The Mother's Day Puzzle

Today is International Bereaved Mother's Day.  Today is a day I wish I didn't know existed.  If I had my way, I would be celebrated as a normal mother, on Mother's Day, in a week's time.

When society can't see your children, they don't think of you as a mother.  You aren't having the sleepless nights that come with having a newborn.  You aren't stretched thin between your mom, wife and work responsibilities.  You don't worry about your child getting hurt as they start walking, or when they are playing outside.  You don't have to prepare bottles, do endless loads of laundry, or console a crying baby.

What society fails to understand is, you are still a mother.  You have the same amount of sleepless nights, if not more.  Except instead of waking up to your crying baby, hungry baby or wet baby, you wake up to the realization that your baby is gone.  This happens, every single time you wake up.  For a long, long time.

You may not be stretched thin between the same responsibilities as a regular mom, but you are stretched thin nonetheless.  You have to continue performing your daily tasks, as well as deal with a roller coaster of emotions.  You have to battle those instincts of feeling you are supposed to be doing something - like getting that bottle ready, buying more diapers or putting away onesie after onesie.  I would also argue, that I still try to teach Preston about the world.  I talk to him often; sometimes just to tell him I love him and miss him, sometimes to teach him about the new flowers that are growing around our house.  I talk to him about patience.  I try to show him how to be a good person.  Unnecessary I know, he's got the best teachers in Heaven.  Regardless, those motherly instincts to want to teach your child don't go away.

I may not be able to worry about him ever getting hurt, but I also can't ever worry about him getting hurt.  No booboos to fix with a kiss.  No crocodile tears.  No making your kid stay home because they aren't feeling well and feeding him toasts while he watches cartoons under a blanket all day.  And sure, no fear of greater injuries, but I'd rather have that fear, than nothing at all.

Despite all of this, I understand that being celebrated as a mother, would be a tough concept.  Even for me, the mother in question.  What am I celebrating?  I don't feel like celebrating without my son.  What do I want out of Mother's Day then?  Perhaps recognition that I am a mother, despite everything that's happened.  A day to think about Preston and be happy.  Remember him and all his kicks and smiles.  Reminisce on that pure happiness that once existed in my life, and hope.  Hope that one day, I can find pieces of it again.  And as long as I'm wishing for things, at the risk of becoming highly unpopular, I wish for a blizzard.  Like we had last year on Mother's Day.  Like we had on what should have been my first Mother's Day.  That day, where I felt closest to my son after having lost him just a few short months before.

If you are reading this and are like me, a bereaved mother, whether through miscarriage, stillbirth or child loss, whether you've had more children after, or if you had some before - you are a mother.  You are a beautiful, strong mother.  I wish you peace today, and peace next Sunday, as Mother's Day rolls around once again.