This week has been SUCH a busy one. All week, we've been getting things ready for a garage sale. We have had friends and family donate items to it and all of our proceeds will be going to our Avon Breast Cancer Walk next month. There is so much stuff left after a day of selling that I'm not sure we'll get rid of it all! I've also been doing a lot of walking this week. I've logged about 11 miles so far. I'm not sure if I'll get anymore walking done this week with the garage sale tomorrow and then Mother's Day on Sunday, but we'll see. My sister-in-law, who is also doing the walk, has been logging about 20 miles each week. She's so going to kick my butt.
I always enjoy Mother's Day. It's a time when I can show my mom and my mother-in-law that I appreciate them and a time when my kids let me know they appreciate me. I remember my first Mother's Day as a mother. I didn't have a baby to show for my title, but I knew in my heart that I was a Mom. It was May 1993, four months after I lost Christian. Every year my church recognizes the moms by giving them a flower. That year, I sat in the pew, silently crying to myself, as each mom went forward to pick up a flower. One lady, who was pregnant with her 4th child and due the week Christian would have been, was recognized as the woman with the most children. I had no way of knowing this, but that honor would come to me in a few short years. The next year, I was pregnant with G and I was recognized with a picture of a little girl praying with her Mommy (that was the only year I remember that they didn't do flowers). I hung the picture over her crib when we set it up.
That first Mother's Day wouldn't be the saddest for me. Fast forward 9 years to May 2002. My brother and his wife had lost the triplets 2 months earlier. We all (my Mom, sister-in-law, brother, and I) wept as the mothers came to the front of the church to get their flowers. My brother got up, took 3 flowers from the bucket and handed them to BJ. I almost lost it. The next Mother's Day, it was the same. He gave her 3 flowers. I bought her a card for Mother's Day with Precious Moments on it--a baby on a cloud. Fitting, I thought. May 2004, during our prayer time in Sunday school, I said I was thankful for a truly happy Mother's day. M and BJ had adopted McK just before Christmas, so we were very happy. Mother's Day 2 years ago was sad for me, too, but I don't remember crying like I did that first one.
If you have lost a baby and have no other children, you ARE still a mother. You have put all of the emotions into your child that mothers whose children are still with them do, and even some emotions that many mothers never experience (grief, extreme worry, sadness, hopelessness). If your church recognizes mothers, don't be afraid to be recognized or let your husband recognize you by getting you a card or something. You deserve it!!!
Those are my thoughts for the week.
Have a blessed Mother's Day,
Paula
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2 comments:
Perhaps you can suggest to the person in charge that the flowers be passed out to all women over 18. THis is how it's done in our church--this way no one is left to feel freakish, we do that enough on our own.
Usually, there are flowers left over, so the pastor lets all of the women get one. My brother, who is the youth minister in our church, passed out flowers to several of the childless women (they are all older) on Sunday and told them they could adopt him. :)
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