mom & I at the beach
Nope, you never stop being a mother. My son has his own place now and my older step children are off on their own - one married and one engaged. But they still rely on me to mother them, and that is fine with me. My stepdaughter calls me at least a couple times a week and sometimes we chat for a long while and we get off the phone without her even talking to her dad. My husband and I joke about this and he always says, "the kids know you're the soft touch..."
We have an empty nest now and we do enjoy it. I know my hubby likes having me all to himself. But I still think of myself as a mama and I know I always will. I've posted before about what a hard time we had with my son last year...how he is off on his own now and doing so much better and getting along quite well in school. Last Sunday he was here for dinner and we sat up late watching t.v. and talking...this week he called and invited me over for lunch. We ate and visited and then he wanted me to just stay over and watch t.v. or read while he worked on his homework. He said, "I just like knowing you're there in the next room".
It is such a bittersweet thing to watch a child move on, grow up...and to recognize in them so much of what we went through as a young adult...wanting that independence and yet afraid of it at the same time. To turn and recognize our own fear in the deepest part of our own "mother heart", that nagging questioning of how a person, once so small and completely dependent on us, will ever find his way in this big world. Now that the storm of last year has passed, I am tempted to say to my son, "move back". And yet I know that him moving on is the best thing for him. To spread his wings and fly on his own. I am learning to have the feeling in my heart that moving on doesn't mean not landing back at the nest for a little mothering now and then - and sometimes quite often!
with my little man when he was about the
same age as me in the photo above
Hope I'll always look back and think, "when I was a mother"...I did the best I could and I gave them the best of me and I was always, always there for them no matter how much they grew and spread their wings or questioned what the future might hold in store.
xo
