As amazing as the little miracles I see every day are, nothing compares to the miracle of motherhood. I am eternally grateful for the positive influence my mother has been in my life, and can only hope I will become half the quality mother my …
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Saturday, may 12, 2012
UPON writing this article, not anyone will agree with me that motherhood is indeed a mysterious sacrifice. If only they see how we see it, they will understand that motherhood for me is a mystery to be fathomed and accepted by the society at large. If it is to be accepted, then it must be brought forth as a main concern and given the most attention. here is my point of view.
I am not a mother but I sympathize with the mothers of today and feel for them as I too have my own mother who has given all her life to bring forth my glory in this world we are now in.
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Even if it becomes quite a nuisance to hear all over again, my mother tells me all over again that she gave up a bucket full of blood just to push me out of her womb and bring me life in a larger domain.
Compared to living in her womb, this Earth realm seems to be larger and much more complicated than things are inside my mother’s being.
Of course, it is not until now that I am slowly embracing the glory and successes of my life that I learn to appreciate how much my mother has given up for herself: her life, her youth, her love, her time, her strength, her own happiness and her own self just to give me the better life.
Think about it, we will not be here today alive and strong if it were not for the trade-offs in life that our mothers have done.
My mother is a strong woman, because it takes a strong woman to give birth to a child of Mindanao. I was a sickly kid then but my mother nursed me to health every time I fell to illness. In our little Nipa Hut — our house back then, she used to bring me something to eat and with her meager income, she buys me guava and burger just to bring me back to my good old senses. not to mention the expensive hospital check-up and costs of medicines they have to purchase for my asthma. Imagine that happening to millions of Filipino families. Mothers of poor Filipino families who had concern and love for their children would do a whole lot more of things just to fill their children’s stomachs and alleviate their pains.
A better story is this: that no one teaches a woman how to become a mother. we can leave it to God to blame for bestowing in women the ability to care for their children. but the love, yes, the unconditional love that a mother can give to her child, is ineffable and entirely encompassing. It does not come from an external source but the entirety of womanhood itself which, too, is from God’s femininity and compassion. It is inside us. God cannot give something God does not have.
One such incident I recall is when my mother had to work abroad, doing the humble job of a caregiver taking care of older Americans. but it was her good paying job that she was able to pay for my tuition and bring my father, me and my brother something to eat, which brings us to the issue of Filipinos working abroad and the social costs it entails to our Filipino Society.
Sometimes, I cannot help but weep in my heart for all mothers here in the Philippines and outside of our country because of the efforts they do to raise their loved ones.
I recall the instance in the Bible when Mary had to endure all the criticisms of her timid minded neighbors, accusing her of being unfaithful and as a lowly kind of woman, and when they were in a journey to Bethlehem and to Egypt just to keep Jesus the Christ safe away from his persecutors.
Even the Indian Sage and Philosopher Gautama Siddhartha Buddha convey to us by pointing out the close relationship between a mother and her offspring.
According to the Buddha, the Mother is given as the best of friends, best of relatives, best of elders. without the mother’s protective love and care, the child can become susceptible to many dangers. he says in one of his sutras that “a mother protects her own only child even at the expense of her life.”
One familiar story in the Buddha’s life was when one approached the Buddha and asked, “Who is the best friend one has at home?” And quite unresistingly, the Buddha replied, “Mother is the best friend one has at home.”
Without strong mothers and without their love, care and affection, we cannot be a great and powerful nation. The Spartans used to take pride of their strong Spartan Women for giving birth to healthy children who will bring them joy and prosperity.
Without healthy and empowered women and mothers, we can never stand-up on our feet and make the whole world bow down and respect us. only when we empower our women and our mothers with the adequate needs in healthcare and in their professional and personal careers that we can make this nation great again. then we will see a Filipino race worthy of respect and worthy of admiration. (Gilbert Emano)
Published in the Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro newspaper on may 13, 2012.
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Today on Mother's Day we celebrate motherhood and what that embodies, starting with Mary. Even though not everyone had an ideal mother or father, on Mother's Day we look at celebrating the traits of Godly motherhood. In Luke 1 it tells of …
The Jesus Christ Show
For more information on Motherhood the Musical, simply click on this link. to enter the Motherhood the Musical ticket giveaway, simply click on this link.
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MADISON – just in time for the Mother's Day weekend, The Madison Area YMCA will host its next free seminar in a Women's Health Series, “Motherhood with less Aches and Pains,” from 10:30 to 11:30 am Friday, May 11, at the YMCA Family Center at 111 Kings …
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Wherein, in motherhood, lies “the conflict”?
