Nursing was extremely difficult. It took everything I had and I was left depleted. The same week I finished nursing, I was exposed to mono. No one else who was exposed came down with the virus. Except for me.
I was barely even around the person who had it.
I get tested for low platelets every few months and I seem to get sick more often than I should. Getting over mono was an ordeal all its own. Nine months later and I still don’t seem to be quite back to normal, though I am mostly better.
I deal with chronic illness.
I also am a mother.
My child was a miracle of God. During the nine months when I was pregnant with her, I had relatively few health complaints. For that I am grateful.
During the time when I had mono, it was difficult to take care of myself and tend to the needs of my little one. The illness trudged on far longer than it would have otherwise had I not been wearing myself out with the endless tasks of caring for a baby. Often, I was able to do little more than hold her or sit on my chair and watch her play. Nights, which were already hard, now became an impossibility. Her father awoke with her as I needed to rest. I cannot brag that I missed nights or that I trudged through and pushed mono to the curb.
And it hurt. It hurt so badly. I could not get up and do elaborate things with her like the other moms. I had to parent in my own way. And I still do. I’m well enough now to go to the park with her on occasion, but it’s usually Dad who gets up and plays with her.
The baby climbs on me and is content to come and to enter my world of chronic sickness. She meets me where I am. She is fine to sit with a book with me, and if she misses the world of other moms who climb and swing and dance and play, I would never know it. She seems to want me. And I am glad.
There don’t seem to be rules as to what a mother is supposed to be. To my little one, and to yours, I am sure, it doesn’t matter. Mom is Mom and that is all that matters. Mom comes without strings attached. A mom isn’t a mom because she dances or because she can take her kids to the moon and back. A mom is a mom because she holds her child in her heart and because she truly has her child’s back.
“Mom is Mom and that is all that matters. Mom comes without strings attached.”
A mom is the one who brushes her little one’s hair with her hand and who lets her baby sit with her as long as she needs to. A mom is the one who is there and who does the best that she can. A mom is a person who leaves a legacy of what it means to be a decent human being in this messed up world. The person who shares all of herself with another and whose gentle influence molds and shapes, as well as plants seeds for future generations.
She passes on her values and her experience. She shows what it is to truly love. She lays down her life for her little one. She knows that these days and these opportunities are a treasure she gets to unwrap one by one. Quiet mornings and still afternoons when sleep falls heavy on little eyelids are her ambrosia. She gets drunk on the smiles and laughter of one particular baby.
Her baby.
I likely never will run marathons with my little one. I will likely never run around the swing set and be enthusiastically active with her like her father. But she comes for me and her eyes do not rest until she finds me. She always comes back to where I am on the park bench.
And her Daddy comes trailing behind her
She has a smile for me that she does not give to another. And I am sure it is the same way for you. And so I’ve had to throw out the rule book of what makes a good mom. We enjoy quiet moments resting together. I let her sit on my lap so she can bang on the piano as I attempt to play. We have our own games and activities that make us laugh. My little one is quite the comedian.
I take her to church so she can play with other kids and at home I read the Bible to her. She has her dogs and her tambourine and we have our life together. I save my energy to take her to the ride the mechanical animals at the mall. We listen to classical music and we usually take naps together. Our grace-filled days are those for which I openly give the thanks, praise and credit to Jesus for. Completely.
I am her mom, no matter what, and that is all any child ever needs. I love her as only a mother can. And whatever I have, though it is not much, is hers for the taking. I give it willingly and with simplicity. Even if I am dealing with chronic illness.
Rosa Hopkins blogs at www.lifeinsidethehouseontherock.com and co-hosts, ‘The Joe and Rosa Show’ on WDZY AM & FM, Richmond, VA. She is a recording artist whose songs have been played on the radio and she appears in front of audiences regularly. She lives and writes in the hills of WV with her husband, miracle baby, Jack Russell and a shapeless hound named Lou.
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