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everyday parenting as spiritual practice

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for all the mothers

14 Comments

You are the hoping-to-be mother. 

You are dreaming of a baby, maybe for years. Every month you wait and hope. You daydream about nurseries and names. You envy other women’s round bellies and glowing smiles. You chart days on the calendar and read up on ways to increase your odds. You promise yourself you will never take a single day for granted once it happens for you.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

IMG_4020.JPG

. . .

You are the expectant mother.

You marvel at how your body is changing (and how hard pregnancy can be). You pour through books about what to expect. You wonder at the kicks and flips that keep you up at night. You count down to hear your baby’s heartbeat and see their sweet profile on the ultrasound screen. You wash tiny onesies and snap belly shots and write a birth plan. You try to imagine how your world will be transformed in a few short months.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

belly

. . .

You are the tired new mother. 

You were up for hours last night. You are trying to figure out how to feed this baby and how to coax your child to sleep. Your body is healing and your head is spinning and your heart is bursting for a tiny creature you just met. You are struggling with how life has flipped inside out since your baby arrived (and how much laundry one small person can churn out daily?!), but you would not trade it for anything.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

the mystery of mothering unfolding

. . .

You are the mother after miscarriage.

You are mourning the loss of a child that the world does not acknowledge. You are burying hopes and dreams for a whole life that will never be born. You will always remember the dates on your calendar that make your heart ache. You catch yourself when someone asks how many children you have, because you do not know how to answer.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

IMG_5831

. . .

You are the happy grateful mother. 

You sneak into your child’s room late at night to watch their peaceful face while they sleep. You marvel that you get to help raise this marvelous, maddening creature. You whisper thanks for the gift of this perfect, imperfect life. You tear up on birthdays and mark the milestones and snap secret photos to capture quiet moments. You cannot believe your child will ever know how deeply you love them.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

. . .

You are the everyday exasperated mother.

You are tired on a cellular level. You are guzzling caffeine to keep up with your kids’ boundless energy. You are rushing between work and home and school and sports and errands. You feel like you will explode if you hear one more cry,  scream, sass, or whine. You struggle to see the goodness of your days because you are stretched to the limit. You wish you could catch a break to breathe.

I have been this mother, too. Part of my heart will always be here.

the grit

. . .

You are the bereaved mother. 

You are stunned that the world continues to go on after you have been shattered. You are holding deep grief that has redefined your very self. You love a child you will never see or hold again. You know exactly how old your daughter or son would be today. You have to learn what it means to parent your child beyond proximity and physicality.

I have been this mother, too. Part of me will always be here.

IMG_5236

. . .

Maybe you have been some of these mothers, too.

Maybe you have been many others. The single mother. The divorced mother. The motherless mother. The birth mother. The adoptive mother. The foster mother. The estranged mother. The childless mother.

The ones for whom Mother’s Day is never as simple as cards and brunch and flowers can celebrate.

None of us is all of these things. But we are all here together. And together, we are what can make motherhood so complex – and sometimes challenging to celebrate.

We are the thousand colors of one stained glass window. Love’s light passes through each one of us, and we are changed. Because we know ourselves to be mother.

The world around us is changed, too.

stained glass

This day belongs to all of us, and we belong to each other.

So whether Mother’s Day is warm and wonderful, or whether you wish it would fly by so you could breathe easy again, remember that you are not alone.

And whenever we let our hearts be stretched to invite each other in, we all love better, bolder, and braver. Because we remember the mothers we have been. We imagine the mothers we might become. We honor the mothers we have loved.

And we love wider. Like the mothers we want to be.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Anita says

    4 May 2016 at 7:36 am

    Beautiful post, Laura! You and your family are still in my prayers. I will add (though it doesn’t fit your word pattern) “You are the mother of teenagers.” You are so proud of who your children are becoming, while at the same time worried about where they will go. Your heart aches watching and letting them struggle through failure, but know that this is also a healthy part of life so you offer your shoulder and your ear. You listen to rants and tantrums, excited stories and dreams (and love them all). You love the days they give you REAL hugs. You appreciate when they go to Church without argument and know that, perhaps much of the time they aren’t listening, but sometimes they do. You love them differently than when they were babies, but no less powerfully. Blessings to all mothers in every stage and age.

