technology, I hope they know me even if they’re shy at first. Shucks, I may just be a little shy myself at first.

When merely being together is a rare treat, it really takes nothing else to make a mother’s day. Have a good one!