“Mother and Child”

Yesterday was Mother’s Day and it was the 19^th I’ve celebrated without my mother. It’s funny, on the one hand it feels like a lifetime ago, but on the other, it feels like it was only yesterday. I guess time is funny that way. Most days, it’s sad to say but, I don’t even think about her. The day begins and ends and she hasn’t even come across my mind. Maybe that’s normal, I don’t know. I have to admit, it makes me sad.

            I was 19 years old when she died. Cancer. It was like the script of a movie: mother of 3 gets sick, makes a full recovery then BAM! She’s sick. Vitals drop. Hospital. Organs failing. Death. I was in college at the time, my second year. I had been to see her a month or two before she took a turn for the worst. I’ll never forget it . . .

            It was August. We were at her house, sitting on the couch. I told her I’d met a friend, a “guy”, at school. I went through the typically spiel about him: his name, how we met, and some other things about him. My mother looked at me, after I was done, and told me I was in love. Of course, I completely denied such a state. In love? No. No way. I had just met him. I told her I wasn’t even looking for a relationship, which I wasn’t. She shook her head and told me I was in love. I guess a mother knows. Three years later Vernon and I were married and we’re now 16 years in.

            In 2002 I gave birth to my first child, a boy. He was the perfect baby. By week 8 he was sleeping through the night and he never really cried unless he was hungry or needed to be changed. At the time I remember thinking: “Shoot! I wanna have a bunch of kids! I don’t know why everyone says being a mother is hard work.” I was stupid. In 2006 when our second son was born, I realized why women said being a mother was hard work. It felt like my entire pregnancy was spent puking in a toilet. I couldn’t keep anything down to the point my doctor had to give my anti-nausea pills that dissolve on my tongue, because I would throw up the other ones. I was miserable. I ended up having to have an emergency C-section at 37 weeks and when we finally went home, he kept me up almost every night. Again, I was miserable. Six years later, in 2012 I gave birth to our third son. He was a typical baby for the first few weeks then we noticed he was crazy strong; lifting his head, trying to pull himself up.

            Each pregnancy was different. Each birth. Each delivery. Each baby. But, one thing remained a constant through all of those: I wanted my mother to be there. I wanted to talk to her when I was having a good day and when I was so sick I felt like I couldn’t leave the bathroom. I wanted her to come visit me, to give me advice, or just listen to be vent. I wanted her in the delivery room, to come see me at the hospital, or come to the house afterwards. I wanted her to be there. I wanted her. My mother.

            Since the first day I found out I was pregnant with my first child, I prayed for a little girl. I think part of the reason was because I knew how special a mother/daughter bond was and I wanted to have that bond again. With every pregnancy I continued to hope each one would be the girl I was praying for. She never came. I must admit, I always felt a moment of disappointment when I found out I was having another little boy, of course, it was always replaced by the joy of having him and the feeling of being blessed with a healthy child but, at first, it was there.

            Now, I’m not going to lie, my relationship with God took a few hits. Early in the grief of losing my mother, I blamed Him for “killing” her, for taking her away from me and my sisters. I mean, He’s God. He can do anything. I couldn’t understand how a God who could bring Lazarus back from the death, after he were dead-dead, how He couldn’t heal my mother of cancer. I thought: “Wait. He could’ve healed her. He just didn’t want to,” and that brought a lot of pain, anger, and resentment. Then, when I prayed for a little girl, year after year, from 2001 until (I must shamefully admit) last year, 2018, that anger and resentment boiled over.

            Last Fall, I had an extremely late period. I mean, I’d had late periods before but nothing like that. I was going on one week late and, against everything in my mind that shouted at me not to, I had a moment where I thought I was pregnant. I mean, we’re talking about a week and nothing, what else was I supposed to think? Now, I must confess something to you, my husband, after the birth of our last child, decided to get a vasectomy and I know what you’re thinking: Well, why in the world would you think you were pregnant??? I know. I get it. I was dumb but, in my defense, I’d heard of women getting pregnant after their husbands/boyfriends had vasectomies so it wasn’t too far outside of the realm of possibility. So, I prayed, I laid in my bed one night and prayed my heart out. You see, off and on for 17 years my prayer for a daughter was a constant. I had dreams about her, wrote poems about her. I could close my eyes, even now, and picture the same brown-skinned baby with big eyes, curly black hair, and fat cheeks. She was real to me. I prayed for her that night, I prayed God would finally answer my pray and that she was in my womb at that very moment. I cried. And I prayed.

