Posts tagged ‘motherhood’

Nov 3

I Am Someone’s Mommy

I’ve spoken before about how I often feel like an afterthought in my son’s eyes. How his Dad can do no wrong and I’m a pain in his ass. Sean’s the playmate. I’m the teacher. He’s the joy. I’m the heavy. My illness makes me weak and Sean seems like the most capable man in the world. His Dad shapes breakfast into starships and his Mom insists he put on shoes before we leave the house (the injustice!). I’ve come to accept that, for the most part, I’m lame and Sean’s cool. I don’t like it but, I’ve come to terms with it. He may love us both the same but, I can’t compete. I’m his rock but his Dad’s his Hero and a Hero throws a pretty large shadow.

The other night however, Lochlan was sick. Not crazy sick, just bad cold sick and it had been a long day so, after I put him to bed, I went to sleep myself. Sean was out and, when he got home, Loch woke up and started calling for me. Apparently, no matter what he did, Loch was still asking for me so, eventually, Sean came to wake me up. He apologized, saying he’d tried everything but, Loch just “really needed his Mommy.”

This is literally how Sean presents Loch's breakfast. There's no competing with that!

This is literally how Sean presents Loch’s breakfast. There’s just no competing with that!

Here’s the thing, I’m an insomniac. Sleep is a struggle for me. When I’m already asleep, I REALLY hate getting up because once I’m up, I’m often up for hours. I’ve spent way too many nights just staring into the darkness worrying, writing notes, breaking down and trolling Facebook, counting the ever shrinking hours until I have to be out of bed again and, just waiting for the sleep that doesn’t come. It’s incredibly frustrating and I really do my best to avoid it at all costs.

I didn’t want to get out of bed that night. I didn’t want to be awake until 3am exhausted at home the next day with a sick child but, my baby was calling for me so, it didn’t matter what I wanted, I was going. I understood. Sometimes you just need your Mom.

He blew his nose and I gave him more cold medicine to break up the phlegm. I refluffed his pillows, straighten his sheets and flipped his blankets and, when he was finally settled, I sang. I sang the lullaby I’ve been singing to him since the first day he was born. I sang it soft and low while I patted his back and scratched his arm. He lay on his side, his little hand resting on my knee and I could feel his tiny shoulder blades through his t-shirt, the little hairs on his forearm, the impossibly soft skin on the top of his hand. I sang and sang and, finally, I just sat. I listened to him breathe. I listened to the sound of his stuffiness, to his little, muffled girggles and, then I made the disastrous mistake of asking if he wanted to blow his nose.

“Mom! You woke me up!!” (I didn’t). “You’re going to have to do it all over again but, this time when you’re done, don’t talk to me after ok?”

“Ok, babe. Sorry about that.” (He’s sick, I’ll give him a break on the tone he’s using.) “DO you want to blow your nose though?”

“Um…Yes.” (blow)

I started again. The singing, the back patting, the arm tickles but, this time, I became aware of how amazing the moment was. I’d passed the fresh out of bed, trying to get back to it phase. I was there now, awake, in it, and the intimacy of the moment, the warmth of being there in the dark with him, the satisfaction of being able to give him the affection he needed, it all overwhelmed me. I was struck by the fact that my love for him had become a tangible thing. A security blanket he craved. Something he needed to hold on to. My very presence was like a xynax for his soul. Despite all the hero worship, in this moment, it was me who made a difference. Me who was required.

The thing is, being diagnosed when Loch was 5 months old, I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to experience that feeling. It didn’t seem as if I’d be around long enough to ever really matter to him. To be remembered or, make any lasting impression on his life but, sitting there quietly on the side of his bed just allowing the song to settle, I recognized I’d made it. I’d lived long enough, and put in enough effort, to register as essential and, it felt amazing.

Eventually I took his hand off my knee, stood up, walked to his doorway and…

Tripped on his door stop.

“Mom!!”

“Sorry! Sorry Lochie! I didn’t see it.” (Ow. My toe.)

