TO be a mother is not a trade. It is not even a duty. It is only one right among many. What an effort it will be to convince others of the fact. You’ll rarely be able to win, and will almost often lose.
But you mustn’t get discouraged to fight, as it is better than to just win, and to travel is much beautiful than to arrive. What you feel is a great emptiness and once you’ve overcome that, you have to set out on your travels again, create new goals.
There is something glorious about enclosing another life in your own body, in knowing yourself to be two instead of one, invaded by a sense of triumph and in the serenity accompanying that triumph. Nothing bothers you, neither physical pain you’ll have to face, nor the freedom you’ll have to give up.
You’re deprived of fun, waistline and sleep…and it will be months before you’ll see your toes again.
I remember feeling a calm, an almost celestial rightness. It was the happiest experience in my life. The first bundle of joy had soft silky hair and fingernails like tiny pearls. Her helplessness was her security that exacted a vow “I will love this baby forever.”
The second was the greatest gift of my life, made me short of renouncing all my earthly possessions, cutting off contact with friends and loved ones, as my life ceased and the new one began.
The third one was a perfect specimen that had to be held constantly because she whimpered and wailed, depriving me of sleep, waistline and fun with all her consuming needs. And while the fourth baby is not the big deal as the first one because she was almost a “caboose,” I’d throw myself in front of a train (putting Anna Karenina to shame) to spare this baby a single moment of pain or despair.
These fascinating creatures changed remarkably from week to week, month to month, from squirming little bundles to walking, talking little women, each with a distinct personality that took me to a rollercoaster ride of joys and worries ahead but survived it all by trusting only instincts.
It seemed only 15 minutes from the time I gave the morning formula, and there they were at the school cafeteria, giggling over lunch, but would sit up straight prim and proper even more, whenever an Assumption Convent nun would surface. And in another minute, I’ve watched them in helpless bafflement and grief when a pair of their Siamese cats died, their wailings unendurable.
As a novice mother then, whose whole focus had been the arrival of the baby, I was in for a rude awakening as one discovered the downside, caring for an infant and its countless demands through dilemma, fatigue, screaming bouts with the mate; marital communications was now sliding. No one told me I should be fluid that I should re-fuel, accept “support” (from grandmothers, aunts, helpful friends and relatives). The transition to motherhood when you become responsible for another human life is forever-changing as priorities were filled with unfounded anxiety.
One’s expectations don’t match reality. It was fraught with peril and confusion. There were times when you felt you live only to serve your child, trapped in a loss of time and freedom and form.
I exercised and fancied myself that my body would return and the stretch marks would go away — and it did, after 22 years (the age difference between me and no. 1).
You see, my first knowledge of the world about life came to me through my senses as they were directed by my mother. She was the first one I saw, the first thing I felt, the first thing upon which I depended for security the day I was born, when everything made me cry…in a desperate wail about hunger, light, anger.
There never was a woman like her, gentle as a dove, brave as a lioness. Her memory and her teachings were after all the only capital I have made my way. She was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. Thinking of her is an unsettling emotion that never dissipates, because it forms questions that have no easy or apparent answers and the earth will never be the same when she died.
I missed her till I ached, and I missed her complete love for the family anchored in the dictum, “Love one another” by giving all, asking little and accepting less.
She was a rich and treasured gift from God, who taught us what real love means, sharing the hurts, hopes, joys and homecomings, when her daughters, all five of us grew older and went on our separate ways. She said love was staying when it would be easier to leave, defending when others accused, holding on when you’re tempted to let go. And most importantly, is letting go when you desperately want to hold on.
The full blessing of Mother’s Day is in the fact that it brings to all men – some belatedly, a few almost too late for peace of mind — real understanding of the richness and nobility of a precious thing even the least of us had for her own and the only kind of love that grows on separation is when our children grow away.
This weekend, on Mother’s Day, it is their turn to give memories and, not take them away. I have tried to do the same for them. I hope they are good and meaningful memories.
I have watched all my daughters grow up… now they are watching their mother grow old, so why am I crying?
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E-mail Mylah at [email protected]
