A Mother's Heart

My reflection on the gift and the grief of being a single mother to special needs children.

PHOTO: Special needs child being embraced by her caregiver at a doctor's office.

If you are new here, let me briefly share a bit about me and my story. I am a single mother to children with varying disabilities. I have been on my own with them for 8 years and use this Substack as a place to talk about issues I have encountered on this journey, while also inviting others to share so that we can all support one another. I write because I don’t have time or money for a therapist. True story! I pray, and I write, and my Father meets in this sacred place each time. So though what I write may not be everyone’s cup of tea, it’s always His, so I keep going. With that being said…

Dream a little dream

As a little girl, all I could dream of was having a loving husband and being the mother to his beautiful children. Even though I spent those young years watching my parents fight and the abuse I witnessed between them is heartbreaking to recall, I still wanted the dream in my head. I also wanted to be a mother more than anything. Probably more than I wanted to be a wife, if I am being honest. I just wanted to love, care for, and teach my children the way I wanted to be, I guess. And who better to do this than their loving mother?

Gifts in small packages

The first time I became a mother was out of wedlock to the man who later became my husband for a time. I was already in a downward spiral in my life at this point, so discovering I was pregnant made me shift my attention from myself to this unborn child. I was eating better, taking my vitamins every day, and even exercising! Sadly, the ground dropped from under me when I miscarried early on. I could not breathe. I could not think. All I could do was cry and wring my body like a sponge, trying to grasp how one minute a human life was growing inside me and the next it was gone.

To my surprise, I conceived again a few weeks after this little one passed. My miracle boy would come earthside healthy and happy nine months later. I later married and gave birth to four more children, and lost four more children to Heaven. Every one of them was a gift, even though I could only keep some of them for a short while.

Hopes and dreams

Motherhood, like anything challenging, is meant to change you. You learn some very important skills in those early years that will equip you for the years ahead. For example, sleep deprivation in the newborn /infant phase can prepare you to learn to survive on little sleep when your kid is up puking in the middle of the night, and you still have to go to work early the next day. When you are overprotective of your new baby and very selective about who touches them, you can be the momma bear who stands up and advocates for your child when they start attending grade school. One thing I didn’t learn until they were bigger and frankly, I am struggling with this one now: how to let go of the hopes and dreams I had for my special needs children and how to embrace the unknown for them instead.

This topic is one that only parents or caregivers of children with special needs can really understand. Everything I thought my kids would get to do, so far, has changed dramatically from what has actually happened for them. Opportunities in education and beyond are going from open doors to little cracks. One of my kids talks about wanting to have children one day, but I don’t know how to tell her that she can’t. That, due to her mental health and developmental disability, she could not care for a child safely. Or my son, who has a moderate to severe disability and genetic markers that could be fatal to a child if he ever had them, just breaks me. As a single mother, I am already limited on what I can do for them monetarily and even relationally. The school opportunities and community support just are not what I would choose for them. It hurts that due to things I cannot control, they are limited even more. Yes, they can have a good future. I just have to be willing to let go of the version in my head to truly embrace it with them.

Surrender all

I have faith that God will continue to raise them up just as He has been doing all these years. And He has been raising ME up too, reminding me to lean on Him for strength. He has placed us in the path of opportunities we would have never found on our own. While I don’t know what the future will be like for them, I believe God is already in it. His best for them is already waiting for them. I count it an absolute honor to be their mother because of the person I have become in doing so. This Substack would not even exist if it were not for them. They are not the answer to my prayers; they are so much more than I could have ever thought to ask for.

“Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”

Ephesians 3:20-21

For Mother’s Day, a funny of the day!

“Motherhood is like a fairy tale, but in reverse. You start out in a beautiful ball gown and end up in stained rags cleaning up after little people.”

Thank you for reading along! Come back again!