What it means to be a Mum.

As we head into Mother’s Day, and I sit at the computer working, it makes me think of my role as a mum and a Daughter.

I came to the realisation in my late twenties that I was raised in a family with a working mother.

I don’t know why it took me so long to realise? As my mum worked very hard my whole life and still does. I grew up with her working nightshift as a Nurse. 

However, when people talked about growing up with a mum working, I never thought of her in that way.

As a child I didn’t see the sacrifices she made, living on very little sleep. Cleaning up when she should be resting. Making birthday cakes each year for me and my four siblings. Heading to work as I nestled into bed each night.

I saw her as Mum, my Mum, no titles, no acronyms. She wasn’t a SAHM, a WAHM, a FTWM, a PTWM, a WOHM, (You get the picture) she was and still is just my Mum.

Someone I could confide in, someone I could laugh with, someone I could play with, someone who made my school lunch box each day. Who made sure I had clean clothes for school. Someone who I could feel safe and secure with. I never felt like she put work in front of me, I felt like she worked for me and my siblings.

And now as a mum to four beautiful children myself I try to see myself through their eyes. 

Yes, I work, as many mums do now. But to my kids the fact I work doesn’t matter.

As to them I am a mum, I am their mum and that’s all that matters.