Ode to Mothering Part 2

So what was it that hard-working Paul thought was so significant about the way mothers do things? Paul wrote that he had been “gentle among you, like a mother caring for her little children.” Paul thought that a mother’s gentleness was a thing to emulate.

When I read that, I am not sure whether to laugh or to cry, because I know that I am not nearly as gentle with my children as I want to be. If I was a gentle mother, I would be calm, kind, tender-hearted, mild, easy-going, even-tempered and self-controlled. I don’t think anyone who knows me well would describe me as more than one or two of these things. Yet they are all things that I aspire to be!

I want to be more like my friend M, who has seven children and somehow did not loose her sense of humour when severe pelvic pain confined her to bed for the last few weeks of her latest pregnancy. Her calmness in the midst of a very busy household is a great encouragement, and also a challenge.

I want to be more like my friend S, who maintained her quiet determination in the face of being diagnosed with leukaemia 10 weeks into her fourth pregnancy, and stoically put up with the daily vomiting caused by the only chemotherapy drug that was safe for her to take while she was pregnant. Her ability to be honest about her ongoing pain, without grumbling about it or growing bitter, is remarkable.

I want to be more like my friend C, who has overcome the flaws in her upbringing in a series of foster homes to become a mother of three who loves each one of her startlingly different children equally, cherishing their uniqueness. She has high standards for herself, but unlike me she doesn’t get impatient or annoyed when her pre-schoolers aren’t able to live up to those standards.

Indeed I think gentleness, such as that of a mother caring for her little children, is a quality that all of us, mothers and others, would do well to cultivate.