Mothers Be Good To Your Daughters Too

I’m completely unqualified to be the mother of a 17-year-old girl. Woman really. At 40, I’m barely learning what it means to be a woman myself.

But motherhood demands all of you. Whether you’re whole or not, qualified or not, ready or not.

The mystery of the mother-daughter relationship is an ancient one. What makes it so complicated?

Is it the unresolved issues with our own mothers? Those intergenerational curses we seem powerless to change. Is it the fear our daughters will become too much like us? Or perhaps not enough. Is it the envy and admiration we harbor when they take up more space than we ever dared to dream? That unnerving truth that our children are often teaching us more than we are teaching them.

Some days the regrets eclipse the memories. Especially when the clock is winding down on the time that’s left. When there are no longer years of living together ahead of you, only months and weeks.

An entire lifetime of first steps, lost teeth and midnight feedings, hurt feelings, sleepless nights and bedtime conversations will flash before your eyes as you ready for launch. As if you haven’t been naively preparing to launch for the past 17 years. Preparing to let go.

And in these final moments of her childhood, your biggest fear is not what if she fails, but what if she FLIES. What if she soars so high without you? Will it be because of you? Despite you? Who will keep her safe? Will she ever come back?

I’ve failed my 17-year-old girl–woman–more times than I can count. It’s one of the casualties of babies having babies. One of the unavoidable consequences of being human.

Nevertheless, she has emerged from my protective, destructive cocoon authentic and true. Loyal to who she is and brave in pursuing it. A compassionate friend, an admired sister, a daughter whose legacy is joy. Creative, independent, responsible, wise, resilient, courageous. SHE IS EVERYTHING.

She has taught me much and forgiven me even more. She has magnified my understanding of and ability to love. She has shown me how wonderful it is to be uniquely, breathtakingly different from one another and still able to fit the spaces of each other’s souls.

I’m no more qualified to be her mother today than I was on March 22, 2004. But I’m infinitely more grateful. In spite of–maybe even because of–me, she is ready to fly. And in the off chance she fails, here I’ll be, loving her exponentially more and intentionally better than I did yesterday.