I'm going to start by saying that I HAVE NOT read the Time Magazine article that has been discussed in every media outlet for the past week.
Of course I have seen the cover, and while I'm not excited about it, to each is own.
As I commented to one of my friends,
"I wasn't big on breastfeeding before, so I'm not a good judge of this cover".
That said, feel free to tell me your thoughts on the cover and article if you read it.
"Are you Mom enough?" - Time Magazine
Excuse me?
You are challenging me to explain to you if I'm "Mom" enough?
Well since you asked, I will gladly answer.
I was mom enough the day that stick had 2 pink lines, and I said "Oh Shit!" in my bathroom. I was 27, and more than ready, but in that instant I knew my life would change forever. After I got over the initial shock, yes, I was ready for anything.
I am mom enough as I have suffered through 2 pregnancies with all day sickness. Two pregnancies where I didn't glow, I was green. One pregnancy, where I was too sick to care for my two and a half year old. So yeah, I'm mom enough.
I am mom enough because I cried day in and day out because my boobs would not work. They were a betrayal of my own body. What good are boobs if they can't do their job in their most simplest and natural form?
I am mom enough because I understood that Formula was not an "F" word, and went against the grain and outright refused to try breastfeeding a second time... Because this time I was in control of my destiny, and no Doula, Lactation Specialist, or certainly Time Magazine is going to change my mind.
I am mom enough because I have forgone, sleep, showers, hot meals, my sanity. I have given all I have in my heart, mind, body, and soul. I give my all to both my kids and my husband. To the point that I forget the woman I am, and only wholly identify with being a mom. Ask Time Magazine how that would work for him.
I am mom enough to be outright enraged my the insinuation that because I didn't breastfeed or carry my baby around on my body, that I am not "mom" enough. What would you say to a "mother" who is in the depths of fertility treatments? What would you say to her? That she is not mom enough? That the drugs and procedures she has put her body through, make her less of a mother because she can only mother that child in her dreams?
Would you challenge a mother with a baby in Heaven? Would you challenge a mom who only got her child for a few precious moments that she is "mom" enough? That mother, with her child in heaven can say she is "mom" enough, because she is... More mom than I will ever be or ever know.
Would you challenge a military mom that she is mom enough? Her life spent serving her country, only to come back and be challenge at her ability to "mom". Are you joking me? Would you rather her take her child with her strapped on her back, through the desert, just so she can live up to your expectation?
Would you dare challenge a man, that he is Father enough?
So yes, WE ARE MOM ENOUGH.
The working moms, splitting their sanity between work and motherhood, forgetting themselves in the fray, they are mom enough.
The SAHMs, who are told they "don't work", where happy children, food on the table, and sometimes clean floors, will never live up to expectation because it doesn't pay the bills, they are mom enough.
The moms with special needs children, who can't breastfeed, co-sleep, or carry their child on their bodies, yes they are mom enough.
The moms with babies in heaven, who live their days thinking only of that child, wanting to co-sleep, and hold, that child, to breastfeed that child, yes they are mom enough.
The moms who sacrifice all they have. All they are worth. All they they would ever dream to be, for just one moment of motherhood, yes they are mom enough.
So please, don't challenge me again. Don't ask a question you cannot answer yourself. Because if you have to ask if I'm mom enough, it's obvious you have no idea!
