Melancholy Baby~For My Friend, Caroline

One of my sweetest friends lost her mother to cancer this past week. I feel a great love and empathy for her as I know how she served her mother very well all of her life, and especially over this past year with that terrible, devastating disease. I know how much she worried and stressed and wanted to change things for the better, and how much she prayed. I don't think anything draws you closer to a person than serving them during their deepest times of need.

And when it is your mother, it changes you. You love her more, you love your kids more, you love life more and take it less for granted. And you grieve in a way that cannot be explained. The price is high to be a member of this club.

I ran across this post I did last year about my own mom and it made me think about what my friend must be feeling now. So I thought I'd republish it here in the hope it might bring her some comfort and at least let her feel she is not alone. Love you, my friend! Wish I could help you! I am thankful you know where the comfort comes from and how to get it. ♥


"I have been thinking about my mother more than usual lately. This month marks the 6th year anniversary of her death. The first thought that I had this morning when I awakened was that when your mother dies, a big piece of you goes with her. Ironically, she also become a bigger part of you at the exact same time. There is that big hole in your heart, a quiet, sacred place where she will always remain. I often think of the ways that she lead and gently guided and was always beside me.

I was struck with the feeling that there really cannot be a closer bond than that of mother and child, it is such a special and unique love. I am not saying it is more important than your love for your spouse, I am just saying the unconditional love for our spouse is something we strive for all of our lives and a lot of conditions are placed on that love. There must be trust, fidelity, etc., etc. I like to think in most cases of motherhood, selflessness is just a part of it from the beginning. For a good mother...the babies wants and needs and comfort always come first.

I think the mother/child relationship is the first place in our lives where we can feel and understand what unconditional love really is. It is the first place we get an inkling of how we are loved by God. I know not everyone has this kind of mother or is this kind of mother, but the potential is really there in the mother/child relationship like no other.

I am blessed to have a mother that knew and understood this. She was my biggest fan, my confidante, my very special friend and always there for me. In so many ways she truly gave her life for me and I miss her. Often times when I am just feeling melancholy...if I search my soul I find I am either thinking of her or one of our own children and missing them.

On Sunday we were reading and discussing the last verse in the Old Testament in Sunday School. Here is one of the places where family relationships are put into to their proper perspective. If the hearts of the fathers and the hearts of the children are not turned to each other the earth will be smitten with a curse. I know this verse has various layers of meaning but perhaps we are already seeing some of this 'smiting' in our world right now. Part of that is that so many mothers are trying to have it all and do it all. I am glad I didn't have a mom that divided herself in so many ways as to dilute her efforts as a mother, her heart was always turned to her family. I realize that I want to be remembered that way too.

Of course fathers are very important too. The relationship is just as vital, but different. There is just something so cellular about carrying and delivering a baby that makes motherhood so sacred and unique. But even more important than that is the service mothers render to children no matter how they receive them. Through that service, that natural love that is born even before the birth, grows by leaps and knows no bounds.

I have long recognized that when my mother was old and infirmed and I cared for her that my love for her grew in the same way. Without that service for the 12 years she lived after her brain surgery, I would have never loved her in the ways I do now. I am grateful to our Father in heaven for his plan, for eternal families and for the potential for joy that can be found in each one.

What did you notice as your first thoughts this morning? For me the morning time is a great time of reflection and thought. As soon as the day gets going I tend to just muddle through putting out fires and working on my to do list. But in the morning comes the most clarity of thought in my day. I guess that makes me a lark...rather than a night owl....and a bit of a melancholy baby when thinking about my beloved mother today.

Passed from this life to a better one
on November 15, 2003