“Can you sing it again?” (It’s my own fault. Damn you rock.)

“Of course baby.”

I crossed back to his bed and sat down. I felt his little hand searching for my knee in the dark.

“When you’re done will you tuck me in too?”

“Do you want your arms under the blankets?”

“No, just my shoulder.”

“Ok, babe. I’ll do that.”

I wasn’t annoyed. I wasn’t tired. I wasn’t rushing to get back to bed. I knew I would be there for as long as he needed me. His little, pudgy fingers softly moved against the flannel of my pants as I started the song again and, this time, I found myself getting choked up. For all it’s efforts, being a parent is an incredible blessing. What an honor it is to be the person who can calm and improve a situation simply with your presence. How extraordinary to be the one looked to for help and guidance, the one who offers security and, in this case, how touching to be the one chosen. The one required above all others.

I sang the song two more times, even after I knew he was asleep, not wanting the moment to end and, every time I sang, the importance of my role grew on me. The repetition was a gift that allowed me to see the wonder.

I am Lochlan’s Mom and, no matter what ends up happening to me, I can say with all certainty that I mattered. That I made an impression on this small, wonderful boy’s life. To him I was irreplaceable.

Thank you Sean. Thank you Lochlan’s cold. Thank you stupid door stop. Thank you beautiful son. Thank you lovely and haunting “Bye Oh By Baby”.

I went right to sleep that night, a completely happy girl and, a totally fulfilled mother.

Blessings to you all.

xo leigh

Nov 19

8 Comments

Being a Parent versus Parenting

Dear Lochlan,

I’m sorry. Sometimes I feel as if I’m failing you. My personal struggles have a way of seeping into our life together. I’m tired and frustrated and I don’t always have the energy to do all I should for you. No, that’s not fair. I do everything I should for you. What I don’t do is all you’d like me to, and if I’m being perfectly honest, only part of that is because I don’t have the energy. The other part is because I don’t really want to.

As I said before in Pre K, I’m kind of sucky at “playing”. Moving cars or trains around on the floor with no game plan makes me twitchy. I’m happy to engage in a board game. I dig building. I’ve made more inanimate objects talk than I can possibly count and I’ve embodied every bad guy from this planet and beyond for you to destroy and capture, but I can only do it in ten to thirty minute intervals before I start planning my escape. I love talking to you. I love going places with you. I love singing and visiting and hugging and snuggling, but playing, just random “play with me” moments, exhaust me. I’m not four. I’m not a boy. I have nowhere near the energy you do and there are so many other things I need (or would like) to be doing. I love to work. Love it. It makes me feel good. I like using my brain. I feel pride in a job well done. I aspire to do better, be better, than I am, not just as a parent but as a person. Despite the fact that my life closer resembles a 1950’s housewife than the millennium power player I thought I’d be, I still aspire for things to be different. I cook and clean and do laundry because it needs to be done. I research the best schools and camps because I want you to be happy and fulfilled. I take you from class to class and involve you in extracurricular, play dates and sports because that’s what a good mother does, but I’m not fulfilled by it. I’d love to be one of those women I see at preschool drop off in full Lulu Lemon on her way to spinning, but my finances can’t stretch to exercise classes, and I don’t have time to waste those two and a half hours on something as frivolous as me. I have to get home, attempt to be creative on cue, then return to my job as a full time mother.

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I love being your mom but being a parent is sometimes a tough pill to swallow. There are days, like recently, when you were furious at me for A: choosing “totally the wrong shorts”, B: having the audacity to take off your long sleeve shirt so you wouldn’t be hot, and C: “interrupting” you, all before I’d even had a chance to brush my teeth, when I just want to say, I’m out, and go catch a movie. I don’t want to be away from you for long, but sometimes I could use an afternoon, an evening, a day, when I wasn’t in charge. I think that’s not so much selfish as self preservation.

I recently read an article in the New York Magazine called All Joy and No Fun: Why Parents Hate Parenting, that gave weight to some of the more complicated feelings surrounding parenthood and that ultimately, made me feel a bit better (and more justified) in my shortcomings.

