My First Day as a Mother

Mother’s Day is a time for memories. Yes, I think of my own mother, but more recently I’ve found myself thinking about the day I became a mother. Just weeks earlier, my doctor had warned me that things were… not as they should be with my unborn child.

The normal worries of becoming a mom were at the moment eclipsed by concern for my baby’s life. As I lay in pre-op waiting for my turn to have a C-section, the words of the doctor, warning us to prepare for the worst, rang in my ears: a “25% chance of life”… a “vegetative” state if he survived…

I was young and scared of the unknown—and I had absolutely no answers regarding my child’s future.

After the C-section was completed, the doctor hurried my newborn baby to me and I was able to get a quick glance at a beautiful blue face before the team rushed him off to surgery. When I asked the obstetrician if I had a boy or girl, he said he hadn’t noticed. There had been more important things on his mind. Because of a mix-up at the hospital, I found myself waiting all alone for hours, apart from my husband, and apart from my baby. I didn’t know what was happening on the operating table. I didn’t know how my husband was feeling. And I didn’t even know the gender of my child.

But when the operation was over and my husband and I got to meet our baby (a boy, as it turns out!) for the first time, there was no doubt: It was love at first sight.

We thought he was perfect—and still do. Eight months of waiting had ended, but the fight for his survival and quality of life had only just begun. I was ready to roll up my sleeves and get going.

For some “life is a highway,” but for moms like me who have medically fragile kids, life is a lot more like getting on a very expensive roller coaster; it’s difficult to anticipate the twists and turns, and impossible to steer. But after performing CPR on our son, getting on a first-name basis with 9-1-1 responders, and having our hearts wrenched more times than we can count… my husband and I learned something.

The more pain we went through with our child, the more intense our joy in the Lord became.

I could never have imagined the blessings our son’s life would bring to us and those who have entered into his sphere. How could I have known on that first day of motherhood how his presence would transform me for the better? Yet, for all the blindness and uncertainty of that moment, I can say now with clear eyes that I wouldn’t pick a different path for my life.

But getting to this point wasn’t easy. I didn’t choose to get on this roller coaster. So, when a friend chose to voluntarily slide into the seat beside us, pull down the harness and say, “Where are we going today?” it made a world of difference.

There’s an old saying, “it takes a village to raise a child.”

But the Bible puts it even more strongly than that! 1 Corinthians 12:12 (NIV) says, “Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ.” When our brothers and sisters in Christ stepped alongside us, they were reflecting the truth of verse 26, “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.”

When brothers and sisters in Christ stopped by with gifts of food, financial help, and friendship, they were helping build up a part of the body that was struggling. They cared for us in such very practical ways, showing us that God still loved and cared about us during some of our most difficult days. The kindness and generosity they showed us demonstrated sound theology more clearly than any sermon I’ve ever heard.

So friend, if you are on a roller coaster, can I encourage you to seek support? There may be a temptation to choose isolation because of frustration and hurt from the church. Don’t let that happen! Just as special-needs families need the church; the church greatly needs families with special needs.

1 Corinthians 12:21-22 (NIV) tells us, “The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you!’ And the head cannot say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you!’ On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable…”

You are indispensable to the church and the church is indispensable to you. Seek community so that you can be built up and in turn, you can build up others.

Perhaps you, dear reader, are not the mother of a child with special needs. Is there someone who needs you to get on the roller coaster beside them? Is there someone in your community who could use a word of encouragement, a prayer, or simply an afternoon of respite? What parts of the body can you help build up and support?

And to the mothers and mothers-to-be reading this post, my prayer for you, from your first day as a mom until your last, is this,

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit”

(Romans 15:13, NIV)

Written By—Rachel Olstad