“Mom, I want to get you a Mother’s Day cupcake.”
“How nice! Why don’t you ask your father if you guys can go do that?”
(She asks, he says yes.)
“We’re going to go get a Mother’s Day cupcake… for you to share with me.”
Aha. Now I see. Heh.
Six years ago, when my daughter was two, she was at a local preschool which was doing a Mother’s Day thing. Handprints on cards, pompom caterpillars, I don’t really remember what it was. The day after they’d done this, but before they’d given the crafts to us, I heard the other moms talking.
“Jordan couldn’t keep it a secret, he just had to tell me.”
“I know! Haley was the same way, she blurted it right out.”
“Kids this age just can’t keep things secret, can they?”
And they all laughed knowingly. Gosh, kids say the darndest things.
I was so angry I was literally seeing red. We were learning about Emily’s problems and figuring out what it all meant. The other moms didn’t know, since we didn’t socialize. My daughter hadn’t breathed a peep about anything they were doing in class, because she didn’t talk the way theirs did. How dare these mothers sit and make light of their children’s ability to communicate with them. I would give anything in the world for my daughter to spill the beans on something. These women didn’t know how lucky they were. I wanted to strangle them for the good fortune they had, all unknowing. (Yes, some months later I did go on drugs for depression.)
That feeling really stayed with me, obviously, and it did rear its head again from time to time, lessening as I came to terms with my child’s differences.
Last night in bed, my daughter told me, “I have something to give you tomorrow for Mother’s Day.”
“Do you?”
“Yes, it’s a secret.”
Six years late, but she got there. My heart is very full.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there.