Find a Mom. Be Her Village

In her blog post To the Mom Without a Village, Chaunie Bruise expresses her gratitude for all the family and friends in the village that supports her as a Mom while at the same time, wishing for more of one. I’m guessing that lots of Moms feel the same way, given the comments on her post and what Moms tell me. She questions, though: “If I don’t have a village, isn’t it my fault?” She ends reminding mothers who desperately want a village but don’t have one that they’re not alone. You can imagine her raising a glass to toast: “Here’s to finding our villages, wherever they may be.” I’d like to put the shoe on the other foot and suggest that the rest of us not wait until Moms reach out; that we reach out first, offering to help, even in little ways. I didn’t get clear about this until an incident with a blueberry, in New York one Sunday morning, waiting in Penn Station for a train back to Philly. A young woman with a delightful two-year-old-in-stroller sat next to me in the Amtrak waiting area. One by one, the Mom put a blueberry in the little girl’s hand and she’d feed herself. As luck (and two-year old eye-hand coordination) would have it, one of the blueberries rolled off the little girl’s outstretched palm, bounced across the floor and came to a stop a few feet away. “I’ll get it,” the mom said to me, as she nearly leapt from her seat. “No, I’ll get it,” I said. “No, no,” she insisted, “I’ll get it.” I turned in my seat to f...
Source: Disruptive Women in Health Care - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Children gender Source Type: blogs