In honor of Mother’s Day, I have decided to write posts about what I have learned from each of my children, and the things I respect most about each of them. I am starting with Ashley since she is my firstborn, and the child that made me a mother in the first place.
Ashley is a beautiful child, full of personality. She also suffers more and has to work harder than most people ever will. I respect how hard she tries to do things, which other children do easily. When people pay attention to her and love her, she lights up and tries so hard to keep them happy with her. I have learned so much from her. I have learned that life doesn’t always go according to my plan, but that we survive and go on to live a different plan. I have learned that when things don’t come easy, you just have to keep trying. Ashley has taught me a lot about pain and loss, but even when things are at their worst, you can still choose to take delight in the little things. I now realize both, how amazing and how cruel people can choose to be. I have met some of the most amazing people in the world through Ashley. Raising Ashley is stressful, exhausting, and intense. But I am a better person because of her. Ashley has taught me about faith, hope, and love. Not the word, “love” that our society likes to throw around, but true, unconditional love that is spoken of in the Bible. Ashley will never be the little girl I expected. I will never be the mother I anticipated. We have both accepted a different reality. Ashley can give very little back to me because she is so affected by autism. But I couldn’t possibly love her more than I already do, even if she was developing typically. I love her simply because she is my daughter. I do not need anything else from her.
1 Corinthians 13: 1-13
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;[a] but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[b] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was achild, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I putaway childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzlingreflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[c]All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and
the greatest of these is love.
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originally posted May 2012
In honor of Mother’s Day, I have decided to write posts about what I have learned from each of my children, and the things I respect most about each of them. I am starting with Ashley since she is my firstborn, and the child that made me a mother in the first place.
Ashley is a beautiful child, full of personality. She also suffers more and has to work harder than most people ever will. I respect how hard she tries to do things, which other children do easily. When people pay attention to her and love her, she lights up and tries so hard to keep them happy with her. I have learned so much from her. I have learned that life doesn’t always go according to my plan, but that we survive and go on to live a different plan. I have learned that when things don’t come easy, you just have to keep trying. Ashley has taught me a lot about pain and loss, but even when things are at their worst, you can still choose to take delight in the little things. I now realize both, how amazing and how cruel people can choose to be. I have met some of the most amazing people in the world through Ashley. Raising Ashley is stressful, exhausting, and intense. But I am a better person because of her. Ashley has taught me about faith, hope, and love. Not the word, “love” that our society likes to throw around, but true, unconditional love that is spoken of in the Bible. Ashley will never be the little girl I expected. I will never be the mother I anticipated. We have both accepted a different reality. Ashley can give very little back to me because she is so affected by autism. But I couldn’t possibly love her more than I already do, even if she was developing typically. I love her simply because she is my daughter. I do not need anything else from her.
1 Corinthians 13: 1-13
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;[a] but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[b] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was achild, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I putaway childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzlingreflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[c]All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and
the greatest of these is love.
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