This is my third Mother’s day. I actually dread Mother’s day because before
I was a mom it reminded me that I was not one, and I was sad and frankly jealous
of all my friends who were and I wanted to enjoy the day with all the other
moms. Now, I dread Mother’s day because it causes my “R” to really struggle with her
emotions. She is afraid of the feelings
that she has about the idea of having a mom who cares and what that means and
how to show she cares. She struggles
immensely with having attention focused somewhere else and not on her. So she can't "allow" that attention to go elsewhere.
My first Mother’s day she did not recognize at all, in fact
she gave me an art project she made at school and then she took it back and said
she wanted to give it to someone else instead.
She completely ignored me the rest of the day. My second Mother’s day she threw several
tantrums and refused to allow any part of the day be acknowledged as having
anything to do with a mother.
Do you blame her? I
mean really….. for her whole life before moving in with us she didn’t know what
it meant to have a mother that you celebrated. “Mother” was not a good word and it was scary
and unpredictable and unstable. Why
would you celebrate that?
So, I braced myself and expected the worst for this year. In
fact I have not written in a while because our life has been in turmoil. She has been raging and tantruming for weeks
now and they have been out of control.
Counseling sessions increased and patience needed at every turn. She was hurting so bad inside and I could
not help her. I could only hold on until
the storm ended and she felt safe again.
There were days I was not sure if I could hold on and was not sure if
the storm was going to end and we were talking about what choices we had to
help her. However a week ago she did
start to settle again and seemed to take a turn in her healing. A small step forward and I will take it. Every step brings us closer to the goal of
healing.
So here we are at year three. I was prepared for yet another Mother’s Day
let down, but to my surprise I was embraced by my girl this morning who was
excited about sharing the gifts she got for me.
She has loved on me today…. Real love.
This to me was way more special than any gift she could have gotten me. It has been a day of tantrum free enjoyment, and I have enjoyed her as well.
I couldn't have asked for a better Mother's Day than this.
