Mother’s Week 2021: Day 1
By Erin Riches-Wong
Being a mom has been the biggest challenge of my life. Or maybe it's the second biggest, because being married is no small thing, either. Every day I wake up and feel unprepared to take care of my two children. Actually, sometimes I do feel prepared to mother them, but then an hour later something happens and I realize that, no, I was not prepared and I am already making mistakes and in need of forgiveness.
When I first became a mom, I thought it was going to be all about working hard. My daughter arrived early and went to the NICU for four weeks, so I was pumping around the clock, and setting alarms for myself to wake up and pump and deliver the milk. I've never been so tired in my life. And I missed her so much and I cried for her every day. We took her home a few days before Mother's Day, and I was still pumping all day and night, and bottle-feeding her, and I wanted to breastfeed her because I knew it would be good for her and I thought if I could do it successfully, I would feel less guilty about delivering her too early. So I put all my energy into that. And she and I figured it out a few weeks later, and it felt like such a victory. It still does. Sometimes I look back on this milestone when things are hard and feel a little happier.
But working hard is only a small- to medium-size piece of being a mother. Another piece of it is being humble. But I'm not a humble person, and I find that I'm learning how to be humble in many little ways, over and over and over again. There are so many things that I've taken for granted that I know how to do, that I'm good at, that I can feel pride about. And now it turns out they either don't matter or I'm not as good at doing them as I thought I was. For example, I thought I was an empathetic person who was willing to listen to people when they needed someone to listen to them. But it is very different to try to listen to kids. You don't get to sit down at a Starbucks and relax with a cup of coffee while you listen to your children. You have to listen when you're tired, and when Thomas & Friends songs are playing in the background. You have to listen to them when you're trying really hard to be patient and maybe even contain your own anger. I also find that I have to listen for a much longer time, sometimes over days and weeks, to figure out what they are trying to tell me. They are completely different people of course, with their own way of looking at the world, and they also have autism, so their way of processing and communicating everything is different perhaps from other children. I don't really know, though, because they are the only children I've ever had.
Erin Riches-Wong with her family.
Before I became a mother, I was someone who liked to play things safe and avoid taking risks or making changes. It limited me socially and in my career. I met my husband at work, which is really not surprising at all, because work was my safe space where I felt the most comfortable. But I have had to step out of my comfort zone a few times for the sake of my kids. One example is making friends. I am a loner, and it took me almost 40 years to realize how much work you have to put into friendships to make them work. In the past, I rarely made the effort. But I realized early on that my daughter is extroverted and social, but that I couldn't just turn her loose in our neighborhood and expect her to have friends. So I had to step out and make friends with moms, whose children would then want to play with my child (hopefully).
Once the kids were past the infant stage, I also realized I was going to have to do a much better job managing my emotions. I have a lot of anger beneath the surface that I've had a hard time processing appropriately since childhood. I get angry, I feel out of control, and I start yelling. It's like I never finished growing up. I've been working on this part of my life for years. And it has been hard for me to see what God wants me to do in this part of my life since I became a Christian -- well, other than being slower to anger and more careful with my words, and practicing that over and over again. And I ask for forgiveness when I fail at that. I wouldn't say I am doing well with this part of my life. But I will keep trying, because I have seen many, many times how much better our lives can be when I can bring calm to a situation rather than cranking up the heat.
Since I became a mother, I've tried to tell my mother than I love her more often. One favorite childhood memory that has helped me is one from when I was about 3. Our Ford Pinto had stranded us in downtown Charlotte. My mom turned to me in the backseat, and said something like, 'we're going to do something fun, we're going to ride the city bus home today.' And I remember being on the bus and having an awesome time on the surprise field trip. My mom doesn't remember this evening, because the Pinto let us down quite a few times, but I have carried the spontaneity and joy of it with me ever since.
