I wanted to draw your attention back to this post:
My Child’s Daughter
As I stared, stunned, at the two lines, my thoughts drifted to my own mother. I was a planned child, a glimmer of hope and new beginnings. I thought of the last moments I saw her. I thought of the pain, both mine and hers. The look of helplessness clouded over with the hopeless worries of a mother for her child. I held her hand until she told me to go. And I looked back as she kissed her hand and waved. I left her with the promise to return. She died that night.
And so there in that tiny bathroom I knew. These two blue lines that came so unexpectantly into my life, were actually not a new beginning but instead a long waited return. I laughed. My shaky hands cradled the two blue lines as I showed them to him. We do have a choice. No we don’t. It’s a non-negotiable deal. It’s her.
There are religions that believe firmly in reincarnation, the transformation of old souls into new life. I can’t say I do. But nor can I say I don’t. However I couldn’t write a blog about motherhood without writing about my own. A woman who suffered. Who spent her life bringing new life into the world and who gave her own to bring her 5 children into the world. A huge influence in my life; my morals, my decisions and my work. She’s an inspiration to overcome the pain and grief of her passing, and the pain and worries of motherhood.
However, the sad truth is that all that influence and inspiration fails to make an appearance when I need it most – amidst the chaos of progesterone – which can turn me into a massive emotional pain in the arse. It’s only after, when I sit and reflect, I calmly imagine her advice and guidance. And then I laugh to myself as I realise I’m imagining some godly-peaceful-figure, she was never a saint herself and I’ve gained many of her traits. She made many mistakes in her short life, she wasn’t perfect, but she was mine, and I loved her. I still do.
I remember someone told me once that losing their father was so difficult to deal with, and it wasn’t until their own son was born, that they could come to terms with it. I always wondered how. It can’t be a replacement, surely not, but it can heal a hole perhaps. Or maybe it’s more about understanding. My mother comes into my mind every day now. I don’t think my daughter can replace her, that by becoming a mother myself, I’ll lose the need for one myself. But perhaps I can then understand her. People say that a love a mother has for her child is incomparable by any standards, so perhaps I can understand the way she loved me and even the choices she made in the end.
No, I don’t believe that she is the midwife, only that without her I wouldn’t have my two blue lines. And that 50 years to the very day of her birth, my daughter will arrive.
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That was a year ago now that I held those two blue lines in my shaky hands. I realise I haven’t wrote much about my own mother since, and especially not since the birth of my daughter. It’s amazing that I was very nearly right. I went into labour on the very day my mum would have turned 50 years old. If labour was kind, I would have given birth to her that night as well. Truth be told, I’m glad she wasn’t. My mum left our lives so quickly, without so much as a goodbye or any deep, meaningful advice for the rest of our lives. In a flash she was gone. And all that was left were a few lipsticks, some Chanel perfume and her memory. But now I also have my little family. I don’t really know what I believe in terms of God or spirituality, although I am still quite sure that Belle was a gift. A way of saying i’m sorry I left you. Because being a mother myself now, I can’t imagine putting my daughter through the same grief and pain I went through. Although she can’t yet understand me, I tell her about my mum and I tell her that I will be here for her as long as I can, I’ll watch her grow up and get married and eventually have children of her own. I wrote above about how through becoming a mother, I would understand my own. In some ways I do, I understand how much she loved us. How it must have broken her heart to leave us, so much so that she stopped fighting and gave up. It’s sad though, because she never really lost us. She should have been my midwife, and she should of held my daughter. Belle should know who she is and call her Grandma. And even though her picture sits central in our living room and I talk about her. Belle will never know her and she will never know Belle.
Nesting 