Motherhood

My brother sent me an email yesterday. He's speaking about mothers and motherhood in church for Mother's Day, and wants to know the good side of being a mother.

I haven't answered him, yet.

It's not that I don't know what the good things about being a mother are, it's just that I struggle to express them properly.

This is what he wants: Can you each email me with a description of the benefits of
motherhood? What are the good things you, personally, have enjoyed
from being a mom?

His goal is to get his mom, grandma and sister (me) to weigh in on this, so he has a multi-generational picture to share with the congregation.

I feel a responsibility to show motherhood in it's proper light, but he only wants the good stuff (kidding, lol). How do I properly portray how I've always wanted to be a mommy, but how I didn't want to have as many kids as my mom because she never seemed to have time for us all? And then, how it ended up not mattering anyway because God has his own ideas about things like that. :)

What about how it feels to feel the first flutterings of life inside you? Or the bond that forms when you hold your child close, whether you can nurse them or not? Or the amazing feeling of giving birth (or at least the aftermath), when they put that squalling, wriggly baby on your belly and you've never seen anything so beautiful in your entire life (even though it's a gooey mess lol)? Or the heart-stopping moments after they take the baby out and before you hear his or her first sounds?

How about the ways you find to relate to each child individually, because they are each so unique? And yet, you still subject them to the same house rules and guidelines, because everyone has to learn to get along in this world.

Sigh. I'd better get started. Mother's Day is only 2 Sundays away.