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It’s mother’s day and this ushers in so many different memories and emotions for people, welcome or not. For some it’s a day to celebrate and cherish the women who have nurtured and mothered us…for others it’s a painful reminder that we didn’t receive the kind of mothering we needed.

There is not a single, perfect, right way to mother a person, but many of us are acutely aware when it’s absent.

I have a good mama. The kind that showed up to every single sporting event and award ceremony I was a part of. The kind that made homemade cookies and initiated food fights and was the classroom mom who nurtured all the other kids who didn’t have a mom who could participate as much as she could. My mom’s not perfect, in different ways than I’m flawed and that’s taken some accepting and grace on both our parts. But she has loved as generously as she’s known how and likely won’t stop nurturing until she stops living. living and nurturing go hand in hand for her.

This is my mom’s first mother’s day without her own mom…and I’ve been deeply saddened this week reflecting on that. Even when relationships change and are different than what we want and/or need them to be, not having a parent to honor when everyone else around you seems to, well, it hurts. Facebook and twitter can feel like nails on a chalkboard to the person who doesn’t have a parent to connect with on mother’s and father’s day. Whether it’s due to loss to death or simply loss of relationship. I’ve thought a lot about what it might feel like for my mom to wake up and have the holiday be so different, and so I want to say this to you who may not have a present or safe mama to call…

You are loved and lovable.

Wherever you are, know that someone has seen and still sees every accident, injustice, heartache, tear, and achievement you make. That there is not a moment that you live that you aren’t still being nurtured and tended to in just the right and perfect way that your heart needs and that you are never, never alone or without family. It looks different but it has never actually been more powerful. You are loved, you are lovable, on this mother’s day, even if you don’t have a mama to physically call. God is with you and sees every single moment of your day and is with you in the ache.

This is my first mother’s day {officially}. The first one that I have a baby who has a name and a unique smile and who knows that I’m kind of a big deal in her life. The holiday feels like a big deal because of how much I am obsessed with my daughter’s every waking moment and how I never want to miss any part of her becoming her own person except for I know she will need space from me to become who that is. I so thoroughly enjoy getting to be Liv’s mama, hearing her laugh, breathing her smell, receiving her kisses, praying over her future. I love it and I’m blessed and I will never minimize how precious this opportunity to mother her is.

Yet even as I breathe the joy in and exhale the sadness out, I am acutely aware that mother’s day is a hard day for another group of women. Those of you who have been trying for babies, who have lost babies, who are grieving children. Liv was not my only baby this year. Three months after having her I found myself in the bathroom, staring in disbelief at a positive pregnancy test. I was angry and overwhelmed and jubilant–we were having another baby, even while having a little baby. They were to be eleven months a part, and the madness and the anticipation were almost too much for me…then six weeks later I lost that baby. Now that it’s mother’s day weekend, I am as aware of that loss as I was the week that it happened three months ago. I wanted that baby and it’s not right that he/she isn’t part of my body and won’t be part of our family. I know I am not the only one, and so for those of you who have been trying for too long for a baby, who have lost a baby, who have lost a child, I say this to you…

There is hope. Not promises, I don’t make those. Hope.

Hope because you were meant to mother, you were meant to nurture–you are already and you will some more, and there is nothing that can stop you from nurturing. It is not right that you do not get to love on that young one today, that you can’t take a picture or read the card or rub your belly, but you will never take for granted your moment when you have it, and bottom line, you are not alone in this loss. I am with you, and more importantly, God is with us. I know that there is no way to articulate the sadness and disappoint and that other babies or children don’t ever take the place; but you are not alone. There is hope still, for just as you breathe in joy and exhale sadness and tell others your story and sit with women in their losses you are mothering this planet and giving way for the type of nurturing that brings healing and maturity to communities. You are making a difference when you donate and volunteer and love on other people’s children and there is hope if you are willing to let others love on you as you embrace what’s hard about mother’s day.

Today. It’s a big one. Not because it’s a holiday, because we have hearts that are aching to nurture and be nurtured. This is why we must come together, love each other and honor the gift that we are able to extend to each other. I love my mama and I am enthralled with my baby, but ultimately it’s you, my community that this day is really about. If we are do truly do life together then we must remember what this day is, and how it is different and equally important for all of us.