While the world's eyes are on the newborn baby, the mother's mother sees her daughter, newly a mother. The role of grandmother can wait, because it's her little girl who cries, her breasts aching. The mother's mother scrubs poop-stained clothes, sweeps the floor, and makes sure they have lunch. She buys button-down nightgowns and washes sheets soiled with milk and blood. She knows how hard it is to become a mother.
In the silence of the early morning, she thinks of her daughter, wakes up. How many times has it happened? Will she make it through the morning with a smile? And she brings her something warm and her favorite dessert, and she can see everything that's happening to her daughter, the new mother, better and before anyone else. Busy, Mama's mother suffers in silence. With every choice her daughter makes, she remembers her own.
In front of the new mother, new baby, lots of milk, and so much lap, she questions everything she did, long ago. Time that won't return. If today is what you have, then today is what it is. She looks into your eyes, brings bread and coffee with milk. That's the lap, that's the milk now. Here and now, present.
A mother's mother helps her daughter fly. She does everything in her power to help her rebuild herself, to discover her new identity. She is now a mother, but she will always be her daughter. Every new mother needs the care of another woman who understands how fragile this moment is. The mother's mother can be a sister, mother-in-law, friend, neighbor, aunt, grandmother, sister-in-law, or acquaintance. The fact is that the postpartum period requires female unity, the understanding that only another mother can have. A female tribe, but above all, and if possible, "a mama," the mother of the new mother.
Author: Marcela Feriani