    Reply
  2. Eileen says

    4 May 2016 at 7:49 am

    So so beautiful, Laura. xx

    Reply
  3. Alyson Naville says

    4 May 2016 at 7:52 am

    Thank you for sharing your words, Laura. Your family is in my prayers.

    Reply
  4. Kay Rindal says

    4 May 2016 at 8:38 am

    Eloquently spoken, Laura — thank you for verbalizing what many of us struggle to express. I’ve been reading you for more than two years, and am always blessed with your blog. I’ve been several of these mothers, and I’m a couple of others that are written about. But I hadn’t realized my own situation quite in those terms. “Hugs” and peace to you and your beautiful family.

    Reply
    • Kay Rindal says

      4 May 2016 at 8:39 am

      Sorry — “a couple of others that AREN’T written about….”

      Reply
  5. Elise says

    4 May 2016 at 6:57 pm

    So, so beautiful, Laura. Praying God blesses you in a special way this Mother’s Day. Your writing is such a gift and blessing to me. Thank you.

    Reply
  6. Ginny@RandomActsofMomness.com says

    4 May 2016 at 11:03 pm

    Such an eloquent testament to the many realities of mothering. Thank you for reminding us that we’re all in this together and none of us is alone, even if we may feel that we are.

    Reply
  7. Laura says

    7 May 2016 at 11:49 pm

    Thinking of you Laura on this bittersweet day

    Reply
  8. Alicia says

    10 May 2016 at 10:01 pm

    It’s nice not to be alone in all the range of emotions that Mother’s Day stirs up. You have eloquently described many of the mixed bag of feelings I experience, too. Thank you for sharing this!

    Reply
  9. Kaitlin Alfermann says

    17 May 2016 at 7:40 pm

    I really wish I could read your blog posts, but the first few lines always bring so many tears that I can no longer see. You’re my favorite writer.

    Reply
  10. Sarah says

    25 June 2016 at 8:50 pm

    Thank you for this post. I’m new to your blog. I read your miscarriage post linked here. I really needed to read that, and your newer posts. Thank you for writing so honestly about your experiences.

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Seven Quick Takes Vol. 2 – Sweeping Up Joy says:
    13 May 2016 at 1:40 pm

    […] Mother’s Day is tough for me because my relationship with motherhood is complex–  Mothering Spirit perfectly describes the mish-mash of feelings that go into the day.  It’s worth the read, […]

    Reply
  2. 5 favorite books on motherhood | Mothering Spirit says:
    5 May 2019 at 8:10 pm

    […] written before about the complicated nature of this holiday (and the need to remember all kinds of mothers on Mother’s Day). But it remains a beautiful time to celebrate the women who have mothered us—and the mothers that […]

    Reply
  3. a prayer for mother's day | Mothering Spirit says:
    6 May 2019 at 6:01 am

    […] Each year on Mother’s Day, my heart goes out to those who struggle with this holiday. Inspired by this column on “How to Widen Our Hearts On Mother’s Day,” I’ve gathered prayers from readers into a litany to be prayed at church or at home – to remember all the mothers. […]

    Reply

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About Laura

I’m Laura Kelly Fanucci. Mother, writer, wonderer. This space is where I explore mothering through writing. It’s where I celebrate how God shows up in the chaos of raising children. It’s where I love to build community with readers like you. Read More…

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thismessygrace

thismessygrace
Nearly 20 years ago (!) these crazy kids graduated Nearly 20 years ago (!) these crazy kids graduated from Notre Dame. Now we’re thick in the midst of life-with-kids, celebrating middle school & preschool & everything in between. 
 
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Rules: Open to the U.S. only. Entries will be accepted until 6/11/22 at 11:59 pm CT. The 2 winners will be chosen at random and announced on 6/12/22. Per Instagram rules, this promotion is in no way sponsored, administered, or associated with Instagram, Inc. By entering, entrants confirm that they are 13+ years of age, release Instagram of responsibility, and agree to Instagram's terms of use.
“How did you do this?” I want to ask her. “H “How did you do this?” I want to ask her. “How did you let your heart break a thousand times?”

I want to call my mother and ask her impossible questions, to probe her heart that held five children and let each of us go in the hardest ways. But I know what she will say, “It’s hard. But you’re doing a beautiful job.” She can’t give words to the deepest yearnings and groanings. None of us can.

