Happy Mother's Day

I awoke this Mother's Day to a blog my eldest daughter wrote over at her place, How I Survived Myself, and flowers and a card from my youngest daughter, (who is in Spain right now), celebrating 'Me' -- their mother. In lieu of flowers, my eldest daughter made a donation to International Medical Corp in my name.

I read their words and felt love cascade through every pore of my body. I am so incredibly blessed. So very grateful for being embraced in the sacred trust of being their mother.

And so the circle continues. The circle of love into which each of us is born, gently held in our mother's palm. The circle of love that nothing and no one can break -- no matter the circumstances of our lives, no matter the hardships we endure. It is a circle of love that connects us through our mothers to their mothers to their mothers before them, and it can never be broken.

When I became pregnant with my eldest daughter, early complications put me in bed for three months. I was worried about becoming a mother. Worried I didn't know enough. Wouldn't be perfect. Wouldn't do it right.

As I lay in bed I read and I read. Every book on child-rearing, the development of the human brain,relationships, mothering and parenting that I could lay my hands on. I was insatiable. I wanted to know more. Know it all so that I could do it all and do it perfectly.

And then, she was born and everything I knew evaporated. Everything I thought would be disappeared. I heard her first cry inside my womb. I held her for the first time in my arms and I knew nothing could ever explain the wonder and mystery, the sacredness of the occasion of her birth. And in my joy and in my fear, I fell and surrendered in Love.

I am not the perfect mother. Ask my daughters. I don't sew on Brownie badges. I don't insist you toe the line and dress to my demands. When the girls were little, as long as they were dressed for the weather -- they could wear whatever they wanted -- and I promised myself I would not apologize, feel ashamed or embarrassed. Which is sometimes difficult when you are at a mother's gathering and all the little girls are decked out in frilly dresses with matching shoes and socks and pretty bows in their hair and your little 'princess' is dressed in a fluorescent green shirt not tucked into a bright purple skirt over which she's draped a white crinoline and is wearing teal stockings with little ladybugs all over them and her shoes are her favourite slip-on flip-flop pumps you bought at the Chinese market because you knew she'd love the sparkly broach and feathers.

I am not the perfect mother. And that's ok.

I am perfectly okay with my daughters being who they are. Exactly the way they are.

They are amazing.

If there is one thing I have learned in being a mother, it is to love my daughters exactly the way they are, where they are, how they are. To celebrate their wonder, their beauty, their joy and laughter, tears and tantrums, ups and downs without trying to make them fit my view of the world, without trying to distort their emotions into feeling something I can handle.

I don't have a close relationship with my mother. There was a time when I wished and struggled and contorted myself to have what I wanted. Could never quite find the path to getting it. I always felt to please her I had to change me -- and I didn't want to do that.

And then, I had my daughters and focused on creating with them what I wanted most in life -- a loving, caring and fulfilling relationship with my children.

And the funny thing is, it is my who mother taught me how to do that. She taught me that I didn't need to change who I am. She taught me that to love my daughters exactly the way they are all I have to do is love myself the way I am and to share, what my mother shared so generously, grace.

She taught me other things as well. She taught me that being gentle is more important than forcing my opinions on someone else. She taught me the value of commitment, the gift of compassion, the beauty of Love.

I never wanted to be like my mother. I always wanted to be me. And in my wanting, I embraced the things I admire most about her -- kindness, compassion, gentleness, caring, an appreciation of beauty, of perseverance, of being strong even when you want to fall down. I became like my mother -- connected through time in a circle of love nothing can pull apart.

I am blessed.

Happy Mother's Day!

And.... just for a laugh and a smile, a short video to enjoy.