Surely its not when the doctor places that wriggling breathing crying baby on our chest. Not every mother is so lucky to reach that moment. Not every mother is guaranteed a living baby. Surely, we aren’t telling those mothers that they aren’t mothers because their babies died. Surely we wouldn't dream of invalidating those almost 10 months they carried their beautiful babies. The months they spent planning and prepping and praying for a baby they would never get to bring home. We would never say “well you didn’t really give birth.” “well you weren’t really pregnant.” We know that they were. That they carried, and loved, and mothered their precious babies for their entire lives. Lives that were far too short.
But when, then, does a mother become a mother?
Is it when baby reaches 24 weeks gestation and is finally deemed “viable”? Valuable enough to be protected against being removed, forcibly, from the womb that has protected them for their whole life.
Is that when a woman becomes a mother? When the living baby inside of her is finally deemed valuable enough to be protected separately from her.
I don’t believe that either.
I have watched friends mourn their babies at 23 weeks. 20 weeks. 16 weeks. 12 weeks. 7 weeks. 5 weeks.
Are they not mothers, also?
I believe with everything in me that they are. That a living child does not make a mother. That we would never say to a woman who has lost her 2 year old that she is no longer a mother. So why would we say it to a woman who has miscarried her precious baby? It that child not equally desired? Equally loved? Equally alive?
Is it when a woman finds out that she’s pregnant that she becomes a mother? Maybe in her heart, but I don’t believe that either. You see, most women don't know that they’re pregnant for four to six weeks, but still, they’re carrying life inside of them. Life that I believe is equally valuable.
Did you know that while a woman is pregnant, her babies DNA mixes with hers, and to some extent it always will be? That as women our bodies carry the DNA of every baby who we’ve ever carried, even if we never got to hold them in our arms.
So is carrying a baby what makes us a mother?
I don’t think so.
What about adoptive mothers? Mothers who hold babies in their arms who never carried them in their stomachs.
What about foster mothers? Who take on the sacred responsibility of loving babies they have no legal rights to. Of carrying them while their mothers can’t, knowing innately the heartache they are risking by doing so.
Do they stop being mothers because the child they were mothering reunified?
I don’t believe that either.
So when then?
I see mothers every day who’s arms are empty. Who hesitate when people ask if they have any children because the answer feels less than straightforward.
I think motherhood is more a posture of the heart than an actual, physical position. Its the intention of mothering. Its the love that a woman is willing to pour out to a child who needs her more than anything.
So here’s to moms, whatever your motherhood journey looks like.