First, I want to wish my readers who are mothers a very happy Mother's Day. I think you are heroic, because parenting is so damn hard even in the best of circumstances. And I hope you have someone who is making you feel special today about being a mother.
But there's another side of me that kind of hates this holiday. Yes, you heard me: hate it. To me, Mother's Day is one of those Hallmark/FTD holidays, just like Valentine's Day, that are designed to point out that there are haves and have nots in the world when it comes to love and relationships.
On Valentine's Day, if you're single, you're not going to get any flowers or teddy bears or heart-shaped boxes of chocolate. If you're in a relationship with a jerk, you also won't be getting any of that swag. So when everyone around you is ooo-ing and ahh-ing about their dozen long-stemmed American Beauty Roses, you get to feel like shit.
Well, it's the same for some of us on Mother's Day.
Not all of us got to become mothers. For some of us, that was a choice. For others, its just how it worked out for us. Why would we feel like the "have nots" on this or any other day, just because we're child-free?
And not all of us had the perfect mother.
If you had the kind of mother who was truly your best friend, the kind of mother you could go to with your dreams, wishes, troubles, and aspirations, then you are very fortunate. Even if your mom had a bad day or lost her cool once in a while (she was human, and kids can be little shits sometimes!), on the whole she was stable, consistent in her parenting, dependable, and you always knew you could count on her to be on your side. If this was your mom, then yes, you should get down on your knees and be thankful you had THAT mom. You are in the minority, I think. Not all of us got that. Not even close to that.
Some of us had mothers who were good at some parts of the Mom thing, but lousy at other parts of it. They might have been tops at baking cupcakes and throwing childhood birthday parties, they worked hard to keep a roof over your head and food on the table, but they weren't good at being non-judgmental and supportive during those all-important formative teen years. For others, it might be the opposite -- they had a mom who was not good with little children but who, when her kids got older, was able to better relate to her children. Further along the spectrum, some of us had mothers with "issues" of their own, serious things they were struggling with ranging from divorce and single motherhood, to financial problems or addiction, to physical or mental illness (their own or that of their parent or a child), that were a major distraction in their ability to parent us the way we needed them to. When you're stuck in the mire of your own problems, it's pretty difficult to be there for your kids. They did care about us to a degree and they loved us the only way they knew how -- but it was never good enough, was it? We saw it. We felt it. We knew it. I think the majority of us fall into this category, somewhere. We're the ones who have struggled with a bit of a love/hate relationship with our mothers for most of our lives (perhaps even more so if we're daughters), where we find it difficult to reconcile how we can love someone so much but yet not LIKE them very much most of the time. We can't tell our moms everything about us, about our personal problems, because we don't get support, we get criticism or laughter or rejection. Our mothers weren't able, for whatever reason, to be consistent and unconditionally loving. So, Mother's Day is just another moment of inner conflict for people like us. We see other people celebrating their mothers, and we muse, "Why didn't I get her mom for a mother?" And then we move on because of course there is no good answer to that question.
And some moms weren't good at any of it. They're at the far end of the spectrum, the Mommy Dearests, the ones we hear about in the news: neglectful, abusive, addicted, hateful, and downright insane. They're the ones where we shake our heads in disbelief and wonder why people aren't subjected to parenting tests before they're allowed to have children. You may have a friend who had a mother like that. You may even be the one who had a mother like that. You were lucky to even survive your childhood. In adulthood, as you tried to put your life back together, your only choice to keep your own sanity may even have been the ultimate separation: cutting your mother out of your life. You have had to move through life, whether childless or as a mother, without any kind of road-map for parenting or self-care as a woman, and every year when Mother's Day comes around, you secretly wonder if your friends wonder why YOU aren't talking about how great your mom is, or how much you miss her. Because you don't miss her. (Well, maybe you miss the IDEA of her.) You're just relieved she's out of your life.
So, if you didn't HAVE a Super-Mom or you didn't get to BE a Super-Mom, then maybe you feel a little bit like I do at this time of year: like you're having your nose rubbed in it, this holy image of motherhood and all that it is "supposed to be", and it's all because of the hype where we're trying to make Motherhood and Sainthood the same thing, all the while spending millions every May on flowers, spa treatments and greeting cards. Because God forbid we don't honor our mothers, right? WHAT WOULD PEOPLE THINK OF US?
The truth isn't like that. Some of us just weren't so lucky in the Mom department. If you were, either because you had or have a wonderful mom or because you became a wonderful mom, then I'm happy for you and I don't want to take away from your personal experience. You deserve it.
I just ask that you remember the rest of us, who aren't feeling so celebratory, and don't judge us because we're not posting tributes to our mothers on social media. I sent my mother flowers today, like I do every year, because I know they'll make her smile. She's aging and having a rough time dealing with my illness, and I'm sympathetic to her feelings about that. But my relationship with my mother is, in a word, "complicated" and I think I'll just leave it at that. (For what it's worth, my relationship with my father was "non-existent" so Father's Day hasn't been on my radar at all.)
Later today, I'll Skype with my mom and my sister and the rest of the family, but I'll get more joy out of talking to my sister and my niece than I will talking with my mother. That's just how it is - in our family. I've learned to be at peace with it, 364 days a year: I have a mother who loves me but who has some trouble expressing that love at times. It is what it is. She's still my mom, I honor the "good mom" qualities within her (and yes, there were some of those) and I will miss her some day when she's gone.
I still hate this holiday. And Hallmark can still bite me. (Though I thank FTD for delivering my mother's flowers. I hope they got there on time.)