Mother, I Love You

My very first memory of Mom is of being disciplined, or rather post-disciplining. I have no recollection of what I'd gotten in trouble for or what punishment had been meted out, but I clearly recall Mom giving me a big, long hug afterward and telling me she loved me. In that moment I understood and felt profoundly that she would always love me no matter what choices I made. It hasn't been until much later in life that I've understood what a profound impact that kind of understanding can have in a child's life.
She has no recollection of negative interactions when I was a teenager (bless her memory!), but I know we had our scuffles. Mom helped me get over shirking and complaining about work by making me wash the dishes by myself every day (by hand) for an entire year. April can back me up on that. :) My poor hands! It was a hard-learned lesson, but it did me good. I think after that I was mostly a cheerful cleaner, if not completely proactive. hahaha
As many of you know, the move to Preston was very difficult for me. I had trouble getting and keeping friends basically the entire time. I got much closer to my family as a result, but particularly Mom. Now that I am a Mom I can see how painful it must have been for Mom to see me struggling so much. The entire first year we lived there I think I came home from school crying most days. Mom kept assuring me that I was okay just as I was, and that I just needed to like myself and then other people would come around. But mostly she listened when I needed to talk, built me up and just loved me.
Oh, how I ache for people who don't have meaningful relationships with their earthly parents! How difficult it must be to believe in God's love for us when you have no one modeling it here! I remember a time that I had made a choice that I was extremely ashamed of, and it took me a while to work up the courage to tell Mom about it, because for the first time that I could remember I had to wonder if she could still love me after she knew what I had done. When I finally did, she handled it just right. She said to me, "Rachael, you're okay. And I still love you." And that helped me feel like Heavenly Father still loved me, too. In fact, in that moment I knew that He did, and that I was not a lost cause.
Thank you, Mom for helping me believe in my worth as a daughter of God. That was a priceless gift. I love you.