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Now I KnowThe Pain of Motherhoodby Tracy Morris At a recent baby shower, the
usual discussion ensued of labor and delivery comparisons.
There were myriad tales in the room:
The only thing we shared in common was pain, but I don't
mean the physical kind. I refer to
the heart-tweaking emotionality of bearing and then caring for another human.
Read more about the joys of Motherhood. Other "Now I Know" columns include: Before experiencing that pain myself, I counseled as a
social worker with hundreds, maybe thousands, of mothers in various stages of
fear, anxiety, sadness, and grief. All
gave me sidewards glances, if not in reality then figuratively, when they
learned (and many had inquired) that I was not a mother. I collected, rehabilitated, and adopted many stray animals,
dogs, cats, birds, squirrels, all in the hopes of meeting my nurturing needs.
To some extent, it helped me understand in a hands-on fashion the many
dilemmas of parental love. I participated very actively as an aunt to my two nephews
and one niece, the children of my older sister, and have never regretted a
single precious moment of the time I have spent with them.
We are special to each other, and I am named as their guardian in the
unforeseen event of their parents' passing. None of these efforts could help me to truly know: How an unmarried, teenage college student's distant stare
tried to camouflage her unspeakable grief as she listened to me carefully and
slowly read out loud the Termination of Parental Rights form that she was about
to sign. How my sister felt when her youngest at four months of age
was hospitalized with what was at first feared to be meningitis, or of her
incredible relief coupled with lifelong paranoia that followed when learning it
was instead a treatable, lesser virus. How my friends felt when their two year old adopted
daughter began to finally succumb to her birthmother's legacy of HIV disease, or
how my friends felt as they held her dying body in bed with them, praying her
soul would move restfully into the twilight. How a young mother could stay for weeks on end at the
bedside of her semi-conscious, ventilated infant daughter, television turned
always to cartoons, while NICU personnel floated in and out in a life or death
vigil, and how that mother felt reborn when her daughter celebrated her first
birthday by being released from the hospital. How my friend Holly could carry on to continue being a
mother to her preteen daughters after holding her five year old son as he
breathed his last breath, years following her discovery that she had given him
HIV. Or how Holly could hold on for
only so long in the end herself, regardless of her love of being a mother and
her fear of leaving her daughters as orphans. To say that I have been blessed is the grandest
understatement. My son, hard fought
for by I and my husband, is healthy, whole, and happy. Our basic needs are all met, as are many of our higher level
ones. Nearly daily, I find myself
gazing intently at Tobias as he toddles about, still unbelieving that he is
here, and he is mine. His newly
developing skills are taking him increasingly further away from me.
Like it or not, it is my turn to endure the pain. Mea culpa.
"Now I Know" first appeared on Moms Online, part of the Oxygen Media network (http://oxygen.com), and is reprinted with permission.
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