Motherhood, Resilience, and Traditions That Carry Us
What Mother's Day looks like as a single mom, living paycheck to paycheck, carrying a kid in a cast up three flights of stairs. A reflection on resilience, motherhood, and the power of traditions.
I am not a Hallmark holiday person, or a Hallmark movie person, for that matter. But, Mother’s Day is a different story.
The Early Years: Single Motherhood
My first few years as a mom were tough. Leo, my son, was plagued by colic that persisted for a year. He screamed constantly. Severe asthma sent him to the emergency room regularly, his tiny toes and fingers turning blue. He wasn’t a walk in the park. Unfortunately, neither was my first marriage. Leo’s dad and I struggled from the very beginning, not only to stop our son from screaming in public, but to stop ourselves from screaming at each other. It wasn’t pretty. Before Leo’s second birthday, we were in the midst of divorce.
I thrust myself into a new normal as a single mom. I got a demanding new job that I hoped would pay the bills. I rented a third floor walk up apartment, five minutes from the office. I made my life as small and manageable as possible. And yet, it was anything but.
On weekdays, I pushed to prove myself in a private-equity backed, high-growth company. My colleagues were married with children, or young and single. Our executives were exclusively white men in their fifties and sixties. I didn’t fit in. Some of my colleagues made sure to let me know.
One Friday, walking to the office parking lot with a colleague, she brightly chimed in, “Hey! I’m going to be a single mom, too, this weekend! My husband is on a boy’s trip.” Her intention to connect was… ill-phrased at best. A weekend of solo parenting does not a single parent make.
On weekends, I was alone with my toddler. Up in the middle of the night to tend to his cries. Up bleary-eyed in the morning to start the day. Somehow keeping his boundless energy and curiosity entertained until bedtime, then passing out in a heap.
When Monday mornings rolled around, it almost felt like a vacation.
The Breaking Point
One day, slogging away at the office, I got the daycare call: Leo had broken his leg. I rushed there just in time to jump into the ambulance with him and race to the emergency room. Hours later, my then four-year-old and I emerged. Him with an above the knee cast, me with my nerves narrowly intact. I carried him up the three-floor walk up, his body weighed down by the cast, and my spirit weighed down by everything that had happened and everything that lay ahead.
At that time, LeVon (my now husband) and I had just started dating. Leo barely knew him. A protective mom, I was cautious of introducing my son to someone I was dating. LeVon walked through the door with takeout and a hug, and I burst into jagged sobs. He helped carry Leo to his bed, then left with words of encouragement. “You’ve got this and I’m here to help,” he assured. “It’s going to be okay.” I didn’t quite believe him. Even as he watched me fall apart, he had full faith in me. He saw strength in me that I didn’t see in myself.
Of my own volition, the heavy lifting, quite literally, fell on me. I carried my son from his bed to the bathroom. I carried him to the living room. I carried him up and down the stairs. I held him in the night to soothe his pain and fear. I held my worry and sadness alone. Still in his cast, he returned to daycare and the cycle continued. Only now, I shouldered the added burden of my job, with its unreachable expectations. I was carrying everything I could.
Until I couldn’t.
Weeks of carrying the physical weight of my son threw out my back, leaving me in excruciating pain each time I picked him up, and debilitated on the floor thereafter. I could no longer muscle through the experience alone. I called on LeVon for help. He answered without hesitation.
Just as Leo’s cast was being removed, and I began coming to terms with the full financial weight of his injury, a new breaking point emerged.
I got fired. Right before the holidays.
Ten years later, I still vividly remember the uniquely humiliating experience of walking out of my office, flimsy moving box in hand, crying, borderline hyperventilating, and wondering what the hell I was going to do next.
The physical stressors were immediately replaced with financial stressors. I questioned how I’d pay my rent, much less put gifts under the tree from Santa. But, I did as I always had done: buckled down, prepared to bear the weight, and presumed it was all on my shoulders.
Breaking the Facade: The True Face of Resilience
I could no longer pretend I was holding it all together. I clearly wasn’t. My faults, my failures, my weaknesses, my mistakes, my missteps were readily on display. Not my favorite look. I had no choice but to open up and be honest with myself, with LeVon, and with my friends that I was scared, bone-tired, and uncertain of myself.
But here’s the thing: that’s the birthplace of resilience. Resilience is not about toughing it out, pretending you’ve got answers, or racing forward and steeling yourself against what lies ahead. Resilience is about balancing two truths simultaneously: the truth that life can be hard; and the truth that you are strong as fuck.
The months that followed were filled with very low lows, coming face-to-face with humiliation, shame, guilt, fear, self-doubt, and exhaustion all at once. But they were also filled with tenderness – the tenderness born of looking your partner in the eye and admitting you genuinely don’t know what to do, of texting an acquaintance to ask if they know anyone hiring, of graciously accepting a friend’s offer to pay for a meal out. Slowly, I crawled my way up, out of unemployment, out of physical pain, out of debt, and into a new chapter.
There was no magical realization that I’d made it. No light bulb. No sudden awareness of my own strength. Even now, I still question myself, despite everything I’ve clawed my way through. But somewhere along the way, I stopped waiting for the revelation. I started believing in the well of strength I can marshal when the moment requires it.
The Mother’s Day Meal
That first Mother’s Day after Leo’s broken leg and my firing, Leo had just turned five. That year, LeVon taught Leo a new tradition: cooking for me on Mother’s Day.
It started small, with LeVon helping Leo whip up a Mother’s Day brunch. Five years old, Leo beamed with pride as he plated his creations.
A few years went by and Leo expanded his repertoire. Mother’s Day brunch morphed into Mother’s Day brunch and dinner.
A few more years, and the dinners became more elaborate and more independently executed. Roasted chicken with orzo and arugula salad, all crafted by a nine-year-old chef.
Fast forward to last year, when thirteen-year-old Leo sat down to share his Mother’s Day meal with LeVon and me. He flopped into his seat. “Wow, I am exhausted!” he breathed.
I know the feeling, buddy.
The Weight of It All: Carrying More Than You Think You Can
This isn’t just a Mother’s Day post. Everyone carries heavy burdens. Whether you’re a single parent, someone navigating illness or loss, or a person trying to juggle more identities than feels manageable, you know this weight. Mothers carry a particular kind of invisible labor that often goes unnamed and unrecognized. But the experience of simultaneously feeling like too much and not enough is an experience that belongs to all of us.
The strength within you isn’t accessed by shouldering your burdens alone. It’s accessed by admitting to yourself and those you trust that you don’t have it all figured out and that you could use a little help.
That admission is what opens the door. Heartbreak and determination. Exhaustion and strength. Fear and perseverance. When you can hold both, and bravely share the experience with someone you trust – that is resilience.
You contain multitudes. You deserve to live all of them – the good, the bad, the ugly, and the glorious. You just don’t have to carry them alone.
Kat, this is beautiful and a wonderful reminder, thank you for sharing.