“I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, as long as you’re living, my baby you’ll be.” In the children’s book, Love You Forever by Robert Munsch, a mother’s steadfast refrain reverberates throughout the seasons of raising her son, even when he assumes the responsibility of caring for her in her old age.
This reminds me of an old saying that, paraphrased, frames the timeline of motherhood as short-lived on the hand-holding segment, but eternally heart-filling. Our wombs provide homes for nine months, but our hearts hold space forever. The tireless emotional attention to our children’s wants and needs, ambitions and heartaches, successes and failures shape them but also redefine who we are in the process. They don’t become ours, we become theirs.
Cultivating a garden is not unlike mothering. We hope for perennials, the established species that promise to return yearly. They are the stalwarts, the dependable ones, living the lives we dreamed for them.
But the annuals, the one-season wonders, provide variety and character to the garden. They tend to be like most children. Varying in color from bright to subdued, some bloom abundantly, while others open sporadically. Some grow upright, established by their root placement. Others spread out freely, untethered by root support. Constant watering, pinching off dead blooms and pampering are necessary for some, while others thrive despite their circumstances. Annuals don’t normally come back year after year, but sometimes they do, depending on the complications and severity of the seasons. And when they do surface after enduring especially difficult conditions, they bloom more impactfully and beautifully, watered and fed by the hardships.
Face it. As much as we love our children, they can be our deepest joy yet our greatest challenge. As the actor Ray Romano describes it, “Having children is like living in a frat house – nobody sleeps, everything’s broken and there’s a lot of throwing up.” It’s sticky, messy, dirty, heart-wrenching, and time-sucking. Our days are filled with carpools and catastrophes, and we ride the struggle bus of schedule equilibrium when choosing between our lives and theirs. The girls’ night we missed because a child had a fever. The vacation we canceled to attend a sporting event. The time taken off from work to meet with the principal about a child’s misbehavior. The agonizing heartache endured due to a child’s wayward path. “To have a child is momentous. It is to decide to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” (Stone, 2023) Those hearts are the vessels that hold every ounce of our delights and despair.
But this selfless devotion also fuels our most amazing strength, the ability to recognize our children’s gifts amidst the messes of their lives, to abandon control, and to allow God to channel those talents, and even their poor choices, according to His will. Some of the strongest mothers I know belong to a support group that I attend weekly. Whether we “gave birth to, adopted, or fostered”, whether a child is “in recovery, has no interest in recovery”, his whereabouts are unknown or “shines from above,” we all share the common bond of a mother’s heart that yearns for healing. There is not one situation that He cannot use for the greater good, but we must understand that our role is partner, not sole proprietor. My mom never questioned this.
For the third year in a row, I cannot call her to wish her a happy Mother’s Day. She succumbed to a myelodysplastic disorder and my heart aches for her every single day. As I navigate my motherhood journey, I understand the sacrifices she made while raising my two brothers and me. I know her joy in watching children grow and flourish. I also admit to the same helplessness when tasked with helping my children through challenging times that she must have felt while dealing with my youngest brother’s bipolar disorder. But I will never comprehend her ability to move forward after his suicide.
But then again, maybe I do. Being a mother is “learning about strengths you didn’t know you had…and dealing with fears you didn’t know existed.” (Linda Wooten) My mother found that strength through trusting her Lord and Savior. Her faith moved the mountains of doubt as to why Brock was called to his heavenly home at the tender age of forty-two. She understood that his age was insignificant to God’s will. My mother was many things … kind, stoic, funny, messy (drove me crazy) … but her enduring gift to me was that of faith. We often kidded her about her obsession with her iPad and her social media stalking, but her most faithful dependence was on her ever-present Bible. She read it, and she lived it.
Most often read at weddings to guide young couples in their commitment to one another, Corinthians 13:4-6 also correlates beautifully with a mother’s love. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. My mother embodied every single one of these characteristics with grace. She tended her gardens, her children and grandchildren with unwavering patience and devotion. We bloomed under her care and I will love her forever for that.
Michelle Page is a married mother of three adult children and one recently gained daughter-in-law. A retired kindergarten teacher, she enjoys crafting, volunteering and cooking. Faith is instrumental in managing the curveballs of life. She writes of her experiences on her blogsite www.gracefromgrit.org.
