If You Only Knew…How much a Heavenly Mother meant to the Motherless

Today’s guest post is from Keira Shae (Scholz). Keira lives in the Rocky Mountains and holds the undisputed title for the Nation’s #1 Worst Baker. Her favorite animal is a human, and that’s why she is in psychology and is married with three sons. Her memoir How The Light Gets In was published in 2018 by BCC Press; you can read our review here and purchase the book here.

I lost my mother long before I became one.

My mother isn’t dead, but she is dead to me. She succumbed to drug addiction when I was still a child, showing up in my life without a pattern, like a butterfly.

Or a volcanic eruption.

It is because she is still alive that I take her loss in small daily doses, like a bitter medicine. She is not always a missing chasm in the landscape I navigate; sometimes her absence is a ghost that sends a brief but forgettable chill during a vulnerable moment.

Still, my unending question is: how do you mother without a mother?

I have faint memories of a time when her body and voice were warm and soft. When life was full and she was kind. I was the oldest, so my younger siblings never knew even that memory. Those are hardly memories enough to make an entire career of motherhood out of. I find myself knowing what not to do, and not the faintest idea of what to do. You can find that question as a line just off center in between my two eyebrows.

I mourn in multiple dimensions at once: First, I am in the present. My three children scream and cry and whine and beg for simple things that I often didn’t receive: a warm meal, a kind word, protection while in danger, comfort from fears, assurance of love, adoration and gentleness. Giving these things doesn’t always come readily–sometimes the well is dry. I curse my mother for the well being dry. I’m angry because I can’t call her and trust her with my children so I may sleep. That lack of trust extends to others–I hold my treasured children close in fear, knowing how cruel and twisted people can be. That means assistance is limited by choice, and I carry much more alone than I probably need to. You can find those experiences in my bent, but unbroken, neck.

Second, I am triggered by small happenings. They aren’t always horrible, like losing a child in a store. Sometimes they are simple things; my child choosing a Halloween costume and not being ridiculed, for example. I try to be present for my children, yet I am instantly transported (without my consent) to another lifetime. The lifetime where I was worthless, hideous, fruitless. I remember feeling insignificant and labeled as having ill intent. I spend all my energy validating and sorting through memories, while extending love and attention to my children. You can find that in my eyes, which flicker between full of mindfulness and completely vacant.

Third, I am living motherhood with new perspective on my suffering mother. As the victim, I fully embraced my resentment and hatred toward my abusers, the main perpetrator being my mother. Then, I became a mother and stopped seeing her as a monster and started seeing her as a hurting human being. They look very similar. I softened in my sentencing of all guilty parties. It has now become one giant circle of hurting humans in that dimension. There is no way of discerning up or down. We are all wailing. I carry that within my heavy soul as I also carry my sons through life. You can find that sorrow in the bags under my eyes.

I collapse into bed, my day consisting of having time-travelled through hundreds of years and weaving multiple dimensions, hoping to create harmony within my family and within myself. You can find evidence of my weaving in my undone dishes and my lack of skill in real-life homemaking. I am a knitter of souls–a realm no one sees, when the work is done right.

How do you mother without a mother? It is quite a simple answer, really, when you’ve missed it all your life: do everything that you wish someone had done for you. Stroke another’s hair like you wish someone had lovingly touched you. Your voice says those long-awaited words, “It’s okay to feel just like that. I would feel that way, too, if I were you. I love what you are. You are precious to me.” You make sure there are enough vegetables and you don’t buy the refined sugar. You give yourself and your children a bedtime. You make sure that every time you are parted from loved ones you insist they hear that you love them one more time. You listen intently to their words and tell them how proud you are of their efforts, however small.

I give my children all I wished for and more.

Then I climb into bed. Not always, but very often, I stare into the darkness and my heart matches the empty night. There is a hole where the Mother fits. I don’t imagine my earthly mother anymore, but a Heavenly Parent. This unique to Mormonism knowledge has been my balm of Gilead.

I don’t have a face for her. I try to imagine she smells like fresh bread. I imagine her body is soft. I imagine how she might whisper some nickname for me that I had simply forgotten… That special name that makes sense and makes me feel known and cherished beyond measure. Like a secret password between us.

There is only so much I can do on my own. I can put broccoli on my plate. I can set an alarm. I can say the words that keep me from insanity. I can reach out to mother-like friends who swoop in to help.

But, like Cosette, I have a castle on the cloud. I go there in my twilight. It is a place where no one’s lost, where crying is not allowed. There is a Heavenly Lady in white who holds me and sings to me. She’s nice to see, and soft to touch. She says, “Keira. I love you very much.”

Until one day I rest, I self-soothe.

The post If You Only Knew…How much a Heavenly Mother meant to the Motherless appeared first on Segullah.