You’re a Mama Too.
“We are all in this together no matter what you are nurturing or birthing!”
This is my second year writing a Mother’s Day piece for the OneMama blog. Last year, we celebrated the Mother Spirit and what that represents to the OneMama community and to the world as a whole. This year, as I grow my third child in my belly, I can’t help but reflect more deeply on this day.
I’m growing a girl. Can you believe it? Another fierce woman will be coming into this world in August. A mother spirit already forming in her – she may or may not birth children of her own one day but I know she will carry the mother spirit on. How do I know this?
Because she’s strong.
She kicks me deeply in the side every time I take a deep breath in. Every time I see her small frame on an ultrasound the technicians laugh under their breath at the swift summer-salts she takes, making it nearly impossible to take the measurements they need. Already, in the comfort of my womb, she doesn’t stand still just because she’s told to. Already, in the comfort of my womb, she has a place in this world, a place that was written just for her, a story I don’t even know yet.
As I rub my growing belly, I reflect over the last year – a powerful year for The Woman, and I think that, though we have a long way to go, we have started etching out a new path, a path my girl will take. The Mother Spirit is growing on this Mother Earth and taking on the roll of caregiver to the next generation. I feel the mother spirit building within me and all around me. We’ve seen evidence of this time and time again over the past year.
As I shared these thoughts with Siobhan, she said she relates to being a mother in a different capacity. “As a mother of OneMama, I relate to these similar transitions, internally and externally, and what it means to be a voice for women, empower women, and let the women spirit grow in and around us.”
The Mother Spirit takes strength…
It takes strength to nurture. It takes strength to love even when it’s hard. It takes strength to go through tremendous loss and still carry on, even if you are never the same. It takes strength to do it alone. It takes strength to wait. It takes strength to wish for something. It takes strength to grow when everything else says, “Shrink.” It takes strength to speak up when everything else says, “Be silent.”
“I feel like I have this baby kicking and growing inside of me, always worried that I will be able to keep it alive and growing. This is a tremendous responsibility.” She continues, “I ask myself daily, will it be taken from me and the world? Will the OneMama Clinic and this international baby keep growing through me? I’ve been reflective on what it really means to be a mama, a woman of purpose, to stand up and be a voice, to be a voice of integrity and a voice for change.” – Siobhan Neilland
This Mother’s Day, and every day, we celebrate all types of Mothers because whatever specific role of mother we have, the world needs it. The world needs the clinics and the kindness, and the world needs the strength of the Mother Spirit.
I’ll end with something Siobhan said in our conversation that resonated deeply, “We are all in this together whatever you are nurturing or birthing – Be the strong disciplinary voice of what is right and what is wrong, Let this weave through all us.”
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