Who Is Your Mother? Identity Issues

I've had a bad couple of weeks - but my pain is not terminal and my own daughters do not see a heartbreaking end looming in the short term. Yet I saw what they as caring helpful daughters must often be feeling in the blog of Brianna.

She says that her mother, who has inoperable cancer, is still able to spend some time on the deck each day but that she is not able to care for herself.

"but she needs a lot of help getting there"

Then she reminded me of how apologetic we mothers are when needing help.

"She has spent a lot of time apologizing to me this week, most heartbreakingly when she spilled a bottle of water on the bed two days in a row, necessitating a quick change of the sheets. “What a dumb thing to do. I’m so sorry.”

I gazed at her blankly for a second, stunned. “Mom, this isn’t a big deal in the least."

Daughter #3 says the same thing.

Yet we hate to see you have to take care of us. We're eternally mothers who should be doing for you instead. Our identity is not of someone who needs you to make appointments for us, innovate creative ice packs that fit our weird pain patterns, or remember when we took our pills.

Take it from me, Brianna; your mother is so proud of you and thankful to have you with her now.

For no good reason this post is leaking links to TongueTied on Duty being unpopular, Debbie Schlussel's post about Tom Monaghan of Dominoes and his stance on Illegal Aliens, Assorted Babble 123 beta and the Blue Star Chronicles.  Long live the Link Leak virus!

 

Comments

[Susan]

Hey Butch. Thanks. I've got typepad set to screen comments with that nifty captcha system but trackback pings I have to approve myself or I get a bunch of links to various ringtone sites etc. But we should be linked now, yes?

[Butch]

Susan,

I sent the trackback...not sure why it's not showing up(?).