The article points out that being a parent is something that most of us chose and when asked, would say we would be miserable without. I agree wholeheartedly with this as having you was an active choice that I can’t imagine living without. The article, however, goes on to say that most people assume having children will make them happier yet “a wide variety of academic research shows that parents are not, in fact, happier than their childless peers, and in many cases are less so.” The article quotes a 2004 study by Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Prize winning behavioral economist who, after surveying 909 working Texas women found that “child care ranked sixteenth in pleasurability out of nineteen activities.” * Preferred activities included cooking, exercising, TV, talking on the phone, napping, shopping, even cleaning. The article suggests that perhaps much of the problem may be attributed to the fact that raising children has fundamentally changed.

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“Before urbanization, children were viewed as economic assets to their parents. If you had a farm, they toiled alongside you to maintain its upkeep; if you had a family business, the kids helped mind the store. But all of this dramatically changed with the moral and technological revolutions of modernity. As we gained in prosperity, childhood came increasingly to be viewed as a protected, privileged time, and once college degrees became essential to getting ahead, children became not only a great expense but subjects to be sculpted, stimulated, instructed, groomed. (The Princeton sociologist Viviana Zelizer describes this transformation of a child’s value in five ruthless words: “Economically worthless but emotionally priceless.”) Kids, in short, went from being our staffs to being our bosses.”

Reading that resonated on many levels. I do see childhood as a privileged and protected time. You’re an adult with responsibilities for so long that I think having the opportunity to be a child without pressure is key, but I also want you to go as far as you can in life and with that hope comes a certain amount of stress. According to the article I’m not alone. Apparently middle and upper class families are particularly susceptible to unhappiness as they are more likely to “see their children as projects that need to be perfected”. Though your Dad and I try so hard to not put that anxiety on ourselves, or worse, on you, the fact of the matter is there’s so much competition, so much emphasis on making the “right” choices and choosing the “right” path that it becomes overwhelming. The article acknowledges that feeling saying, “middle-class parents spend much more time talking to children, answering questions with questions, and treating each child’s thought as a special contribution. And this is very tiring work.” Yet it appears that level of diligence is something few parents feel they can neglect “lest they put their children at risk by not giving them every advantage.” It’s a tough road to navigate and one that leaves very little energy left for for Ninjango, let alone doing something for yourself.

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According to research, all parents today, regardless of social status, seem to spend more time with their kids than (when I was born) in 1975. “Today’s married mothers have less leisure time (5.4 fewer hours per week), 71 % desire more time for themselves (as do 57% of married fathers), and yet 85% still think they don’t spend enough time with their children.”

The article reminds us a few generations ago “people weren’t stopping to contemplate whether having a child would make them happy. Having children was simply what you did.” It goes on to say “We’re lucky today to have choices about these matters, but the abundance of choices—whether to have kids, when, how many—may be one of the reasons parents are less happy.”

It also matters what age you are when you have your kids: “When you become a parent later in life there’s a loss of freedom, a loss of autonomy. It’s totally different from going from your parents’ house to immediately having a baby. Now you know what you’re giving up.” There’s no more “let’s meet up for dinner” or “wanna catch a movie?” Your freedom and autonomy no longer exist, you traded them for parenthood, and for the most part you also traded your disposable income and marriage first mentality.

It’s been said that you should always put your relationship first, that a happy marriage makes a happy family, but in real life that can prove quite difficult. Thomas Bradbury, father of two and professor of psychology at UCLA, says: “Being in a good relationship is a risk factor for becoming a parent.” Psychologists Lauren Papp and E. Mark Cummings asked 100 long-married couples to spend two weeks meticulously documenting their disagreements. Nearly 40 percent of them were about their kids. “And that 40 percent is merely the number that was explicitly about kids, many other arguments were ones couples were having because they were on a short fuse, tired, or stressed out.” According to Changing Rhythms of American Family Life one of the biggest problems with marriages with children “is the amount of time married parents spend alone together each week: Nine hours today versus twelve in 1975.” Husbands and wives apparently spend less than 10 percent of their home time alone together. “And it’s mostly just two tired people staring at the TV.”

