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Bless her heart: she was really a Mom, and glad about it, too.
Mama Kat asked me to write a post telling how I knew I was really a Mom.
I thought of several incidents – isolated stories that I could tell, where I knew, for sure, that I was really and truly somebody’s mom, but none taken by itself seemed to encapsulate the whole enchilada, if you know what I mean.
How do you know you’re REALLY a mom?
I decided to generate my own list of the
Top Ten Ways to Know You’re Really A Mom.
(Some, you may relate to. Some, not so much. But these are some of the ways that I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I was somebody’s mama.)
10. When my heart melted at my very first glimpse of them, there, in the delivery room, and they turned their very sober eyes to find the voice they’d been listening to for the last nine months.
9. When I looked at my haggard post-partum reflection in the mirror a day or two after I got home from the hospital, after having given birth to my first child, and realized that I would never, ever, truly again have a single night of sleep where I wasn’t responsible/concerned in regard to the health and well-being of another human being. Oy. Happy moment? Not so much.
8. When the knowledge that one of the kids was even a teeny bit sick. made me sick at heart.
7. When tears sprang to my eyes, and my heart felt like it would blow up, from just watching their sweet, innocent faces, slumbering peacefully in their crib. Really, is there any other thing as poignant and pure as a freshly bathed, sweet smelling, sleeping babe?
.
6. When the things that brought them joy became my delight, even if previously, I never once thought about the excellence of plastic toy guns, or, a few years later, the praiseworthiness of indie rock.
5. When the waiting-on-tiptoes-anticipation of their first word, began to turn into “Why did I EVER teach him/her to talk?”. (Same concept also applies to mobility: “Why did I EVER teach him/her to walk?”)
4. When I realized that I would gladly take any problem of theirs and make it my own, instead.
3. When I figured out that taking their problems and making them my own was no longer in their best interests, and when I figured out that the best and hardest thing for me to do was to allow them to suffer the pain of the consequences of their own choices. (If you haven’t hit this hurdle yet: don’t worry. It’s coming. You’ll get there. 🙂 )
2. When kisses and hugs really became the Christmas gift that I valued and desired the most: and that ain’t just whistlin’ Dixie.
1. When I realized that the successful, desired outcome of being a good mom is to have completely worked myself OUT of a job. Job Security??? I think NOT!
WHAT WAS I THINKING SIGNING UP FOR THIS GIG IN THE FIRST PLACE???
How did you know YOU were really a Mom?
This post was prompted by a writing prompt that I picked up over at Mama Kat’s Writer’s Workshop. You can read lots more great posts that are far better than this one over at her blog.
Thanks, Mama Kat, for helping me remember what an idiot I am. ;-D
(And how I’d make the same, stupid choice all over again if given the chance.)