I wish I could ask my grandmothers, each of them gone for decades now, each of them matriarchs who raised big broods of their own. I never got to know them as an adult, but I have heaps of questions: How did you do it? How did you not lose yourself or your way? Or did you, and that was precisely the point?

I want a whole book of answers to impossible questions, and none exists. So I send my thoughts to the mothers of faith whose short stories, mere snippets on pages, have sparked small lights to guide me along. To Sarah and Ruth, Hagar and Rachel, Mary and Elizabeth. Every unnamed anguish the holy ones carried, every treasure of love they held in their heart.

Is it any coincidence that birth often brings both cries and screams, laughter and joy?

We hold it all within us. We cannot give words to the enormity of what it means to mother.

I sit outside a coffee shop two blocks from my children’s school on a sunny afternoon, the last day of the year. I wipe away tears for the natural nostalgia, but I also feel the gutting grief welling up from my own wounds of motherhood to know a deeper truth: marking milestones with love and longing is nothing compared to the gaping loss of not having your child here to break your heart in a thousand tiny ways.

So I resolve again, a hundred times again, to let this vulnerability become the strength that keeps me fighting for all children to have what I want for my own: life, love, health, safety, support, opportunity, community, hope. This is how parenting asks us to change. To let the particulars of our lives stretch us to love more widely.

I once thought “to mother” meant to have and to hold.

Now I know it also means to let go.
Many of you asked me to save these suggestions I s Many of you asked me to save these suggestions I shared after the school shooting in Uvalde.

Remember: we can’t do everything, but we can each do something.

Just because we can’t eradicate evil overnight doesn’t mean we can’t take small strong steps toward change.

Any work for justice and peace is long and hard. But we can build this work into our daily lives in concrete ways.

Look at the children in your life. What would you do to keep them safe and alive?

Start there. Let your life and love lead you.
When women meet, the world changes. Today is the When women meet, the world changes.

Today is the Feast of the Visitation. A day when we remember the meeting of Mary and Elizabeth.

Two women pregnant with new life, blooming with prophetic power.
Two mothers called to change the world.

What would happen if we gathered together like this today?
How could the world change if we made Mary’s song our own?

“He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.”
(Luke 1:51-53)

Imagine if we stayed in this holy space—not for a moment’s meeting, but for months together—to gestate the dreams God was waiting to birth through us.

Imagine if we let ourselves be filled with the Holy Spirit to shout out with loud cries.
Imagine if we lifted our souls with prayers of justice and joy.

Imagine if we gave each other strength and service, courage and compassion, as we kept asking how to answer God’s call in our ordinary lives.

When women meet, the world changes.

If you want to know how to fight for justice for your children, for your people, for this world, look to the Visitation.

The mothers will show us the way. They already have.

(Image from the “Windsock Visitation” by Br. Mickey McGrath, OSFS, commissioned for the Monastery of the Visitation in north Minneapolis.)
Here’s what I wish I would have heard preached t Here’s what I wish I would have heard preached today on the Ascension.

Right now is a time to be prophetic and pastoral, a time for each of us to ask how God is calling us to act.
I am writing this to us next week. When our right I am writing this to us next week.

When our righteous anger will have quieted down. When the white-hot fury pulsing through our veins will have subsided. When the news cycle will have moved on.

Do not forget how we felt tonight.
Stay angry. Flip tables.

We cannot live like this. Literally—our children are dying. Our elders are being murdered. We have accepted violence as—a way of life? An unfortunate side effect of freedom? A helpless shrug?

No. I am not resigned.
Stay angry. Flip tables.

Remember how it felt today to hear the news and feel the world crack open—again, for we have heard it a hundred times now. Remember how you felt sick to your stomach. How the children around you glowed, alive and fragile, miraculous and vulnerable.

Remember how you wanted to do something, anything, how you wanted to act, how you wanted to stop and scream for it to end, how every cell in your body cried out that this was evil and unjust and horrific and cannot continue.

Press into that memory like a bruise.
Stay angry. Flip tables.

The only way anything changes is if we change. Change what we believe. Change who we support. Change how we vote. Change where we give. Change how we act. Change how we speak. Change how we pray.

There are no easy answers to terrible, complex problems—which is what gun violence in the US has become. But the lack of easy answers makes it all the more urgent and vital that we press into our righteous anger and say NO MORE.

Stay angry. Flip tables.

I am writing this for us, for tonight, for next week. And I never want to write it again.
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