Feb 19 2008
You Never Stop Being a Mother
That may sound like the most obvious statement in the world, but in a culture that’s so fond of delineating things into stages and phases, and perceives a linear journey more than an exponential one, we sometimes forget that walking through a door doesn’t mean closing it.
I was once taught that you raised your kids, they became adults and you let them go. And if you had a relationship with them then, it was as adults. (Not by my mother, by the way, who raised me to believe I was responsible for her welfare and would always be.)
But your kids do grow up. They become adults and the time of childhood is over. But your relationship to them as their mother isn’t.
The needs of the relationship changes and the way you express your love changes, but the parent/child relationship never ends.
A Lovely Lunch with My Son
Today, I had lunch with my son, whom I adore. As a young man approaching his 23rd birthday, I don’t see him all that often, so I really cherished this time together and the two-hour fifteen minute talk we had. He did most of it, sharing this thoughts, his feelings with me. I soaked up every word.
And yes, without a doubt, there was this young man, a young adult making his place, figuring out his priorities and what that looks like to him…no longer the eight year old I remembered, nor will ever be again.
But he wasn’t talking to a peer or another adult. I was his mom, and there was a significance to my words that only I could have as his mom.
No matter how well or how poorly we do our job, we as parents carry so much power to be able to make a difference in our children’s lives - no matter their age.
Never to be Replicated or Substituted
This doesn’t mean we make choices for them or live their lives for them or carry them on our backs. It doesn’t mean they have to live up to our expectations. Their lives, after all, are their’s.
And this isn’t another one of those very worn out “mothers are to blame for everything” kind of Freudian scapegoating either. Our children, especially as adults, are responsible for the choices they make, and are indeed, free agents.
But what we bring to our children, as their mothers, can have significance to them that cannot be replicated or substituted by anyone else. No matter how old they get, we have a power.
We have the power to matter - regardless whether they want to or are capable of admitting that or not. Most importantly, we have the power to see. How we see our children has incredible potential to heal, support and uplift them…or tear them down.
It’s never too late to bless our kids.
Children grow, kids turn into adults, but once you take on the job, you never stop being a mother. How I am needed changes, but the fact that I am needed never does.
And that comforts me.
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