Mother's Day

I wanted to talk about the part of motherhood that no one really acknowledges or understands. I have two beautiful sons who are smart, resilient and determined. They are fiery and strong with big personalities and overwhelming presence. My older one is pure love with a soft heart and passionate energy who gets angry when he is hurt or misunderstood. My little one is a force of love and willpower who acts tough but is genuinely sensitive and tender. My boys, my babies - who are tough on me, who challenge me, who remind me that I have work to do on myself too. I can be more patient, more understanding, more loving and happier. Motherhood is a journey like no other. It highlights your limitations, your imperfections, your brokenness and how lonely you feel despite two needy human beings who yearn for your constant love and attention.

Entering it at a young age reminds you how much you've accomplished and how far you've come, but you still feel like you've missed out because your life is at the mercy of your children. Your internal clock is on their time - nap time, lunch time, play time. Everyone encourages you to go out to escape, but your moral compass is in a frenzy because you miss your children and no one can take care of them quite like you can and the time your friends have are early in the mornings for brunch or late at night when the baby wakes up twice to feed during their sleep and that's your responsibility as a mother to handle, not someone else's. And who wants to go out after bathing two children, scraping snacks in between fighting with them, lying down for two seconds then getting up because they need something, wiping their nose with your shirt because you don't feel like getting a tissue sometimes, or just having to ignore them for ten minutes because you're drained?

There is a point in motherhood where the people around you don't understand that your already sensitive forcefield requires time to recuperate, and "normal" has to change because now there are two human beings who you constantly have to worry about or people may scrutinize them or your parenting ability and you're tired of the judgments as a mother who can do nothing quite right because the baby's diaper line seems to always be blue or your toddlers fall to the floor at Target even though you never taught them to do that, but it's still your fault. You're the mother who absolutely hated breastfeeding and resented the fact that you felt like you had to even though it was the healthiest option for your baby. It was far more of a mentally and physically taxing job than a bonding experience and that makes you feel like a bad mother too. You're the mother who struggles to gain or retain weight after having children and it's hard to feel good about yourself when you're just bones even though people tell you that you need to be grateful it's not the other way around. Great, now you feel bad for feeling bad in the first place. You’re the mother who feels like a guilty failure when you give your child exactly what they asked for and it results in a temper tantrum that you don’t quite understand, but then again, neither do they. You have a million stretch marks and a C-Section scar that imprints through your tight dresses that you used to love to wear so you just wear t-shirts every day. You're the woman who has to mother her children when your dreams are broken and parenthood reveals a lot of truths and heartbreaks about people and belief systems you trusted.

Motherhood is a mirror, and you are trying so desperately to raise your children to be good human beings who will leave the world a little better than before they got here. To be better than you were and provide more guidance than you had. You are raising sons who you want to have respect for women, who feel confident enough to share their feelings and understand their pain instead of projecting it or burying it on others. Who you want to prepare for the battles they will face, not only as men, but men of color in a world that seems to be pitted against them. And not just to face it, but not become bitter by it because you cannot change people's hearts with hate. Shaping them to understand that the world is sometimes merciless, but they are equipped to combat it's turmoil in the best way you knew how to teach them.

My older son was recently diagnosed with epilepsy - another burden that I bear to know my baby suffers, sometimes in silence, and I can't even tell all the time and I can't help him. I put him to bed in hopes that I don't wake up in the middle of the night to hear him convulsing in his vomit. Being a mother is so much more than birthing human beings. These perspectives change throughout the course of the days, but these are feelings that fluctuate from negative to positive often. There are a multitude of happy times, but there are very heavy, low times too. It is so difficult to take care of human beings when you are barely coping yourself at times. But we do it, we show up, every, single day - sick, drained, tired, happy, energized or scraping by. And to balance, there is a rewarding abundance of love and appreciation. Our children accept us for who we are, they forgive us for our faults and they give us a reason to keep going amidst the chaos of our lives. Be patient with yourselves, mothers. Appreciate your mothers who did it for you. Appreciate your daughters doing it for their own children. We are all doing the best we can and the best we know how.

Your light and love are resilient - as is your spirit. Bent, broken and glued together again. Happy Mother's Day. Love only, love always, Sharda.