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Beth Kephart's avatar

agreed: Paradoxically, it seems as if the unrelenting attention teetering on adulation of all things Mother once a year is demeaning, even dehumanizing. And it’s limiting, siloing the value of a person–typically a woman–to the mother-role. Green was my mother's color, too. What we know for sure. What we surmise. These are the conditions of our stories.

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

Thank you. The conditions of our stories.

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Rona Maynard's avatar

While my grandmother was alive, my mother used to send her a flowery Mother’s Day letter every year. Grandma kvelled over these letters, which sounded nothing like my mother and had become a painful obligation. My mother was a fine writer who tried and failed to write the truth about her mother’s controlling, suffocating love. Mother’s Day makes me squirm. Thank you for your honesty.

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

Rona, thank you for understanding.

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Prajna O'Hara's avatar

Hello Nancy, I love the approach you took to this piece. It's sharp and ot the point. I read somewhere that the woman who fought for a day to be recognized for mothers, after a few years fought to have it deleted. It was not her idea whatsoever. But I never fully got the point of it all. I vowed never to be a mother for all the reasons you say, a confining role that many are not called to. I became a mother late in life - 37. I remember the grapefruit diets, the scales, the mirrors, the diet pills for women to fit an image. It's a painful trap that so many of us are or were challenged by. Great piece. Thank you for your perspective.

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Blair Glaser's avatar

I so agree, enough already! Enjoyed learning about you and your mom. Mine isn't warm and fuzzy either, and has cut me out for publishing the book. Even though I agree, enough! I am writing a personal about the difference between the relationship and the bond....

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

Yes, the difference between the relationship and the bond. I'll be very interested to read what you write.

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jean newburg's avatar

Another good piece showing another bit of you. I also considered those NYT questions, so interesting. We both may have complicated relationships with mothers and motherhood, but we have a friend who’s mother was so withholding she left home in her teens. She had 3 children and now 3 grandchildren, and her greatest joy and fun was and still is playing with them and expressing her creativity thereby delighting all. Go figure.

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

Exactly. Go figure.

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Ann's avatar

Nancy, I learned so much about your mother from this essay. So very touching. Thank you for writing this and sharing.

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Nancy Jainchill's avatar

Thank you.

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