Mothers or Heroes????

"When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child."
- Sophia Loren, "Women and Beauty"

I was at the early education centre where my 4 yr old does his school readiness program.....eeew that does sound a mouthful.....it never ceases to amaze me how people come up with such fancy terms to snare unsuspecting parents :( Anyway it was a very busy hour at the daycare centre with parents dropping off kids and signing the registers, so the tiny office area was quite crowded. Suddenly a mother's voice boomed into the enclosed space, the anger emanating from her, very palpable, causing heads to turn in anxiety and some in eager anticipation of an ensuing confrontation. She was voicing her displeasure, to the childcare centre staff, over using a different sunscreen lotion on her toddler's body than the one she had given them. To most people, the accusation would have been seemed trivial and perhaps even insignificant but this innocuous overlooking of parents requirements by the staff had a different effect on the group of women standing in that office.

You see, you had forgotten we are mothers, a breed of its own kind :) The atmosphere in the room shifted.....none of the mothers questioned the reasoning or logic behind her anger anymore ( the boy has a skin disorder which we came to know later), but immediately our sympathies were with the irate mom and instead we became more like "children of the corn" collectively focusing our displeasure at the staff who were squirming under our baleful eyes.

I have just finished a book "The Life You Longed For" by Maribeth Fischer, an author I have hardly heard about. Her writing reminds me of Jodi Picoult, Jacquelyn Mitchard, authors who masterfully capture the nuances, the subtleties and the complexities of human relationships. The book is about a mother, accused of Munchausen Syndrome by proxy while caring for her dying child. It is not the pathos of the mother's struggle with a dying child, or her mortal fear of losing the child that caught my attention, but her ferociousness behind protecting her child and going out on a limb to fight for few more years of life for her child that moved me immensely.

Like all other species, the homo sapien mother does not lag behind in viciously protecting her young. The same theme is echoed in Jodi Picoult's "My Sister's Keeper" where the movie version did not fail to move me, especially the scene where Cameron Diaz in her superb emoting as the mother shaves her own head to support her sick child. I was both crying, laughing and shaking my head over at that mother's behaviour thinking that all mothers, despite their skin colour, race and ethnicity are the same. When I came to know about Madhu's hair loss problem which can turn out to be total in some cases, I remember stating vehemently in helpless anger and in deep anguish that I would be shaving my head too (despite my hair behind my only vanity) if Madhu ever ended up like that as I would not want my kid to handle her loss alone. Touch wood, she has had a healthy scalp for the last four years with occasional episodes but nothing major so far.

Anyway the incident at the daycare centre hit a little too close to home given that the book and the movie remain still fresh and raw in my memory. My heart goes out to those valiant mothers, living every parents' nightmare and dealing with the trauma of having a sick child in their hands. My heartfelt prayers to such moms, whose strength and positive attitude is so amazing......may their battles leave them unvanquished and less scarred.