My Second Chance at Having a Mother

I'm so excited to share some happenings in my personal life...so personal that I had quite forgotten to mention it to my husband until this weekend. God blessed me and my brother with a wonderful mother. We had an incredible childhood...we were loved, taken care of, and provided for. And I had a great relationship with my mother. It wasn't perfect, we had disagreements, but we had an open and close relationship. Then when I was in college, my mother's alcoholism resurfaced again. It was something she had kept hidden, substituting prescription medication, for many years. The woman she was the last few years of her life was not really the mother I knew. Our relationship grew strained...to the point of me believing I did not love her anymore. She passed away almost 5 years ago. The year after she passed away was a huge time of growth in my faith. Even though she is gone, I've reconciled with her and the pain and hurt I experienced due to her actions. Her death taught me about GRACE.

But...I was 23 when I lost my mommy. She wasn't there for my wedding day or just a few months ago when my own daughter, Charlotte Grace, was born. If you've ever lost a parent, you know this feeling. Time passes but you go through some situations or celebrations, and you miss that parent. I completely expected that this past Mother's Day. I expected to be sad or reflective about my mother. And while I was in a way, God completely showered me with a desire (and an answer to a desire) that I had not expected.

When things go wrong, as they often do in this world, I love to hold onto these two words, "but God". I lost my mother, BUT GOD is an incredible provider and so graciously gave me another one!

In December of 2005, my dad remarried. I've always loved and appreciated my "stepmother", Lisa. (And I've never liked using the word stepmother as I don't view her that way.) I know that many, if not most, people experience challenges to some degree when a parent remarries. I can't say that for me there were any challenges...my relationship with Lisa has always been a good one. For one, she loves my father and they encourage and challenge eachother's faith. I also believe she's helped our family grow closer together...instead of feeling like my dad was "taken away" from me after he remarried, I've actually grown closer to him since then. But I never had a desire to call her "Mom". It never really crossed my mind except when I would hear my brother say it...and I would think, "Huh, he called her 'Mom'." It was like a casual fact that I noted but did nothing about.

So I was quite surprised this past Mother's Day that instead of feeling loss for my mother, I was overwhelmed by a desire to have a deeper mother-daughter relationship with Lisa AND to begin calling her "Mom". I don't feel that Lisa is replacing my mother but instead that she is my "second mother". If I believe that God loves me and ultimately knows what is best for me (and I do), then I have to believe He will provide for me everything I need. Not everything I think I need...just everything I actually need. (Thanks to my friend, Anna, for sharing this with me last fall.) Over the past 5 years, I've had times where I just broke down crying because I wanted to have my mother back. I thought I needed my mother. What I needed to do was trust that God was giving me everything I needed. And that He had already provided in my life a woman who wanted to be a mother to me. On Mother's Day (cheesy, I know, but that's really when it happened :)), I fully embraced that Lisa is my mom now. And I'm excited about building a relationship with her...so I ask for her grace as I learn to call her "Mom" instead of "Lisa". :) Old habits are hard to break!