A Very Merry Un-Mother’s Day To Me
It's a few minutes before midnight on the night before Mother's day. My first mother's day as a mom. Well kind of. A foster mom. Does that count? I think it does…I don't know anymore. I was looking forward to this day, my first mother's day. It was feeling like a bigger deal than I thought the closer it was getting and then today it hit me like a tidal wave and knocked me to my knees. Little man’s bio mom won’t get to see him on mother's day. I can't imagine not seeing my own kid on mother's day of all days. She was upset when she didn't get to see him on Christmas Eve (even though I later found out he is Jewish) which I totally understood…I got it but also wasn't about to spend any of my holidays at a visitation. But tomorrow, tomorrow is different. It's Mother's Day.
When I became a foster parent 8 months ago, I was very adamant about not being called mom. My parents jumped right into referring to me as a mom and it made me super uncomfortable. I wasn't his mom. Weeks went by, then slowly over months it started to feel more comfortable, and eventually somewhere along the lines I became "mom". Enter in Kevin moving in and eventually he became "dad", something we had a conversation about prior to as to whether or not he was ready and comfortable to be called dad just yet. But what else do we do? We have a little one who is babbling all the time and will eventually be learning his first words. Those won't be Megan and Kevin and if they are then what? What happens if he stays and we adopt him and we have to go from Megan and Kevin to mom and dad at a year and half old? How do we do that? I figured I would take my chances with starting with mom and dad and then if he doesn't stay he will adjust to calling someone else, mom and dad. I have absolutely no idea if that was the right call but that's what I went with. If we had an older placement, of course, it would be different but I really wasn't sure how to navigate this situation. There is no rule book for these kinds of things and everyone in our lives referred to us as mom and dad long before we started calling each other that in front of him so we just kind of went along with it.
Here's the deal though. We aren't mom and dad, I mean we are, but we aren't. He has a mom and a dad. We are his foster parents. Doesn't mean I'm not a mom because as any mom, biological, foster, or adoptive can tell you if you’re the one getting up 5 times in the middle of the night for feedings, and changing all the diapers, and worrying if they will crawl, you’re a mom. The rest of the title doesn't matter. But I've been struggling with it a lot lately. The mom and dad thing. We are his parents for right now, but we aren't his mom and dad. But I am a mother. And I think a pretty decent one.
But tomorrow as I get to celebrate that, another mom does not. For me to become a mom, someone else had to lose that privilege. The overwhelming sadness of that is not lost on me.
I don't think about her much anymore. She isn't as big of a part of our life as she was when he first came into care. At this point, we haven't seen or spoken to her in months but today, today I thought about her a lot. I want to celebrate her tomorrow because if it wasn't for her I wouldn't have this amazing little person in my life and I wouldn't be a mom. I want to celebrate her because even though she isn't capable of being a mom right now, she still made this amazing little human and while some of that is from being here, loved and raised by us, some of that is her. I thought to myself I really should send her some photos tomorrow and wish her a Happy Mother's Day but instantly thought that she would probably take that as me rubbing it in her face. But it's Mother's Day. How do I not send her photos of her child? How do I do that in good conscience? But then I go down the rabbit hole of questions. Does she care? Does she miss him? Did she want to be a mom? Why didn't she show for visitation this week? Does she view me as his "mom" or just merely a babysitter?
Tonight I’m thinking about the bigger picture, will I think of her on every mother's day? Will there be a Mother's day where he asks me about her? I hate that foster care has taken that away from me. The right to be called mom and not feel bad or guilty about it. I never thought about these things prior to becoming a foster parent. The way I would feel on mother's day being a mom to someone else child. It's hard. Harder than I thought. Not the loving a child that isn't yours part, that part is easy. But the loving a child so hard that you forget that they aren't yours. I don't know how foster parents do it. How you love a child for months, sometimes years that isn't yours. How do you compartmentalize those emotions? Mom and dad seemed like the easiest approach but now I realize that maybe that wasn't fair, to him, to us, to her.
I am his mom, but so is she. I'm not really sure how to rectify that in my head and my heart for that matter especially on Mother's Day.
“A child born to another woman calls me mom. The depth of the tragedy and the magnitude of the privilege are not lost on me.”
I'm thankful he is too young to understand and that tomorrow there will be no questions. I know that for a lot of foster families and foster moms, tomorrow will be a very difficult day. One of the hardest days because it’s complicated, the caring for and loving of someone elses kids. We are told to love them unconditionally as if they were our own, which I did with open arms but you know what happens when you do that? They become yours …or at least appear to feel like they are but they aren't. He isn't mine. He has a mom and it isn't me.
But today I get to celebrate because this little man made me a mom. Even if we aren't his forever home, he is and will always be the baby that made me a mom. And motherhood has been really amazing. It's been everything I imagined and more as cheesy as that sounds. He has changed me in a way only loving a child can do to a mother's heart and I am forever grateful for that.
Today I would like to wish a Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there especially the ones that don't go by the name of 'mom'. And lastly, I pray for all the moms that won’t get to see their children today and all the children that will not see their mothers today.