Yesterday I considered adopting a child from overseas. Again! The day before that I was designing a kitchen table enterprise based around home and hearth. Today I cried when I reread a poem I had written seven years ago, when my son left home. (You can read that poem at the bottom of this post.) It occurs to me that maybe I have not come to terms with the end of a season of my life: mothering.
It is not that I will ever stop being a mother. I am just no longer mothering. I mean the stuff of home and hearth, and life’s reason and season being centred around motherhood.
Perhaps it coincides with menopause and the stopping of the biological clock. It certainly coincides with my feeling middle-aged and what I see in the mirror each day; and dare I say, passing my ‘useful’ date. Maybe if I had gone on to have more than two children I would still have a child at home?
Perhaps if my children had made me a grandmother by now I would not be thinking about these things either. But I have let that go. I am accepting that is God’s will and my children’s prerogative; not mine to request.
I seriously did think about adopting from overseas yesterday. Social media brought to my attention a single woman of fifty-three adopting from overseas. She is two years older than me. This was not a new thought as I had earnestly looked into this six years ago. At the time my husband and I felt led to foster and became the foster parents of a preteen later that year. For three and a half years I loved mothering another.
I have been mothering for twenty-five years in total. Even though both children left home the same year I managed to be involved in my children’s lives from a distance. These past six to seven years, I have watched and supported them finishing university, starting a business and finding permanent work; one has partnered up and they both have established their own lives away from me, my husband and the family home.
Motherhood is a comfortable and safe place for me. Perhaps not so twenty-five years ago when it first started. Sometimes I would count down the years until it was over when I felt the crushing responsibility of it. But, I did discover my rhythm and joy for this season of my life. I possibly hid behind it as I have served the family and have encouraged their hopes and dreams. Nothing or nobody has prepared me for the day when I am no longer actively mothering. I never planned for this.
My hopes and dreams that have been pushed aside for a long time, now have the chance to flourish. I no longer have parenting responsibilities. With the exceptions of genuine limits, there are new possibilities out there. And yet, I am struggling to overcome a strong pull to go back to doing what I have known for most of my adult life. The landscape is vast and yet my automatic response is to return to what is safe and comfortable: mothering.
What next? Who am I when I am not mothering? That is the big question? Ahead of me, God willing, is another 25 years. It is time for me to grieve the loss of my season of motherhood. It is time for me to take courage and dare to risk for my next season. We have a divine priority for life to risk and grow and yet our feelings are saying, be comfortable and safe. (© David J. Riddell, Living Wisdom)
What about you? Do you know who you are if you are not a mother? Are you like me and have this pull back to what is comfortable and safe? What does it look like to risk and grow: to dare to dream of what life is like after motherhood? Who are you when you are not a mother?
See Ya!
He left for the next chapter of his life with an uncomplicated “See Ya!”
Fresh places beckoned his passage of rite along with promise and fervour.
His Ute filled with luggage and golf clubs; the fuel tank full for the journey in front.
Without even a kiss or hugs, he left our home empty of his presence and stuff.
I had tried to get a life before the family spread, thinking I had it all considered.
Nothing could prepare my heart ahead; the emptiness too big to be covered.
It feels like the heartbeat has stopped in our family home, his absence tangibly evident.
Now barely a retreat for mum, dad and the two dogs, the house and my life-desolate.
Is there life after motherhood, when it seems as if one’s purpose has runs its course?
I wish these feelings away if I could, as few understand my unhappiness.
It’s easy to feel worthless when one’s apparent use has expired in a sense.
The future seems so pointless, when a home has lost its reason for existence.
Unprepared in spite of nine months warning; before there were only two of us.
As was his departure Tuesday morning his entrance was as raw and rushed.
Again only two of us, just as before; unprepared for each other’s company.
Conversation is now difficult and unsure. What do we have in common? Anything?
The lounge chair he plopped in each night is as free as the outside car park.
No books to trip over piled alongside, the stool vacant at the breakfast bar.
The house has never been cleaner or the grocery bill so small.
This is healthier for my demeanour as there’s nobody to nag or be anxious about at all.
He has been on loan to us for nineteen years; a gift from our Creator and Saviour.
He goes blessed and leaves with few cares; his future sealed with sovereign favour.
God made him like no other, unique and full of potential to be discovered.
Our job as father and mother was to prepare him for the destiny yet to be uncovered.
Its time to look backwards and rejoice in the highlights of the life of a son becoming a man.
His preschool stuttering voice outshone by the eloquent toastmaster he has become.
His home-schooled math a year behind and now he tutors others as its master.
And sieving gems in his uncle’s sapphire mine; a prelude to his mining future!
He was mobile at nine months although he did not learn how to fall on his rear.
He had a head full of bumps as he fell frontward onto the coffee table and floor.
Fast forward fifteen years; he seemed happy to fall for the game of rugby league.
This time grunts but no tears; as well as corked thighs, busted eyes and bumps on his knees!
I remember him as a gentle kid, not liking dad’s company and preferring mine.
He would rather stay inside he said, preferring quiet activities to his father’s life.
It started with football and progressed to fishing, before they took hold of diving gear.
Bungee jumping, paragliding and spear fishing, something they both shared without fear.
No partner for fishing, footy or diving; Dad will especially miss his best mate.
No more rivalry or card playing? What will happen on Friday nights?
No socks or thongs to go missing, nor eskies left behind somewhere else.
Dad is going to miss him and the pain of his absence perhaps yet to be admitted to self.
We will miss his easy-going manner, his wry grin and peaceful presence;
And I am beginning to miss his clutter, his unwashed laundry and kitchen mess.
His room is ready and his bed sheets laundered, for whenever he returns for a weekend.
The kitchen’s clean and pantry replenished; almost ready for the messy gourmet again!
A text, an email or a phone call, should easily keep the family connected.
If only he liked to talk, however small, this mother would be glad for a few words said.
He’s so busy now and so grown up; we seldom see glimpses of the boy who used to be shy.
He is responsible and has stepped up; time to release the parent strings and let him fly.
We miss you son! See Ya!
(©Angela May, January 2010)
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