Strawberry Flavored Toothpaste and Gut Instincts

Hello Moms and Mom-Types out there! As I gear up for my preschoolers Preschool Graduation, I can’t help but think about this role of being a mother. See, some of you may think that I am a first time mother but truth is, I was a mother before I was a mother. A wonderful wedding gift I was given was the privilege of being a full time step mother of school aged children. The ages ranged from preschool to preteen. I also was a foster mother of two late teen-aged girls. So when I speak from the perspective of a mother, I believe I’m validated to speak.

I have a dear Sister-Friend who will step into the role of mother tomorrow. She is adopting her cousin’s son. She is a little nervous. She’s been doing what most of first time mommies do and read up on different aspects of parenting. I commend her for this. She is even researching how to help him have good oral hygiene. I mean, after all, you must be sure that your child has good dental hygiene so it is imperative to make dental care “fun”. (She’s my good sister-friend so I can make fun of her this way.) When I read this post on her social media page, I blurted out a laugh. Why is that funny? Because this is what we do when we don’t “know” from experience what to do: We research the expert advice and opinion and proceed from there. See, when I was beginning to teach my son to brush his teeth, I bought the cartoon strawberry flavored toothpaste because it was “cute”. And now that he is older, he uses what I use and I tell him to “brush”. She, on the other hand, was thinking more analytically about the act. She wanted to ensure that he was motivated to take on a good habit.

I laugh even now because this is what we do when we don’t “know” from experience what to do. We search outside of ourselves to find out what to do. My Sister-Friend is nervous because she doesn’t want to get it wrong. She has been given the task, duty, responsibility to care and nurture, rear and raise up, a man-child she is adopting. A very daunting task. She wants to make sure that she makes up for whatever societal pressures he may face as a result of a myriad of things. But as a many times over YOUNG mother who has the present role of rearing up a child with just one parent in the home, I have to remind her to breathe and pause. I must tell her that the Spirit of God within her will guide her in the parenting of this child. The expert advice is crucial for matters she does not “know” from experience how to deal with but I know that she already “knows” how to care and how to love and how to protect and how to provide and how to be the priestess over this child. This woman is the TRUTH.

I think of me stepping into the role of mother at a young age. I did read but I most certainly trusted my gut knowledge of being a lover and a nurturer to care for my step-children. Mothering is about expertise but it is so much more about instinct. You see your child is dirty, instinctively you’ll bathe them. If they itch as a result of that bath, you will replay in your mind what soap you used and not use that soap again. For my sister-friend and other women who are first time mothers of your own child or through the spirit of adoption, be encouraged to know that you have everything you need already to be the BEST mother that child needs at this present moment.

Blessings to you, Aurellia