Inside My Heart Guided Journal by Robin McGraw

Author:Robin McGraw
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Five

A DISCERNING HEART:

What I Learned From My

Mother’s L egacy of Love

You never know when your life will change forever. One moment your existence is tidy and ordered with everything and everyone in its place; then a tornado blows through and life as you knew it lies scattered around you, tattered and broken and making no sense at all. That’s what happened to me one Sunday morning over twenty years ago when my mother collapsed and died of a massive heart attack while I was talking to her on the phone. I had no warning, no time to prepare. All I had was the sound of her voice and the incomprehensible realization, later, that I would never hear it again.

After her death, what I remember most was a feeling of awe, because at that point, oddly enough, I wasn’t as sad for myself as I was for my mother. I remember thinking, What is wrong with me? I feel sorry for my loss but at the same time, I feel sorrier for hers. My mother was such a precious woman; she loved her life. And all she wanted was for everyone to be happy.

That’s what was causing me the worst anguish, the thought that she had been denied the chance to live the life she loved so much. She had been cheated out of what was most precious to her—time with the people she loved—and we had been cheated out of time with her. I replayed my mother’s death over and over in my mind during the days that followed. First it made me cry, and then it made me think.

I was thirty-one years old, married for eight years, and the mother of a six-year-old boy. There was nothing in the world as precious to me as my husband and son. Just as my mother had always put her family’s needs before her own, I had put my family’s needs before mine. Like most mothers, I daydreamed about the milestones to come in Jay’s life, and pictured myself beaming beside him as he grew stronger and taller and took his place in the world. In my mind I was always there, smiling and protecting him and making sure he was happy, just as my mother always did for us . . .

It was then that I realized that loving your family and neglecting yourself are not the same thing; that, in fact, if a woman truly loves her family, she must not and will not neglect herself.

And then it would hit me. She was gone. My young son would grow up without his grandmother and perhaps forget what she looked like, or even that she existed. My life was immeasurably, profoundly diminished because she was gone. And she was gone because she didn’t take care of herself.

It was then that I realized that loving your family and neglecting yourself are not the same thing; that, in fact, if a woman truly loves her family, she must not and will not neglect herself.

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