On and off this week, amid the usual flow of posts on the intersection of family and culture, policy and news, the Motherlode blog is going to focus on exactly that: our own “conflicts,” as mothers, and the book of the same name: “The Conflict” by the French philosopher and feminist Elisabeth Badinter.
I’ve asked women at different stages of their family and career lives to respond to “The Conflict” by describing how reading it has affected their views or plans for work and motherhood — women approaching motherhood, women for whom work is not a choice, women who’ve chosen to stay home, women who are returning to work and women watching the stability of their marriages falter. I proposed we start from here: no judgment. There’s value in staying home, and there’s value in working outside the home, but how do we, as individual women, decide for ourselves, and how does society push us in different directions?
Between the book’s covers, “The Conflict” pits what Ms. Badinter sees as the insidious forces of natural mothering — the breast-feeding, the cloth diapering, the constant attentive enrichment of the child — against feminist good sense, which leaves room for mothers to work outside the home and allows fathers in as full and equal partners in the tasks of parenthood.
But after just over 10 years of motherhood, I find that to be a simplistic interpretation of a “conflict” I’ve come to realize I shouldn’t even expect to resolve: the one between myself as a mother, and my previous incarnations; and between my expectations of myself as an adult and as a mother, and the reality that I’ve cobbled together, which falls far short of my own ideals.
We don’t, as a society, make it easy for parents of either sex to balance the financial demands of raising children with the physical and emotional demands of being there for them as they grow up. for women on one side of the income divide, the societal pressure is to get to work as soon as possible, and the only way to “balance” a job and parenting in many fields is to quit when family needs become too intense and find a new job when the pressures have eased.
The “conflict” we’re talking about here comes mostly on the other side, in families where one partner’s job (or some other income) is enough to provide the basics of food and shelter, and so what comes next is a matter of priorities. This is where choice comes in, and we can be pretty defensive of our choices — which means that mothers at different stages of work and parenting life appear to judge one another, and harshly.
We may inflict those judgments on one another, but we’re really judging ourselves. every accusation is a self-defense, and every defense a self-justification — because no matter how we make our choices (or have life circumstances choose on our behalf) there is no perfect way to balance all of what we want when we want it. that is the biggest “conflict” of them all. to hang every choice of home over work on the pressure to mother in a certain way seems to me to be missing the pressures that would remain even in the absence of the “natural” parenting movement.
Return formula to prominence, subsidize and perfect child care, make the disposable diaper eco-friendly and even create one that changes itself, and we will still struggle with how often it’s appropriate to take Friday afternoon off to watch a soccer game. Not because we believe soccer will get our children into top colleges, or because all the other parents will be there, or because we have an inflated idea of how important our presence is to our child, but because we (even we feminists) like to be around our kids (and feel guilty when we’re not).
The desire to be as present as possible in a child’s daily life is “natural” for parents of both sexes. It’s how we interpret and act on that desire, not the desire itself, that creates the “conflict,” along with the circumstances of life — illness, kindergarten, divorce, autism, middle school — that change the pressures. those issues often still affect women disproportionately, but there’s a whole lot more than breast-feeding at the root of that, and the real solutions are best found in societal and corporate structures that make it easier for men and women both to have more flexibility within work, and more off- and on-ramps in their careers. As for the impact of the minutiae of “natural” parenting? There’s a whole lot of a family’s life to be lived after the last diaper — cloth or not— has been changed.
Is your “conflict” as much internal as external? or is Ms. Badinter right that, as Molly Guiness put it in the Wall Street Journal this weekend, “modern mothers have a serious problem on their hands, and it’s other mothers?” Speaking from a moment when my own personal and work lives have struck a good — if probably temporary — balance, and yet I still find myself working at midnight on Sunday night, and I’m often still conflicted, but I admit that my biggest problem is usually myself. you?
By Howard A. Ludwig April 19, 2012 12:12PM “Motherhood the Musical” is running at the Royal George Theatre, 1641 N. Halsted, Chicago, through June17. | Supplied Photo I have very little doubt that “Motherhood the Musical” will be a hit.
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WHEN it comes to being a mum it is much more than biology and genetics.
the miracle that is motherhood is sometimes planned, other times a complete surprise.
a woman's desire to have a baby has taken a backward step in recent years with more women choosing to wait until later in their lives to become a mum.
But for first-time mums Anne-Maree Nolan, Tianna Muscat and Samantha Mitchell, the joy of motherhood is the one job where they feel their lives are complete.
all three women are in their early to late 20s and never thought they would be mums to Liam, Kiara and Scarlette so early in their lives.
