The gift of motherhood
this Mother’s Day
This Sunday, we will be celebrating
Mother’s Day in South Africa. As usual, the commercial world has been
advertising ‘Mother’s Day’ specials’ for weeks and families are enticed to buy
‘smellies’ and jewelry to ‘show mom how much you love her’.
Well, let’s forget about all that
nonsense and think about what Mother’s Day is really all about.
Mother’s Day is a celebration of
‘Motherhood’. Each time I was pregnant, I would think about my growing baby
when I was in the bath. I would wonder what was happening in the hidden world
of my womb. While my tummy was still flat, I would think: Is a baby really
growing inside there?
After a few months, when my tummy
began to swell, this confirmed my pregnancy. From six to nine months, my tummy
was like rising dough or an inflating balloon. Then it began to look like an
island in the ‘sea’ of my bathwater. As my skin stretched and became tight and
shiny, my belly button popped out like the plastic indicator in a cooked
turkey. In the last few weeks, before my babies were born, I would feel the hard
head just above my pubic bone, and see a tiny foot or knee move across my tummy
like a little mouse under a blanket.
And then, the crumpled, wrinkly
skin after birth when my precious baby lay in my arms.
The gift of motherhood makes a woman strong and protective, creative, resilient, patient, kind, loving and
forgiving.
Motherhood gives a woman a purpose. A
mother will sacrifice everything she has for her children. The satisfaction of
motherhood comes not only from watching children grow and develop, step by step
and stage by stage (without reading a book, they know just what to do). The
final reward is watching your children do for your grandchildren what you did
for them when they were small.
So, Moms, take time this Mother’s
Day to reflect, and thank Creation for the gift of Motherhood. It’s not only
about gifts and breakfast in bed – it’s about family, love, togetherness,
having fun and enjoying the little things in life.
