Our guest blogger today is Carey Fuller (@Indyinnz). She’s a west coast mom, who like most of us, wants the best for her kids. Thank you Carey for sharing your thoughts on Mother’s Day.
…….one day out of the year to pay homage to the woman who made your life possible! In my honest opinion, mothers are not paid enough for all that they do since for many, being a full time parent is labor of love. But what if you happen to be a homeless single mother taking care of two kids on her own? Does the holiday suddenly mean any less? Well in my case it’s a mixed bag….
I spend the day as I normally do depending on whether or not I’m able to do a load of laundry, help with homework or preparing a meal. Finding a place to sleep for the night is a daily routine as well. Many times, Mother’s Day is a reminder of how much work I have to do. You see I’m not worried about all the things I don’t have, I’m worried about the kind of future my kids will have and what kind of impact homelessness has had on them. I also worry that my kids will see me as failing them by not being able to prevent homelessness from happening.
Mother’s Day tends to be another holiday that doesn’t apply to us. For my kids, watching other kids taking their mother out for dinner with their dad is an experience they haven’t had. The best they can do is make handmade cards which means more to me than anything that can be purchased from a Hallmark store. If the day happens to be nice, we often spend it at a local park or at the library if it’s raining.
Now you may be thinking that I’d be out spending the holiday with my own mother but for those of you who don’t know how homelessness works, once you land out here, you often lose contact with your relatives and since I have never been on really good terms with my mother, it’s not even a consideration. Once we became homeless, we pretty much became invisible not only to her but several other relatives as well.
If I were granted a Mother’s Day wish, it would be that no mother (or Father) be allowed to go without basic needs like housing which is why I advocate for the homeless. How easy it is for society to blame the parents for becoming homeless yet this same society will pay a stranger to raise their kids (foster care) or threaten to take kids away because nothing was done to prevent a parent from losing their job due to downsizing, outsourcing or because of an injury or illness. Never assume that family members will come to the rescue as I can speak from my own experience that many will not.
As far as I’m concerned, every day should be a Mother’s Day or Father’s Day for the hard working parents out there doing the best they can in an economy that has fallen apart.
I can be found at http://invisibull.wordpress.com, @Indyinnz on Twitter, Carey Fuller on Facebook, Indy on Blogher.com, or come visit us at We Are Visible and Invisible People TV also on Facebook.
Photo credit via Creative Commons 2.0: _Fidelio_