"it was never in my plan to have a baby in my 20s," Miss Mitchell said.
"Women want to live their life, go overseas and have a career."
But for Miss Mitchell, having Scarlette last year was one of the most amazing things she had done in her life.
"In my situation we had just got to a really comfortable place as us, and to throw another person into the mix was frightening," Miss Mitchell said.
"I thought, we don't know enough about each other to guarantee this was going to work.
"right now is the best time in my life. Scarlette is an amazing little person who I get to hang out with. it is allowing me to be a kid again."
for Miss Muscat the news that she was going to be a mum was a daunting experience.
"I thought, 'I am too young to have a baby, can I do this, am I going to survive this?'," Miss Muscat said.
for mrs Nolan she always wanted to be a mum and couldn't wait.
after Miss Muscat's daughter Kiara was born she said the first three months she was in survivor mode.
"it took a while to register that I had a baby to look after," she said.
"the first three months you are in survivor mode and sleeping whenever you can".
Miss Mitchell said when she became a mum she learnt more patience.
"This is going to sound really cheesy but I think being a mum has made me a better person. it has given me a lot more patience, a lot more respect for people and I see the world a bit differently now, because I have something so amazing to care for."
and mrs Nolan agreed and said it was the best job she ever had.
"I just love watching my son Liam grow plus all the cuddles and smiles," she said.
Miss Muscat said one of the joys of motherhood was when her baby did something new each day.
"you can be excited over the littlest of things, like clicking their tongue," she said.
Change in lifestyle the biggest hurdle
THE biggest hurdle in becoming a mum is the change in lifestyle.
Samantha Mitchell said it was the things you gave up for yourself, such as making your own money.
"My partner makes his own money and goes to work and gets that social interaction."
she said when she and her boyfriend were expecting their first child they sat down and worked out if they could afford it.
"We went through our finances – on paper we were fine but in reality we have to budget," Miss Mitchell said.
"Going on a coffee date or for lunch are things you don't do on a whim anymore because that money can do elsewhere.
"when I say we have to think about what we spend, we are still incredibly comfortable.
"We don't go without.
"I just don't spend money like I used to.
"you lose your independence because you are not making your own money."
Tianna Muscat said one of the biggest changes was losing your career and your body.
"you lose all self esteem, you wake up in the morning and you look in the mirror and you go 'Is that what I look like now? what happened?'."
"you have stretch marks and caesarean marks and flabby bits – but it is all worth it."
Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen’s comment that Ann Romney, the wife of presumptive GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney, “never worked a day in her life” has turned into a discussion about women’s choices, motherhood and the value of staying home to raise the kids.
“Stay-at-home mom” encompasses a lot of women. the U.S. Census Bureau says there were 5 million moms staying home to raise children in 2010; 23 percent of married-couple family groups with children under 15 had a stay-at-home mother, up from 21 percent in 2000. in 2007, before the recession, stay-at-home mothers were found in 24 percent of married-couple family groups with children under 15.
CBS’ “60 Minutes” noted in 2009 that women of real power are at the helm of government and business enterprises. “But look for the women of the next generation — the ones everyone assumed would follow in droves behind them, and you’re likely to find many of them walking right back out and staying at home.”
Being a stay-at-home mom is a choice that includes women who’ve never sought outside employment and those who have left high-powered careers to raise children, experts say.
When ABC News asked women on the street what choices they’d made in terms of working and raising children, it found a variety — and pretty much universal agreement that families need to do what works for them and it may vary with circumstance. “Let’s give people the choice to be able to do that,” said one mom.
The data don’t support the impression that staying at home is just for those who can afford the luxury, says Buzzfeed.com. It crosses economic categories and “increasingly” includes lower-income families, including those with less educational attainment who won’t get high-paying jobs to counter the costs of working, such as child care.
The decision to stay home or work outside is not casual, notes Quad City Moms Blog’s Erin Haluska. She has opted to stay home with her children. “Both decisions are very, very hard.” It’s also hard work, she said.
The Chicago Sun-Times quoted First Lady Michelle Obama on the topic. “every mother works hard, and every woman deserves to be respected,” she said.
In an opinion piece on CNN titled “Why the left fears Ann Romney,” Teri Christoph and Suzanne Haik Terrell, co-chairs of ShePAC, dismissed Rosen’s initial comment that Ann Romney “never really dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of women in the country are facing.”
ShePAC is a group dedicated to support and elect conservative women.
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