mothering – Anjuelle Floyd

Of Mothers, Admiration, and Forfeited Goals …

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Despite the difficulties I had with my mother I admired much about her. That I admired so much about a woman who could be abusive speaks to the craziness of our relationship and my own struggles.

Yet and still my mother was a hard worker.

Whatever she set her mind to achieve, she remained committed until she had ascertained the goal.

As for not gaining the goal, I cannot remember anything that she set out to do and she later admitted not having accomplished.

This is weird to think about, because there are things in my life that I set out to gain, but for whatever reason have not attained, forfeited them.

Somewhere during the first five years of my marriage I

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Of Mothers, Understanding, and BeComing Present …

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How might your life be different if you knew more about your mother?

Knew her fears and worries, not just about you, her daughter, or your siblings, and your father or other family members.

What would it mean to you to know and understand your mother as an individual with her own hopes, dreams and wishes, regrets, ambitions, etc?

How might you be different, your life changed if you could see the entire person that comprises your mother, the little girl who lives inside her?

A pang of fear grips me as I write this for

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Of Daughters, Mothering, and The Willingness to Turn Inward…

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One of the most difficult aspects of being a mother is the requirement of self-reflectiveness.

As mothers we need to be able to look back upon ourselves, most particularly our time as children, and recall the difficulties and fears we faced in order to remain connected with our children.

Our willingness to do this is most particularly effective in nurturing our daughters.

“[D]aughters can model a great deal from a mother who is self-aware herself,” says Juanita Johnson in, Know Thyself First(Part 6 of Our Mothers, Ourselves: Mother-Daughter Relationships)

I address this at length in the blog post, Of Daughters, Actions and Self-Awareness.

While sons are

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Of Cinco de Mayo, an iPad and Mothering…

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Friday afternoon I felt as if I would crack. Each one of my children, ages, 11-years-old to 23 years needed me for emotional support as they struggled to attain their goals. My eldest was working hard on a paper search for a 15-page graduate research paper she must write.

Our 11th grader needed guidance on how to organize her study and tutoring sessions for her Chemistry and Algebra finals along with preparing an outline for her 3rd and thankfully, last term paper. And our youngest, having been home for the holiday in observance of honoring Cinco de Mayo, simply wanted to go out.

Having had a strenuous week of trying to play catch-up on my writing–I had spent last weekend helping our middle edit the first two term papers 12-15 pages each–I was scoured with fatigue.

Dinner with my husband at our favorite restaurant down by the water in Berkeley would have been a godsend.

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