I’ve just spent a wonderful two days with eight other women from our church moms’ group. Usually when we are together, we talk about our kids. But this time, under the gentle guidance of a deeply spiritual woman (not coincidentally, a mother and grandmother), we talked about our mothers.
And our stepmothers. And our friends’ mothers. And our teachers. And our neighbors. And our aunts. And our grandmothers, godmothers, and mothers-in-law.
We came to realize how many women had mothered us. Even those of us who had very close relationships with our own mothers could name several other women whose influence in our lives had been powerful.
Countless cultures throughout the world and throughout human history have encouraged women to cooperate in the raising of children. Sometimes this was by necessity—grandmothers or older sisters cared for children because parents in their young adult years were needed for heavier labor, for example. Sometimes it was by convenience—extended families shared a courtyard cooking area or even a house.
But however it happened, it gave the children access to other people in their lives. By contrast, our American culture sometimes seems to see parenting as a competitive sport, each of us going all out to give our kids everything we can, all the while compulsively watching what other parents are doing and agonizing over our own choices.
I’m not saying we can or even should return to those days. There are many things I treasure about the nuclear family. Parents have more choices in child-rearing and more control over their children’s lives. (At least for a while.) I treasure the closeness I spent with my son the first three years of his life, nursing him, bringing him to work whenever possible, introducing him to nature and music and play-dough and fingerpaints. Our society is also much more diverse, making it less likely that neighbors or even extended family members share the same values about raising children.
Even though my family lived far away from most extended family while I was growing up, I found I can still name several women who “mothered” me: a youth minister at church, a nun who served as my confirmation sponsor, a high school teacher, my supervisor at one of my first jobs, a couple who had served as “adopted grandparents” to my husband and immediately and naturally adopted me too.
This time of reflecting on my many “mothers” was especially powerful for me because it gives me a way to relate to my daughters’ experiences of literally having other mothers—birth mothers, foster mothers, even grandmothers and aunts I don’t even know about.
I am extremely thankful that I get to be the mother who parents my children to adulthood. But it’s nice to reflect that what sometimes seems a paradox impossible to fathom—that these children who are so entwined in my heart once belonged to two other mothers, however briefly, is really not so foreign to my experience after all.
The Saturday before Mothers’ Day (which is the second Sunday of May in the United States) is often observed as Birthmother’s Day. For a related blog, see below:
Please see these other related blogs: