Walking along side my daughters

I watched my daughters walk in front of me yesterday. How tall and healthy they look. I am proud of who they are, thankful for the privilege of motherhood.  This is the beginning of a wonderful post by fellow blogger ChristaSterken.  As I read the post it made me thankful for my two beautiful, kind, caring, and thoughtful daughters.

When I was finishing up Allergic to Life, I asked my daughters to write about my illness through their eyes.  I am going to share a little bit of what each of them wrote.

SARAH

My mom is my best friend and I almost lost her. ..She was outgoing and fun and extremely crafty.  And one day, it all changed.

By the time I realized how sick my mom was, she was being shipped off to an environmental clinic in Dallas, Texas…I thought I would be okay while she was gone, but I was wrong.

When mom finally came home, she was a different mom than the one I had always known.  Yes, she was still loving and kind and beautiful, but she had changed too.  She was cautious and reactive and tired.

Ten years later my mom is well enough to play with her three grandchildren and love on them the way she loved on me and my sister.  I once thought my would not live to be 50, ans here she is making my girls dresses and teaching them how to do crafty projects…..

I am so proud of the woman I call mom.  She is a fighter who has never given up and has become so educated in the areas of her illness…My mom could have let this illness be the death of her but she chose to fight and she chose to live…I have never known a stronger person and I don’t think I ever will.

LAURA

After a war is over, many times our thoughts focus on the victories and the losses rather than the battles that were fought in the process.  People will talk about things as “pre-war” and “post-war”; in the same way I often think of mom as “pre-illness” and “post-illness”.  It’s so much easier to focus on the person she was before she became sick or to revel i the gains she had made over the last few years than to think about the times in between.  However, I know that thinking like this doesn’t do justice to the battles that she fought or the people who helped her fight them…Reading her words allows all of us–those who were present and those who couldn’t be–the opportunity to appreciate the long journey that this has been and to save the victories even more.

I was just 17 and graduating from high school when my mom first became ill…When I came home from college to visit, it was clear that my mom was not the same person she had been when I was growing up.  Before her illness, my mom’s creativity and resourcefulness made her a community leader, a good friend, and a great mother…When this illness came into our lives, I watched as it tried to destroy the very things I loved most about her…

From the beginning this illness as been a formidable opponent, but was no match for her indomitable spirit….Many years and battles later, she has succeeded in copying with aspects of her illness and has made more progress than I could have hoped for.  Her perseverance and good humor teach us that we can’t give up no matter what challenges life gives us….

Reading what my daughters have written, lets me know that despite not being able to walk ahead of them and lead them as long as I wanted to, they have done just fine.  They have become wonderful women full of love and compassion and knowledge.  Today, I walk along side these amazing women with pride.