Last year, Mother's Day was hard. Like, really hard. The past October we had lost our first baby girl. I had a miscarriage at 13 weeks. I had never met her, or even gotten to see a sonogram picture of her, but she had already stolen my heart. Nobody truly acknowledged that I had been a Mom, because our girl had never actually been born. But she was and always will be my daughter, and she will always be missed.
The day was also bittersweet, because I was pregnant again. The catch - we hadn't told anybody yet. It was absolute torture going to Church and watching all these moms celebrating motherhood, while my mind kept running on two tracks. 1-I'm a mom too! My baby girl may be in Heaven, but I'm still a mom! 2-I'm a mom too! I have this brand new life inside of me that no one but me, my husband and God knows about. It was a whole range of emotions that I couldn't truly express to anybody. Not much fun.
But this year.... oh, this year! I have my beautiful, happy little boy. The present I got from Blake and my husband was a picture frame with the photo in one half, and a mold of Blake's hand and footprint in the other half. But the best gift of all is just watching my son smile, laugh and play.
I still think about my daughter all the time, and there is a note of sadness to how I feel today. I wonder what she would have been like, and I wish she were here. But there is so much to be happy about, also!
So. My view of this day has changed dramatically.
Mother's Day is so much more than trivial little gifts, and Sunday brunches. It's celebrating the life that you've brought into the world, and also remembering the life that never made it to the world. I don't need or expect gifts, breakfast in bed, or any of the other things that I always thought this day was about. I have everything I need here in my arms, and treasured away in my heart.