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Lest you feel depressed my love, or feel I’m somehow saying having you was a drain on my happiness or a detriment to your father’s and my marriage, I will tell you that is unequivocally not the case. Your father and I are stronger as a couple because we are both so devoted to our family. If anything you have brought us closer together. Life, in itself is more of a strain, but statistics (and my heart) will confirm that “though parenting might make people unhappy, not parenting makes people feel worse.” That when we “take stock of our life, in the end, it isn’t by how much fun we had, but what we did with it.” Children give us a real sense of purpose and a point to our lives. It might not always be fun, but it’s exceptionally rewarding. Tom Gilovich, a psychologist at Cornell highlighted the concept of “retrospective happiness”. The idea of looking back on our good times – the very things that in the moment might have felt like a complete drag – but later can become the “source of intense gratification, nostalgia and delight.”

I know this to be true. You’re only four and a half and I already feel it. It might be just a trip to Target or grocery shopping or brushing your teeth. Time we’re simply filling in, or errands that just have to be done – those ho hum, nothing special, moments between moments – but in retrospect those times are some of the best. It’s time just spent together, snippets of connected activity where I get to steal a kiss or two from your sweet skin and talk with you about everything and nothing. Days I know I’ll look back on with nostalgia and longing. I may miss my old life. I may have days when I desire my autonomy. Times when explaining why it’s not “unfair” that you can’t have a mall pretzel at 5:30pm is just too much, when the selfish takes over and I can’t bare to pick up another toy, or I just want to shut my door and be alone, but I wouldn’t give any of it up for the world. You are by far the best thing I’ve ever done, my most prized accomplishment. In my heart of hearts, I know even if I don’t get as far as I’d like in my professional life, looking at you makes me feel like a success. I love you. Your presence has blessed my life.

There are so many moments as a parent that make it worth it. Moments that melt your heart with joy and make you say things like, “God, we’re so lucky” and if you can accept that there will also be times of exhausting, overwhelming tedium, extended moments where you wonder where your life went, then you’re well on your way to being a happy and successful parent. Your Gigi tells a story about when your Dad and Uncle Matt were young and she would sneak out to the garage just to hide in the car and have a break. I always thought that was a hilarious image, but now that I’m a parent it’s starting to look like a pretty good idea.

Why do you think I have so many magazines in the bathroom?

I love you kiddo. Cut me a little slack will ya?

xoxo your loving Mom

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*all quotes from Jennifer Senior, New York Magazine, “Why Parents Hate Parenting” July 4, 2010

May 14

13 Comments

A Love Letter to My Mother

Dear Lochie,

Being a mother is by far the best thing I’ve ever done. I realize that’s a cliche, and part of me feels I should somehow be more profound and illuminating, but it’s the truth. Choosing to be a mother is choosing to put your life after another’s. Committing to a long term relationship is choosing to be someone’s equal, but the act of being a mother is the act of actively deciding to be second, or fourth, or eighth. You are no longer the most important. You can’t choose to look out for number one, or you can, but number one isn’t you.

As a mother your choices get usurped by what’s best for someone else. You change where you live. You buy sensible cars. You give up the things you want to afford things they need. You forget to eat. You clean bodily fluids that aren’t yours, and you have to get up, when every bone in your body says stay asleep.

Me and my boy.

When you choose to raise a person, to devote your life to making them the best possible version of themselves, you sacrifice and save and commit to their well being, knowing full well one day, if you’ve done your job right, they’ll grow up and leave you and you’ll have to smile and let them go. Our children may be ours but we don’t own them. All the love and attention we shower on them is soaked up and hopefully serves to make them loving, caring people that will go out and make the world a better place.

