I never thought it would happen...could ever happen.

I became a mother almost 5 years ago. In 10 short days MB will be 5 years old. I would not trade the mothering experience for anything in the world. I actually became a mom almost 7 years ago when I married my husband. He has 2 boys from his previous marriage and they are my stepsons, and though I love them dearly, they are not mine. I don't see them on Mother's day because they belong with their mother on Mother's day and I will not ever steal that from her.

Anyway, as we were in church this morning I thought about all of the women who desperately want to be mother's but can not for physical reasons. To you today, I want to wish you the love and joy friend's children and family's children can bring to you. To somebody, you are full of the love of a mother. They know it. How do I know and say this? Before I got married, my best friend's children were like my own. They knew I loved them as a mother loves her children and would do anyting... ANYTHING for them. Though they are not my children I would throw myself in front of a train and die for them if necessary. Stand in front of a loaded gun so they would be safe. The same things I would do for my son.

My heart does ache for the women who can not have children of her own. It was supposed to be my story. That is why MB name is Samuel. Samuel's mother, in the Bible of course, prayed that God would give her a son. That she would be worthy of the name mother. Her husband's other wife had children and she lorded it over her and made her feel horrible about not having children. In that day it was a shameful thing for a woman not to have a child. She prayed and prayed so hard that the priest though she was drunk and tried to make her leave the temple. She told him what she had prayed for. God gave her a son and she named him Samuel because he was "asked of God". That is why my son is Samuel. I asked God for him. Begged. Pled. Cried for a child of my own knowing I was told my body was broken and would not accept a child.

The day I discovered I was pregnant was the most exciting and frightening day of my life. I remember looking at the pregnancy test and having a friend check it just to be sure I saw what I saw (the 2nd blue line). I rember sitting in the bathroom saying to my unborn child...."Fight, you are the most wanted baby in the world!". He still fights. His life has been a hard road so far. He was born 2 months early in renal failure but too small and weak to start on dialysis, spent 6 weeks in the NICU before coming home for the first time, went back in the hospital for another 6 weeks and was started on dialysis which we did at home every night for a year, got a kidney from daddy, had several surgeries in between for hernias and recathetrizations. This boy tried to die too many times for me to count. So many opportunities for the gift to be stripped from me. I am thankful he continues to fight and do so well. My pregnancy was frought with problems as well. I had to shoot insulin from the 3rd month on. I had to take shots of Heparin every day (a blood thinner) because of a history of blood clots. I ended up in the hospital on strict bedrest (only allowed to sit up to eat and stand up to go to the bathroom) for 6 weeks (could you imagine how insane I would be if he held out all 8 weeks he was early!). I was on a high dose of blood thinners when I had an emergency c-section to deliver Sam. It was a hard road....and one I would love to take again. But it will not happen. This is a fact that it can not and really should not.

God has blessed me. The best thing that has ever happened to me is to be a mom. I have learned more about God and grace and forgiveness and discipline from being a mom than I ever would have understood if I were not a mother. God, thank you for the lessons. I know and pray that I have many many many more years of these valuable lessons as I watch my son become a man of God.

On Mother's day I have to tell you that being a mom also makes me appreciate all my mom did for us. The sacrifices she made and the hardships she withstood for us. I now understand how much it hurt her when we said we hated her ask kids. How much she apprecaited a hug for no reason at all.

Mom...I wish you were closer so I could hug you today and let you know I'm glad you are my mom. I love you.

To all the mom's out there. Hug your babies today. Put aside your anger and frustrations and make ammends. Let yourself FEEL really FEEL the love that is inside you for your child. Children are a gift from God and we moms are honestly the lucky ones.

MB, thanks for making me a mom. ... you deserve the gifts and love today. (I have to brag on a baby's love here. At his baby sitter's house he and the sitter's husband made a card for me and picked a rose from her garden. When he presented me with this rose, it was wilting and dying, but it smelled wonderful and MB and I played with it...hard. Sniffing it, kissing it, brushing it on our faces. I put it in a bottle of water I happened to have in the van but did not expect it to survive the night. The next morning when I got up that rose is alive, strong and well......it's baby's love that brought that thing back. Magic I tell you, love is Magic!).