On the second Sunday of the month of May, we pay tribute to the special women in our lives who have raised us, nurtured us, cared for us and who have made us who we are.

George Washington, the first president of the United States, loved his mother. “My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute all my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her,” he is quoted as saying. Our mothers played and continue to play a pivotal role in making us who we are every single day – the games they played with us, the hard lessons they taught us, the hidings, the soft caresses, the stern words spoken at forgotten homework or lost lunchboxes and the valuable advice given at times of need will never be forgotten.

Mother’s special day

On the second Sunday of May each year, we honour and celebrate our mothers and the incredible amount they have done for us and continue to do for us every day. Caring children and fathers, boyfriends and husbands often treat the various mothers in their lives to a luxurious breakfast in bed, a luncheon, or even a night out on the town. On Mothers Day this year, the DA treated 50 elderly Khayelitsha mothers and grandmothers to coffee and hot soup at the Masikhule pre-school in Harare. While speaking about the event, DA member in ward Yoliswa Vuthuse said: “This may look like a small thing, but our mothers are smiling.” There are many, many different ways in which smiles are brought to the faces of mothers across the world on this special day; even though all the flowers, greeting cards, gifts and kisses could never express the heartfelt gratitude we experience for our mothers every day.

Having a mother

If there is only one thing in the world that we all have in common, it is that we have, at some point in our lives, had a mother. People’s relationships with their mothers are spread across a wide spectrum and they are filled with many conflicting emotions: love, anger, care, bitterness, tenderness, apathy… I don’t think there is another person in the world that can bring up so many paradoxical feelings than one’s mother. “My mom is basically what I live for,” says Charity Msweli, a Rhodes student who wants more than anything for her mother to be happy. “She has been selfless, tried to do the best for me and my sisters,” she says. “I could not imagine a life without her”.

As women, we learn so much from our mothers concerning who we are – they are, after all, our first point of reference for what we should become. “I am indebted to (my mother) because she struggled to make ends meet as a single mother,” says Caroline King, a Grahamstown resident who was raised along with her sister. “Living in a house with only women made us all very independent and capable women who know how to fix lights and look after ourselves without needing men,” she says.

Being a mother

Although we spend such a large part of our lives around our mothers, there is no possible way for us to know what being a mother means from an outsider’s perspective. One thing we can all agree on, however, is the massive amount of work and commitment it takes to raise a child. A lifelong promise made to another person – a promise to change dirty nappies, a promise to stay awake until the early hours of the morning waiting for rebellious teenagers to come slipping in the back door, a promise to support another person with everything you have – is not an easy one to maintain.

Many mothers who are feeling the pressure of raising children in this ever-increasingly fast-paced time are turning to a ‘doula’ – Greek for ‘servant’ – to help them become better moms. Doulas, who are said to ‘mother mothers’, offer practical advice to anxious new parents, helping them find a rhythm and overcome various problems.

In an article about the meaning motherhood brings to life, Laura Fortgang discusses the ways in which the relationship between mother and child centres on a mother’s growth as much as that of her offspring. “Being a parent is a very hard job no matter how you slice it, but to further the true blessing that children are,” she says, “is to work equally hard on being conscious and mindful of the growth our kids call forth in us”.

"The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men - from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms." – Oliver Wendell Holmes

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