In my room in Toronto there is a tiny, framed water color with a quote that says, “There are two lasting gifts we can give our children. One is roots, the other is wings.” It reminds me of the new Jason Mraz song “93 Million Miles” where he says, “Oh, my my how beautiful, Oh my beautiful mother. She told me, son in life you’re gonna go far. If you do it right, you’ll love where you are. Just know, wherever you go. You can always come home.” The best we can do as mothers is give our children the strongest foundation on which to build their lives and then softly nudge them into the world with the knowledge and security that no matter where they go, or who they become, they always have a place to come home to. That in this big, overwhelming world there is somewhere they will always be loved, safe, cherished and respected. Whether that area is a physical home or just in their mother’s heart, they know they have a space they’ll always belong.

My mom last summer at the cottage.

With that in mind, and seeing that yesterday was Mother’s Day, I felt it was only fitting to write a little about the woman who taught me everything I know about being a mother. The person who showed me what it means to unconditionally love and sacrifice. The person who put her own life on hold to raise yours truly, and the person to which I owe the most in the world, your Granny, Penny Elliott. As we grow, I think it’s important to know where we came from. Who we are a product of. Who raised us. Who raised them. Who we’re genetically or emotionally linked to and how that plays out in our lives. It’s not about looking back, it’s about filling in the knowledge, so we can move forward. It’s a healthy respect for the history of life, our life, and who came before.

My mother was born Rene Penelope Lowndes in Toronto, Canada in 1943. Her mother, your Grand Mimi, was one of the four famous Locke (no, we didn’t name you after them but it’s a lovely coincidence) sisters who grew up with their mother on Lynwood Avenue in an area called Forest Hill. When I say famous I don’t mean to say that your Grand Mimi or Great Aunts were movie stars or famous burlesque dancers or anything, merely that they were 4 attractive sisters living close to an all boys school who made quite a name for themselves in the social circles of 1930’s Toronto society.

My mom. 1 year old.

Your Granny’s Father’s name was Charles Lowndes and he married Grand Mimi in spite of the fact that her father, who would die soon after of colon cancer, told her to “give him up.” According to family lore, he was not quite ready to be a husband and a father and when he went off to war (WWII) he formally decided it wasn’t for him. Grand Mimi became one of a very short list of divorcees in the 1940’s and moved into the 3rd floor of her childhood home with her new baby, Penny.

Your Granny spent the next 10 years of her life living on Lynwood in the winter and Lake Simcoe in the summer with her mother, and grand mother, and various other cousins and relatives, of which there were many. It breaks my heart to think of my Mom’s Dad leaving and never getting to know her. I think it’d be fair to say it affected her whole life. I’d hazard to guess the child in her never fully understood it wasn’t her fault, or that she was lovable and not to blame for what happened. I think many of her personality traits probably stem back to those early feelings – the need to be likable and agreeable – and, I think she always felt she had to somehow make it up to her mother.

A child should never feel responsible for a parent’s happiness. As parents we are responsible for our children but not the other way round. It’s too big of a role for little people to handle. I loved your Grand Mimi dearly, but not withstanding her own disappointment (and I’m sure there was plenty) I think she might have let her first born down a bit.

Granny’s sister Jill’s Christening. Grand Mimi is in the center holding Jill, the youngest of all the cousins, and Granny is second row top left.

When Granny was 10, Grand Mimi remarried an Englishman named Henry (called Seb) Askew, a strikingly handsome, businessman and cabinet maker – and according to Grand Mimi “a wonderful dancer”. They relocated to a small but sweet house on Heath Street, about 15 minutes away from where Granny had grown up. Seb and Grand Mimi went on to have a daughter, Granny’s sister Jill, the following year. I’ve heard Granny say she was never quite sure how she fit into her mother’s new little family. That, despite their best efforts, she always felt a little like an outsider in her own home, and that she was more of a parental figure to her sister than a sibling due to their 11 year age difference.

Granny and Granddad leaving on their Honeymoon.

