My mom died in 2016, and I don’t think I will ever stop missing her. Each May my sisters and I would go to her home to fill her pots with flowers and to plant her flower beds for Mother’s Day. I wish a million times over I could do that again to see the smile on her face and to get one more hug. When I was a little girl, I wanted to be a mom just like her but no one, not even she, could have told me it would be the most rewarding and heart-breaking job I would ever have.
As teenagers, most of us thought our moms didn’t know anything because there was no way they could be hip and cool enough to understand what we were going through. If my mom said not to do something, there was a 90 percent chance I would do it anyway. Seriously? What did she know! And, when I fell in love in middle school, she couldn’t understand how much I loved the boy. She didn’t understand love! Well, I had my first child at the age of 22, and I quickly learned to appreciate and to learn how much my mom understood love and life.
Having my own tiny baby girl placed in my arms at the hospital broke me. I fell so much in love with her, I thought my heart would explode. When we went home, I checked when she was sleeping to make sure she was still breathing. I worried that she wasn’t eating enough. I worried about everything that could possibly bring harm to her and then I worried more. I cried the first day she went to school. I felt angry when girls at school were mean to her. I hated when her boyfriend broke her heart. I laughed when she played basketball and scored for the other team?! My heart shattered when I told her her father had died. I worried when she made friends with “those” girls. She broke my heart when she said she hated me. I prayed for her when she went astray. Even though I repeated this process with three more children, it never got easier and still doesn’t.
Being a mom doesn’t ever get easier; the worries just change. And for you moms with children with disabilities, our people at CORE are here to help ease some of that worry. We want to help guide your children to live their best lives, to be happy by finding meaningful employment opportunities.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms and extra love to our moms who have children with disabilities.
