Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

When the words don’t fit

For years, I didn’t know what to say when someone wished me a Happy Mother’s Day.

I’d give a polite smile, maybe nod. But inside, something clenched. It wasn’t quite anger, it wasn’t even sadness in the traditional sense. It was more like disqualification. Like I wasn’t allowed in the club. Like the title didn’t belong to me.

Because what do you say when you’ve lost a child and the world keeps celebrating motherhood like it only exists in strollers and school photos?

The years I hid

I didn’t have any of those things. What I had was a grief so old and so deep it had learned how to camouflage.

So I avoided the day. I dodged it like a phone call I wasn’t ready to answer. Because I didn’t feel like a mother. I just felt like someone who failed at being one.

Invisible grief

There was a time I thought real mothers had kids you could still see. I thought motherhood expired when your arms were empty. And no one corrected me. Not really.

People meant well. They always do. But when your grief makes other people uncomfortable, they start speaking in half-sentences. They change the subject. They fidget when you say your child’s name, like the air just got too heavy. Like love should be easier to digest.

I buried it. All of it. The memory, the title, the ache. Even the joy I had once, however briefly. It felt safer to pretend it hadn’t happened. I tucked it away behind ambition, behind work, behind strength.

The landmine month

But every Mother’s Day was a secret landmine.

Some years I felt numb and mechanical, powering through like it was just another day. Other years I fell apart at a grocery store display of carnations and cards. One year I threw out the entire month of May.

Grief isn’t tidy. It’s not linear. And it does not care about your calendar.

The long return to joy

It didn’t change overnight.

It took years. Many, many years. Years of silence, of pretending I was fine. And then slowly, always on God’s timeline, I began to see it differently.

Not because the loss disappeared. Not because the grief stopped existing. But because something deeper started rising. A quiet, knowing that never left me. I was Aiden’s mother. I am Aiden’s mother. And nothing, not even death, can undo that.

My faith is what pulled me through. Or maybe more honestly, it’s what held me while I lay in pieces. God didn’t demand I hurry up and heal. He sat with me in it. Year after year. And when I was ready, He began stitching me back together. Not in spite of my grief, but because of it.

The peace I know now

I don’t dread Mother’s Day anymore.

In fact, it’s one of the most peaceful days of the year for me. It’s not a sad day, it’s a day I am so grateful. I usually spend it in reflection. Quiet joy. A kind of sacred remembering. No fanfare. No flowers needed. Just me and God and my son. And the knowing in my spirit that I mothered with everything I had.

That I still mother. That I always will.

Because love like that doesn’t vanish. It roots itself in your DNA. It changes your cells. It shifts the way you see the world. And it becomes part of everything you do.

I am a proud mother. Not just because I carried Aiden, but because I carry him still.

Happy Mother’s Day, from me to you.