Granny met Granddad when they worked in the same law firm in the early 60’s. She’d say she fell in love before he did and often jokes that they got engaged because he was so traumatized that his best pal Todd had decided to get married. Granddad would tell you that Granny was the only woman that had ever made him stop his frantic pace and take notice, and for him that was love. They were married in 1969 and honeymooned in Spain and Portugal. Granny had travelled to Europe previously with friends and had to convince Granddad to go abroad. The joke is Granddad would have been happy to have honeymooned in Georgian Bay (where they would later buy the cottage), but once she got him overseas, he became hooked by the travel bug that’s never left him since.

Coming home from the hospital.

I came along a full 5 years after their marriage. After planning on a big family they resigned themselves to the fact that I would probably be their only child, and moved on, as we have, to giving that one child all they could. My Dad worked a lot when I was young and though I could tell many wonderful stories about how he never made me feel like I wasn’t important, or we did wonderful things together, this is a story about my mom so I’ll leave those tales for Father’s Day. Granny and I spent every day together when I was little. She was a stay-at-home mom till I was in the 5th grade and I can’t thank her enough for that sacrifice. We have a very old recording of me speaking into a tape recorder on our way up to Collingwood to ski for the weekend (back then we had a chalet that we rented every winter so I could learn to ski and my parents could party with their pals). On the recording the 3- year-old me is recounting the day I’d just spent with my mother and it sounds very similar to a day you and I might have whiled away together.

Me: First we went to the bank…Then we went to the cleaners…Then we went…where?

Mom: To the bakery.

Me: …to the bakery.

Mom: And tell Dad what you got at the bakery Leigh.

Me: I got a cookie Dad.

Mom: And what color was it?

Me: It was GREEN Dad!!

Dad: What!? A green cookie!!

Me: Yes!

Happy Childhood Days with my mommy. I learned affection from her.

I know those days. They’re boring and wonderful all at the same time. It’s just life unfolding. Daily, dull, have-to-do stuff, but now you’re doing it with a little person. A little person who’s absorbing the whole world. When I first got sick and thought I was going to die, it wasn’t the big things like never being famous or successful that I morned. It was the boring, every day things that I took for granted like going to the grocery store or just hanging out with you. At the end of it all, it’s those little moments that make up a life. It doesn’t matter that the world doesn’t know who I am. It matters that you know me and I know you. Staying home with your kid is a gift that goes both ways, and for those mothers that have, or make, the opportunity to do it, it means so much and I want my mom to know how grateful I am to her for all those years.

Granny went back to work when I was 10 and it was an adjustment. I could no longer go home for lunch, I got home and hour before she did and she no longer knew every aspect of my life. Looking back that was probably more a product of age than her working, but it was still a trip.

Reading in front of the fire at our first house on Plymbridge Crescent.

I kind of got her back when I started private school in Grade 6 because she worked there. Granny was an alumnae and worked in fundraising in the Sr. School. It was the best of both worlds. She was there but not there. Available for debriefings and ventings when I needed her, but not in my space like she would have been if she’d been say, a teacher. It’s a real testament to my mother to say that throughout my 8 years at Branksome I’d often go to her office to chat, just to find one of my friend’s already there seeking her advice. Granny’s just one of those people that’s really easy to talk to. I’ve always been so proud of her. Everyone loves her and it’s such a blessing to be the child of someone that everyone loves. She’s such a devoted friend and warmhearted person that people my whole life have gravitated towards her. If I could give her a gift it would be to see herself through other’s eyes. She has no idea how truly fabulous she is. Though we have none of the same features and our coloring is different, for some reason we look a lot alike, and I’ve always felt fortunate because of that. First of all because she’s beautiful, but secondly because looking like her, people associate me with her. A perfect example is a couple of years ago when I was home for a visit and I took my parents dry cleaning in. The woman behind the counter took one look at me and said, “Are you Penny’s daughter?” and when I answered in the affirmative, she said, “Oh, you’re so lucky to have a mom like yours. She’s sooo nice.”

How can you not feel pride at something like that?

My mom in her early 30’s.

