Growing Up Without a Mother Term Paper

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I did talk to her and it did help. She was very reassuring and said I could call her anytime. With my first child, I called her nearly every day for advice on what to do. I remember once I fed the baby orange juice and all of a sudden she threw it up -- it shot across the room and really scared me. I called my husband's mother and she said I needed to dilute it before I fed it to the baby -- either that, or buy "baby orange juice" for her. It wasn't just the physical aspects of their care that worried me. I wasn't sure how to relate to them. My husband said, "Just relate to them as little human beings," and of course, that is what they are. But it wasn't quite that simple. How much should I hold them? When should I be strict and when should I be lenient? Should a mother be the boss? How democratic should a mother be and when should children make their own decisions? All of this seemed so mysterious!

I do know that I want to be "there" for my children. I like to be at home when they come in from school, for example, so they aren't confronted by an empty house as I was when I was a child.
I try to be open and receptive to questions and to answer them carefully and honestly. I don't want them to be embarrassed to ask me things, like I was to ask my father. I want them to know my values and ideals, too. I take them to church and it seems like it makes up a little bit for my missing out on it when I was a child. The minister in my church told me God is my mother and, therefore, I have always had a mother who loves me infinitely. I love the thought -- it is a comfort to me -- but I also wish my human mother had been present in the flesh as I was growing up. I would like her to have been there when I graduated from high school. I would have liked her to be at my wedding. And I would have liked her to be a grandmother to my children. There is so much I missed, it sounds like I'm complaining and feeling sorry for myself, but actually I'm doing pretty well. I don't think I am too bad as a parent because my kids are happy and they do well in school. I think my mother would have been proud of me......

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