            The next morning after everyone was gone to school and work, I went to the bathroom and there was blood in my panties. At that moment I felt so many emotions: sadness, anger, betrayal, disappointment, and pain. You see, about 4 or 5 years ago I started to pray a different prayer to God. I told God: “God, if I’m never going to have a baby girl, if I’m never going to have a daughter, that’s fine, I can except that. I just need for You to take the desire away. I don’t want to keep wanting something I’m never going to have.” I prayed that prayer to God repeatedly. Over and over again I asked God, I cried and begged God to take the desire for a daughter away. I had finally come to terms with the idea that, what I’d been praying for, believing for, and dreaming of, just wasn’t going to happen and I wanted God to remove the desire for a daughter away so I could fully move on. That night, against my better judgement, after years of pleading with God to remove the desire and He never did, I took a chance and prayed for her again.

            So, when I saw the blood, I exploded. I don’t think I’ve ever had a moment like that in my life. It was as if I was talking to a person right in front of me. I was in the bathroom yelling and screaming at God. I told Him how hurt I was, how I just couldn’t understand how a God who’s supposed to love me, would want to hurt me so badly. It wasn’t that I had my period and therefore wasn’t pregnant, it was that, to me, God wanted me to feel like a fool. I could handle not having a girl but, what hurt the most was that He wouldn’t take my desire to have a girl away. The God who could do anything, everything . . . To me it wasn’t that He couldn’t do it, He just wouldn’t do it and that was something I just couldn’t get passed. I started to feel like I couldn’t trust God, that He wanted to see me hurt and how could I continue to have a relationship with someone who wanted to see me hurt and broken? That was when my connection with God was cut. I stopped praying. I stopped trusting.  

            Over the past few months things have gotten better but it’s not like it was. I feel disconnected and although my desire to reconnect with God is coming back., I often wonder how it will return to its former glory but, I find myself praying that it will. Now when I think back to the Fall, I’ve decided to chalk it all up to me being stupid: I should’ve known better then to pray about her again. I didn’t listen to myself and I caused myself pain. It’s a mistake that will never happen again. I’m decided that I’m done and not just with wanting to having a daughter but, I’m also done mentoring young girls as well. I know, I know. What? Why? How do the two correlate? I see it like this: I need to distance myself from the whole thing. You see, in 2013 I tried to create the “artificial” mother/daughter bond I was missing by establishing a young girl mentoring group called “Know Your Value” or KYV for short.

This program, which I built from the ground up, was like a high school sorority. There was an intake process complete with application and interview. Girls bonded over the course of several days which was called “PINK Week” and after it was over, we had an initiation ceremony. I self-published a member manual and also created a sponsor booklet with materials and instructions, as well as wrote KYV songs and chants the girls would learn during PINK Week. It was a complete program and yes, I’ve decided to be done with it. If I’m being honest, which I am, my decision to quit doing the KYV program is purely based on the fact that I don’t feel I should continue to pour into other people’s daughters after I prayed for my own daughter and never got one. I know that statement is 100% selfish, shameful, and all around disgusting but, right now, in this moment, it’s my truth. To me KYV is dead unless God Himself tells me to do it. I know it’s petty but, it is what it is.

My mother would probably be very disappointed in me over how I’m acting in reference to KYV but, the wound from the Fall hasn’t healed completely. Maybe when it does, KYV will live on again. I don’t know. I wish I could talk to her about it though- get her advice, listen to her scold me, have her pray for me (which I desperately need), hug me, and tell me she loves me. I wish I could have her back, if only for a little while, to tell her I love her, to show her my sons and how incredible they are. I wish so many things . . . People say she’s looking down on me from Heaven, people say she’d be proud of all the things I’ve done in my life and I really hope she is. I hope I’m the woman she thought I would one day become. I miss her so much. I miss the bond of a mother and a daughter. I’m saddened by the fact I will never have it again. If only I knew how precious it was when I had it . . . but, isn’t that how life goes?