Growing up with your Granny I felt pride a lot. I was supported and encouraged at everything I did – save competitive diving but that’s a story that truly belongs to my Dad – and it made me an incredibly strong individual. I also had a place in my mother to confide every feeling, to ask every question and I never got anything less than her undivided attention. She saw every show, came to every meet, volunteered for things I wanted her too and steered clear when I preferred to be alone. She trusted me and because of that I trusted her. I told her when I started drinking, when I tried smoking, when I had sex. I explained my experiences with drugs and unloaded all my heartache. Sure their were secrets I kept – everybody has them – but for the most part we were and continue to be the best of pals.

The best kind of mothers, and your Granny is one, can be your pal while still remaining your Mom. Her primary concern was my well being, my safety and my character. She was my friend, but not before she was my mother and my guide. We had, and occasionally still do have, terrible fights. We have very different temperaments, or maybe similar temperaments, but were raised differently. I was raised in a house where my voice mattered. Where I believed in myself and my convictions and felt that my opinions had weight. Granny was raised to be “a good girl” to be a pleaser and was filled from a very young age with doubt about her abilities. I can remember when my mom was in her 40’s and Grand Mimi telling her that she “couldn’t drive on the highway at night” or “maybe she should go and have a nap” like she was a 5-year-old. I swear my Granny treated me like more of an adult than she ever treated my mom and I’m sure it was exhausting.

My mom in her early 60’s.

That constant second guessing by the woman she loved – and always tried to please – made Granny what I can only describe as, a nervous person. She’s a bad flyer (a learned behavior I adopted); an anxious driver (and even worse passenger); a blue chip investor (though I understand the need for stability, I’m definitely more risk tolerant); and her most used quote and possible life motto is “When in doubt, don’t.” I think it’s a real testament to her strength of character that she raised me to be different, bolder, more confident than she was. Though doubt can be a possible warning sign to disaster, I’ve always seen it as reason to get more information or put in more work. You might be unsure but it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. Life in itself is a risk. Do your research. Make educated decisions. There’s always room for doubt, but that doesn’t mean it should prevent action. I recently filled out a financial questionnaire and one question was, “What does risk mean to you?” I answered C: Opportunity. My mom would have circled A: Danger.

I moved away from home at 19 and – save 2 years when I returned to Toronto for Grad School – I never moved back. I believe I was able to do this because of my mom. I was so filled with her love that I could take it with me no matter where I lived, and no matter where I was I knew I could always come back. She’d filled my life with a confidence and security I’m sure she never had, and my life’s been blessed because of it.

When I got sick Granny came to live with us. She was amazing. Giving up her life to come down and help with ours. So many times she said to me, “I wish I could trade places with you. I wish I could take this on. It’s not fair that it’s you. It should be me.” My mom was feeling what we all know, that we’re not supposed to outlive our children. How do you get your head around saying goodbye to someone that you can’t bare to live without? I hope she never has to deal with it. I hope I can take care of her in old age as well as she took care of her mother. I hope I can care for her as she’s always cared for me and I hope I can live a good, long life and spare her the pain of my passing. I can’t imagine a world without her but I’d like it to play out in the right order. She deserves it.

You and Granny when you were 9 months old. Granny was living with us after my diagnosis.

When I got married I found out that my mom had been saving money for years to be able to help make it the day I wanted it to be. That same year I found out it was my mother that had paid for my private school education. I’d always credited it to my successful, lawyer father but it was my mother – my oft overlooked, overworked mother – who had my tuition taken out of her salary to pay for my fancy – and well worth it – private education. So much of who I am I owe to her. She taught me love in a way that I can never repay. She sang to me and read me stories. She held me when I was scared as a child and as a grown mother afraid of dying. She has a fabulous – almost sibling like – relationship with your Dad, and she’s cultivated a relationship with you that breaks my heart it’s so mutually devoted. Your Granny pledged her life to me in a way I’m not sure I’ll be able to match. I’m not as patient or selfless and I’m not sure I have as much time, but I will do the best I can, just as she did the best she could. I plan to give you all I have without losing myself.

I think that’s all we can ever really ask of our mothers.

I love you Mom.

I love you Loch.

May God bless you both.

xo leigh