What do you do if the week before Mother’s Day, you get a phone call from your adopted son’s birth mom, announcing she is seven months pregnant and wants you to adopt the child? I recently had my 50th birthday! My son is 6. A six-year age difference between siblings is significant. Despite these numbers, this baby will be his blood relative. His older brother was adopted by another family, but he will be able to grow up with this sibling. We want that for him.
Motherhood is the greatest thing and the hardest thing
-RICKI LAKE
After focusing on my son for the last six years, I was beginning to look toward the future. It felt like time to combine his needs and mine. I am setting up a nature school to offer a supplemental science course for homeschoolers in the area. My plan is to start introductory classes next month. It is not a small undertaking, and the plan gets exponentially bigger later in the year with a two-week-long outdoor nature curriculum for my son’s school. It is one of my passions, but the timing is not great for a new baby.
I have done a lot of introspection since that phone call. Motherhood IS a battle. I do not mean with your kids, but there are those days too. I mean it is a battle for your children. You are their warrior. You either give up, or you make it work. Moms do not give up when it comes to their kids. We should also fight for ourselves because that is a fight for our kids’ best interests. Stepping out of your comfort zone and letting your curiosity guide you does not mean completely throwing caution to the wind. We can all take a chance AND mitigate the level of risk involved. If we want to achieve our goals, feel personally fulfilled, and be the best mothers we can be, there will never be a perfect time. There will be bumps in the road, plans will suddenly change, and we can always find excuses not to. What sets us apart is the push to keep moving forward. It is not an easy road to travel. It IS, however, worth it.
Sometimes the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws
-BARBARA KINGSOLVER