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Yesterday was Mother’s Day. We had a nice day of homemade gifts, surprises and family together time. The kids had been working really hard at school making gifts for me for the last couple of weeks. My four year old had already shown me her present of course and hid it several places all over the house. She finally found it just in time to give it to me.
Mita had drawn a picture of my and had a list of my likes and favorites written out. I was amazed to realize how much she knew me. She may have asked Hubby the details (he doesn’t remember?) but the fact is that she either knew or found out my likes and favorites. I was very touched by this. I have been her mom for a year now and she has been pretty focused on herself, and rightly so, but she has picked up things about me along with way. That makes my heart warm!
Enu made me a few cards, but also bought me a book! They had a buy-on-get-one book fair last week and she came home with only one book. The other one was for me. The thoughtfulness of this child makes my heart sing. She knows I love to read, she knows I love books with animals in them. She bought me a book about a giraffe.
Both of these examples tell me that they are learning, they are paying attention to our family. Progress is being made.
With all of this warm-fuzziness of Mother’s Day, there is also sadness in our family. Two of my children have lost their mom before. They went years without having a mom. They miss her.
When all of this activity started about making Mother’s Day gifts, Mita also woke up crying in the middle of the night. She misses her mom, she wakes up in pain. Her body shakes with grief and there is nothing I can do but hold her, tell her I’m sorry, and tell her I love her. Grief is so raw, it is painful to watch, impossible to cure.
Last night we looked at pictures of their Ethiopian mom. She was so beautiful and young. Her sassy smile reminds me of Enu, I can almost hear the laugh from her voice coming out of the pictures. We held each-other and prayed a prayer of thanks. Thanks that we have pictures of this beautiful woman, thanks that the kids have memories of her loving them, thanks that we are now a family.
I am so in awe at my responsibilities of being a mother to this other mom’s children. Why do I have the privilege of raising her daughters and watching them grow and she is gone? Life is definitely not fair and never will be. When times are hard and I am tired I often think of their mom and how she never had the chance to go through this stage with her daughters, she never got to watch them learn to read, go to school, play with friends. They were to young to make her sloppy and gooey homemade gifts.
Thank you Asnaka for birthing these children. I’m so glad you got to see their first smile and watch them take their first steps. I am honored to raise your children and you will always be in our thoughts and hearts just as your pictures are in our home.
We have three copies of the children’s book Ten Days and Nine Nights by Yumi Heo to give away! Please visit our giveaway post to enter!
