The Ultimate Mother's Day Gift Guide

A teeny tiny and very simple list | No. 004

Photo by Jasmin Ne on Unsplash

Birthdays. First baseball games. Playing dress up. Drinking out of mom’s coffee cup. Lost teeth. Late nights spent feeding, waking, rocking, changing, feeding, repeat. Graduations. Baking cookies. A toddler’s funny dance moves. Trip to the ER for a broken arm. A teen’s first job. Breastfeeding advice. A new system for getting laundry under control. Squishy baby legs.

I have posted about some of these moments in my motherhood journey. As parents, and as mothers specifically, it sure seems like a lot of us post about our kids and our day-to-day motherhood experiences often. Like, all the time. In recent years, this has become a debated topic, controversial and heated in some circles.

Should our kids’ lives be “content?” For the most part, they aren’t consenting to having an online presence. Should we show their faces? Say their names? Are we causing long-term or future damage we never intended? How honestly should we share our feelings about parenting online? Won’t our kids read this stuff one day? There are opinions on these questions, but ultimately the effects are yet to be seen.

Overall, with my time-limited knowledge, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to post about our parenting experiences, including the authentic, real, and often very hard moments. I am one of the contributors in this arena, after all. Of course, some content can be harmful if or when it takes on a life of their own. Videos of tantrums, children adamantly protesting being on a live video, parents playing pranks on their kids that only result in tears or shame - I’m never in favor of this category of content and that’s not what I see the majority of parents posting (the ones I see in my feeds, anyway) and it’s also not the content that I’m talking about in this post.

But, the question is: why has motherhood content posting become such a widespread and immense cultural force and phenomenon?

Why. is. there. so. much.

Moms want to be seen.

For most of history, the details of individual motherhood journeys have largely been invisible or seen by only a very few people. Our children see our journeys, but they see them through the lens of their own childhoods, not through our perspectives as parents. Often even our partners or best friends don’t fully understand what our own days of motherhood entail. It’s so much unseen work; work done at 2 a.m., during car rides all over town, early morning routines, work held in the internal mental load we constantly carry, and time at home for hours and days and weeks when we are the only adult around.

Social media has given mothers a way to be seen for their life’s work.

Lindsey Stanberry

in her lovely essay, In Defense of Motherhood, says, “As a mother and general consumer of pop culture, I feel like we’re living in a sort of Golden Age of Motherhood Media™. There are all kinds of moms depicted everywhere.”

Our motherhoods are as unique as our children themselves, yet we know our experiences carry some universal truths and relatability. These are the stories we post, the feelings we type, and the videos and reels we can’t stop watching.

I can’t say it better than

Asia Suler

did in her essay Why mothers send you pictures of their babies:

There are a million reasons why mothers send you photos of their children.

But mostly it comes down to the one thing we need everyone in our lives to understand.

This. This is what I’m doing with my life.

This. This is what is so important I’ve given up so much else.

This.

Without knowing this, you cannot know me anymore.

So, this.

I want you to see this.

Because just by you seeing it, I feel seen.

The three tiny eggs in the bike helmet

Leaning against the back of our house are some items: a rusty fire pit, two under-utilized bicycles, a rake, a bike helmet. My husband recently found a bird’s nest with three little eggs in the bike helmet. The past few days we have watched the mother bird fly back and forth to the nest, collecting twigs, and tending to her eggs.

When initially looking at the miscellaneous collection of things, nobody can see the nest or the hard work mama bird is doing day after day, the tiny eggs being tended with care. Nobody sees the search the mother bird is conducting constantly for twigs or the energy she expends keeping those babies safe.

But looking closely, she’s doing all the work behind the scenes, quietly, diligently, persistently. Obviously, mama bird doesn’t care if her motherhood is seen on social media. But, as human moms, we’re a little different. We want to be seen.

For Mother’s Day this year, if you’re wondering, “what should I do for my mom/kids’ mom/partner/mother figure/myself, etc.?” See her. Really, really, see her.

Maybe she is the mom who wants traditional flowers, chocolates, or jewelry. There’s nothing wrong with that if that is what she wants. Or are those better gifts for some other mom? Some moms love to spend Mother’s Day with their children. Others want the day to themselves. Maybe she wants to go out to brunch, beers, the beach, or absolutely nowhere at all. Maybe a handwritten card or a macaroni necklace would light her up.

She doesn’t want to explain to anyone what would make her happy, how to plan it, or remind someone to do it. She wants someone, anyone, to know her well enough just to do the things.

There is no specific gift to buy or thing to do - as long as whatever her day entails, she feels:

understood. known. seen.

for who she is.

This is what mothers want for Mother’s Day - and every day.