Posts Tagged Love

Make Time For Love

coupleAs mothers we love our children unconditionally. Now I am not saying we all have not had that moment when a roll a duct tape looks good when they are misbehaving, but we will do anything for them. We will rearrange our schedules for theirs. We will be awake all night for bad dreams and illness. We will rush out to by cupcakes the morning of the school party. We will read the same book ten times that week. We will buy yogurt with cute characters on them because for some reason they just taste better to our little ones. We will cave in and buy that fish, hamster, cat or dog because they need a pet, and NOT because we needed another thing to take care of. We will sew the holes in their lovies and blankets because it would be catastrophic not too.

There is someone in our life we tend to forget (other than ourselves which I wrote on a previous blog). Our significant other. They tend to get a viewing pass into our lives but rarely do they come up on stage. We will make excuses to get out of intimacy (usually exhaustion). We will them all the errands they need to do, and hand them a honey to do list. When they want to do something for themselves like buy a motorcycle, go fishing, etc…we sigh, we roll our eyes, we may even tell them no. A priest told me a very important thing once. You are a mate not a mat for your significant other. It is the same the other way around. So stop wiping your feet on them, and maybe they will follow suit. Because as mothers, women, and spouses we have more than enough love to share, we just need to give some to them….

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Love Lessons

Me and my baby girl....
Me and my baby girl….

Not all of us grew up in the fairy tale life of an amazing strong father or an adoring mother. Sometimes we get reality. I will not go into the specifics about my own childhood, but let’s say I lived in reality. I was also an only child, most of the time alone, till my father remarried and I got three insta-siblings (love you Mary!). I always wished for a fairy godmother to come to me as in the movie Cinderella and make my parents different, but that’s what I had. I did and do love them, maybe because they are the reason I was born or maybe I was born with a big heart. I was always nervous that having parents like them, I would be lacking the ability to love whole heartily or even be a good wife or great parent.

I guess you can say they did the best they could. I was born in the 70’s, a different time with different rules and expectations of parents. I fortunately had two amazing grandparents that raised me for a lot of my years and definitly shaped me into the human I am today. They were amazing people all the way to the core. I miss them everyday since they died in 2005. They taught me to love someone more than yourself. I did love them and I thought my love for them would be the greatest love I knew. Then I got married to my best friend, who I had been in love with since the day I met him when we were only 13 years old.

That love was unexplainable. Never wavers. Never perfect. Always forgiving. Always evolving. I thank God for him everyday. In my prayers I say, “I know he is not perfect, but he is perfect for me.” Here I was sure this was the greatest love one could feel.

Then I had my baby girl in 2006. My heart at times wants to burst because the love I have for her is so overwhelming. Now I am not saying I might have not pulled some hair out over her, but the love I have for her is different from anything else I have known. Your children will always be yours. Whether they grow up, move out, pass away, or even disown you, they will forever be yours and a part of you. They are from you. Now I am sure you get this same feeling from a child you have adopted (my father and my mother in law were adopted and their parents love them as their own and it is rarely ever brought up they were adopted) but I can only speak from my experience.

As she gets older she exasperates me and fulfills me all at once. More and more she says the cutest things and I just want to smother her faces with a thousand kisses. For instance, she tells me I am her best friend, I am the best mom, the best cook. (Talk about your own little Cheerleader).  She makes me laugh so unexpectedly, for instance, I bought a dollar ring at a garage sale, and she picked it and said, “China mom? Really?”  and she shook her head disappointingly. She touches my soul like when she genuflects at church and crosses herself. One time I was sick and she took a wet rag, wiped my face, neck and shoulders and said, “Mommy I doctor, I wiped your sick off, you better.” What an amazing little person she is…what a blessing…

There is a Bible passage in 1 Corinthians 13:4 that really does describe Love overall. It was read at my wedding, but it’s for any relationship where love is involved.

“Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one.
Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;
never selfish, not quick to take offense.
There is nothing love cannot face;
there is no limit to its faith,
its hope, and endurance.
In a word, there are three things
that last forever: faith, hope, and love;
but the greatest of them all is love.”

I am honored and humbled I have had such loves in my life. Each one is different, carrying their own meanings and lessons.

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