In Sickness and in Health . . . and in motherhood.

I wanted to write a story about someone other than my mother. You see, mothers can be tricky, because they don’t always do what’s fair or what’s fun at the moment, and they’re really easy to see as imperfect once you realize they’re human. My mother, though, I realized while thinking of a public figure like Michelle Obama or Hilary Clinton, to write about, isn’t just my mom, she’s a woman who immigrated to America from Haiti at the age of 17 and raised me and my siblings in the worst worst circumstances possible, in order to give us a chance at life.

I remember being 4 years old. It was early in the morning and I woke up to find that my mother wasn’t in the room with us. We (my mother, my older brother who was 6 years old at the time, my two sisters, and I) lived at our uncles house in Pompano Beach, Fl at the time, in a small back room that he used for storage. My mom convinced him to let her rent it out for a couple of months while she figured out what to do next. The room smelt like old paint and various mixed spices.

I stood up and shimmied past my sister who slept soundly next to me. I remember how cold the tiles of the floor felt as my toes touched it. I scanned the room one more time. My eyes had adjusted by then and I could see the space better, but she wasn’t there. I eventually found her when I opened the room door. She’s was slumpt over the kitchen chair, resting with her head on the table, with markers, paper, and scraps of a cake she was eating. I don’t remember feeling the bed move, but she’s must’ve gotten up after she put us to bed.

Not wanting to wake her up, I slowly spun on the small heels of my feet and crept slowly back in the direction of the room. But before I could reach the door I heard a voice. Deep, tired, and slow.

“What are you doing up, Abby?” She asked.

I turned to face her. She had tired eyes, just as always, but something about them this time indicated that she was crying. I felt terrible for waking her so I made an excuse. “I needed some water.”

My mom gestured for me to come to her and I took careful steps to the empty chair across from her and sat down. She got up and took a cup from the cupboard. She filled it with tap water and placed it in front of me.

I brought the cup to my mouth and took a small sip.

“We may not be here for long. Abby.” She said to me while organizing the papers into a pile in front of her. “We have to go soon.”

I felt excitement surge through my body and a meek smile came to my face, “Are we finally getting a house?” I asked.

“No,” She answered quickly.

As instantly as the excitement came, it went. I knew what it meant then. That we would be homeless soon and that my mother’s kidneys were most likely causing her sickness again. She couldn't work anymore and couldn’t pay my uncle for another month of shelter. It also meant I would possibly have to go to a new school and start all over again as the new girl from god knows where. Although I was used to the routine I felt a bit of hope hide away.

There were times where we would be good for close to a year, but it never quite reached a year. We moved more times than I could count on both hands and feet. And sometimes it was easy and most times it was incredibly hard. I watched as my mother grew weaker and weaker as the days grew more hopeless, and as we ran out of family members willing to house us. Her gleeful, kid-like spirit dwindled into a sharp tempered, slow moving, nervous energy. And so did mine.

At age 10, I realized there was something wrong with me. I was sad all of the time, my energy wasn’t nearly as easy on my mind, and I thought about sad things so often that it was hard to be happy overall. But at the time, there was no way I could verbally admit I had depression. The treating and diagnosing of Mental illness doesn’t exist in my Caribbean culture, and even if it did, there was no money in site for me to see a doctor. So I stuffed it away and I tried being a happy kid. Meanwhile, my mom tried to be super woman.

She wasn’t an Amazonian. My mother was only 5’6” and a deep chocolate brown. She had no powers, expect for maybe her power to make every terrible experience into something less bad. Although she didn’t have the same energy, her spirit shown through and lit up during holidays. With the little bit of money she had, we would go to pick out a small tree and decorate it with Christmas lights from the dollar store nearby and things we could find around the place. Photos, baby doll shoes, a random piece of string, all of it looked amazing under the lights. My mother would sing to us while holding us tight. And for a moment, it felt like we would never experience pain again.

But life got harder as we got older, as we started to feel our place in the world amongst privilege and opportunity. It was then that I realized that I probably couldn’t make it in life. That my options were limited by transportation, money, and optimism. That moving ten times a year wasn’t necessarily a fairly normal thing. Poverty held its grip around my ankles wherever i went, like shackles on a prisoner, and I felt the pain in my bones.

