What We Owe Our Mothers

I watched the first part of Father of the Bride again last night. I had to laugh at his realization that his daughter was the age his wife had been when they married. He couldn’t imagine she had been so young. I’ve had that thought often, as next month, my daughter will be the age I was when I got married.

I kept thinking how hard that had to be for my mom, as it was much the same situation: I met someone from a distance and brought him home to say we were getting married. I was still 20 at the time and so sure of myself. Well, mostly. My daughter is older than that now and heading that direction *sigh* and I just can’t see how she can be old enough to be thinking of marriage.

We’re not as old at that age as we think we are. How do our moms deal with watching us walk into a whole new world while knowing we really have no idea what we’re getting into? How do we let our little girls, who we’ve protected and defended and veered into the right direction and taught to be ladies who should stand on their own and be proud of themselves walk down the aisle and tie themselves to some man who thinks he loves her more than anyone else in the world?

Of course that’s not true. No one can love a child the way a mom does. And yet, as my mom always said: we raise them, put up with all of the hassle and hard times, the spit up and throw up, the NOs and I DON’T WANT TOs, the head-locking when all we’re really trying to do is to make things better for them, finally get them to adulthood and see all the beautiful results of all those frustrating hair-tearing-out years … and they leave us for some guy.

Wait. How is that fair?

But, I did it to my mom and it’s time for payback.

So what do we owe our moms for having to go through this whole routine, especially the horrible letting go part?

Everything.

Of course we can’t give them everything, but we can try to give them what they always wanted most for us: to live in a way we make things better for ourselves, not harder; to make good choices as she kept drumming into our head; to not let ‘that boy’ or anyone else turn us away from who we are and what we want from life, and to always remember that what we do affects our moms, forever. Yes, we owe them that. And if we keep that in mind and do our best to keep making Mom proud, we will better our own lives, as well.

That’s all Mom ever really wanted.