As my 4th Mother’s Day draws to a close, I find myself going through photos on my phone. The ones I have had on there since I before I was pregnant with Mackenzie. All the ones that never made it to social media. All the heart melting moments that I needed to keep close to see how my babies have grown. It was then that I realized how much I had changed as their mother.
That word. MOTHER. Oh, what a heavy word.
I didn’t think I would ever be a mom. I didn’t find the whole “life” experience with children to appealing to me. I had my two dogs and my career and I was good. I was 30 when I met Bryan. Both of us were emerging from broken relationships and neither one of us were looking for anything very serious. In fact, I think on one of our first dates together I remember telling him “Yeah, I don’t think I’m going to ever get married again or have kids. I just don’t like children all that much.” I now know that God was laughing at me from above, waiting to send me my slice of HUMBLE PIE.
After two weeks of feeling like I was dying, my mom suggested that I take a pregnancy test “just to rule it out.” I was so sure that I was dying of cancer that I remember buying a two pack of the cheapest pregnancy tests at Food Lion on my lunch break thinking it was a complete waste of money. I took the test at my apartment and waited the three whole minutes to look at the results. Because it was the cheapest pregnancy test ever, I couldn’t understand the whole two-line thing and had to read the directions twice to see that I was in fact – PREGNANT. I was in shock. I remember saying out loud “What am I going to do?” over and over again as I paced around my tiny apartment living room. I went back to work that afternoon, but barely got through it. I knew I couldn’t say anything to anyone until I spoke to Bryan. We weren’t married. We had only been dating nine months. I wasn’t supposed to have a baby. I didn’t know anything about them! I didn’t even like them!
Fast forward through four years to the woman I am today. 36 years old, wife to Bryan, work from home mom of a four-year old little girl and two-year old little boy who literally just wiped poop off the butts of both kids within the span of the last hour. Yes, the same woman who didn’t like children and never thought I would be a mom is a professional butt-wiper, boo-boo kisser, high-five giver.
You see, God knew that I WAS a mother all along. He knew that I needed to have these two incredible human beings to teach me how to LIVE my life.
There are no words to describe mothers. We are constantly evolving around who our children need us to be. What I was to them when they were first-born is not what they need now. (Not all of it anyway….I was more of a food source then. Haha) What I am to them now is not what they will need when they are 20. In doing so, my heart evolves right along with them. My love is ever-growing.
To all of the should-be mamas, want-to-be mamas, soon-to-be mamas, adoptive mamas, birth mamas, Grand-mamas, and all the other moms that I’ve forgotten to mention (because hello, MOM-BRAIN)…..you are without definition. But if I could give you one word it would be LOVE.
xoxo, Brandi’