Yet, through all of it, through her sickness and stress, my mom woke up every morning, fixed us a small breakfast of coffee and bread, and drove us to school. Before letting us into the building she would tell us, “the world is yours, even when it just feels like you’re living in it. Don’t be afraid to learn, and to grow, and to reach for the stars today.” I rolled my eyes most times and walked slowly to class thinking of all of the things that were wrong with me and my life. My shoes were old, my clothes too small and untrendy, my stomach maybe more empty than my classmates. I was simply poor. And I would always be poor to the world.

At 14 years old, my siblings and I were taken away from my mother and put into the foster care system. She didn’t hit us, she didn’t abuse us, she didn’t hate us or regret us. Her only offensive is that she didn’t have enough to take care of us. So we went without. Not because she wanted us to go without, but because she couldn’t give us the world at the time. My mother wailed when they packed us up into those trucks and drove us away from her. She pleaded with child services to give her more time, but it was too late. And in those years that I was separated from her, I realized how much I actually had, how much she sacrificed for us.

My mother had a hard life growing up in Haiti. Her mom, my grandmother, was a stritct, church going, baptist women who abandoned her and left her with her aunt to go to America. My mom didn’t grow up with her dad. All she had was her older brother and her goat that was gifted to her one year. So when we finally had the chance to come to America, the land of opportunities, she joined my grandmother’s church, met my dad, and started a family with him. But she wasn’t submissive. My mother had a boisterous voice! She was very opinionated, head strong, and challenged by father whenever he crossed the line with her or us, and he did quite often. My mother finally left him after five years of marriage, but to spite her he promised to never help her out with us no matter what.

When I think of my mother, I think of her as the parent who stayed, dispite not having much to give. Her body betrayed her constantly with chronic illnesses, yet she hardly ever showed just how much pain she was in. Every couple of months or so she would end up back in the hospital. Her kidneys were failing overtime and she became sicker and sicker. But on the days that she could walk and smile, she tucked us in, kissed us good night, and fed us a ton of eggnog when the holidays came. Even to this day, Christmas has a special place in my heart. It reminds me of the warm lights my mom put up and the small gifts she gathered for us and the songs she sang.

There were a couple times in my life where I thought I would lose her for good. Her hospital stays extended for months at a time. Once for a stroke and once for a Blood infection. But she persevered and recovered, only to go back to being our mom. Although, we weren’t in her custody for some time during our adolescence, she visited us whenever she could, always with a smile on her face and hope in her heart.

When I think of the word tenacity, I automatically think of my mom. She’s the most tenacious women I know. When she’s down on her luck or doesn’t have much she doesn’t hesitate to help those around her. She could be down to her last dollar and she’ll offer it to someone because she knows how it feels to be without. And although life hasn’t treated her fairly, she strives to get the best out of it. I try to adapt that selflessness into my every day life as an adult now.

At the age of 19, I was hospitalized for attempted suicide during the year of 2017. It was one of the hardest times of my life. I was temporarily homeless, I just got out of a terribly emotionally abusive relationship, and my depression caused me to self isolate and become severely anxious of my circumstances. I couldn’t shake the shackles from my bones and no matter how hard I tried, I didn’t have the strength that my mom carried with her. She visited me everyday the whole time I was baker acted. She didn’t say much. We just sat down together and played cards or listened to our favorite music. On the day I was released, she drove me home and while sitting in the car before I went inside she said something to me that I would never forget. Something that changed my perspective on life.

She said, “Abby, I know life is hard and it’s unpredictable. I know what you’re feeling inside, and maybe I should’ve told you sooner, but you don’t have to fear anything. You don’t have to be ashamed of anything. You don’t have to feel like you have to prove that you’re worth it. You being here is enough. You’re young, creative, and incredibly smart so you’ll figure the rest of it out eventually, even if it feels like that’ll never happen. And if not, I’m here.”

I think about everything we went through together, the ups and the downs. I’m 21 now, about to start college again, and I’m doing well mentally. My mom isn’t a hero to the general public, she doesn’t wear a cape, she never ran for president or was the First Lady, she may be unexceptional to most, but to me and to anyone who has the pleasure to meet her, she’s the strongest person I know. I wouldn’t be here without her. I wouldn’t be writing my next novel about self help, or working on my inner strength, or looking forward to life without her. She’s my rock. She’s my foundation. And mothers like my mother, deserve the world.