Mother's day

Today is mothers’ day. A tribute to all mothers. However this day seems more about the flower shops, jewelers, candy stores making an extra buck, than it is celebrating mothers. Mothers should be celebrated and appreciated every day. Why just one day? I am not saying this because I used to be a mother or because I never got flowers on mother’s day, but simply because mother’s are the most under appreciated people in the entire world and they actually have the most important job of all. It is proven that a stay-at home-mom with 1 child is the equivalent of a full time job. But what if she has 2 children or more and has a full time job? Around this time of year, the mom does get more air time on tv, just to remind us all to remember our mothers. That is good, but there are a certain kind of mother, who is forgotten or just not mentioned. The mother of a special needs child. That is not only a full time job, but that is 24/7. And very often is is a life or death situation. I know. I use to be one.
As I mentioned, I didn’t get flowers or candy on mother’s day, and at times it did make me feel under appreciated. But instead of moaning about it, I started to appreciate myself.
Martin and I made a ritual. It started when he was about 13-14. Forgive me if my memory is not what it used to be.
Every Monday Martin and I would go down to the flower shop. The flower lady knew that we needed some time to ourselves before she came over. I would take a few flowers and let Martin smell them. It always made him smile. I would then ask him which color he wanted for mummy’s flowers. He wasn’t able to verbalize it, but I knew his sign, and with his eyes he always picked orange. No doubt that was his favorite color. So 8 times out of 10 we got a orange flowers, but at times I did ask if he would choose a different color. He did.
We called the flower lady over and she made them in to a beautiful bouquet. I didn’t want to see her do it, because i wanted to be surprised. She wrapped them for me and I put them on Martin’s table, so he could “carry” them back to the flat. Then he would give me the sign, that I could take them and together we would open them. He loved the iihh and ooohhh that followed. So did I.
Unfortunately flowers are quite expensive, so we had to change it to every other week and then to once a month. But it was something that we did together and that made me feel good and appreciated.
So I may not have gotten flowers on the official mother’s day , but every time we went to the flower shop, it felt like mothers day to me.
Maybe there is a lesson to all moms. Don’t wait to get flowers once a year. If you want to change a bad day in to a good day, buy yourself some flowers. You truly deserve it. So until the day comes when mothers are appreciated every day, then I guess that one day out of 365 is a start.
Happy Mother’s day all. But a big special shout out to the special needs mothers out there.
You are truly appreciated, by me. trust me, I used to be one.