“A Mother is only as happy as her saddest child”.  My mom used to say this to me when we were growing up.  I never really understood it until right now.  It is easy when our children are little and they get hurt.  We hold them tight, pull out the boo-boo bunny, and assure them that it will feel better.  They don’t question us or doubt us and whole-heartedly believe and know that in our arms they will feel better.  As a mom that is a wonderful feeling. 
Then they grow up and exchange the scratches, bumps, and boo-boos for heartache, fear, and the stress that comes as you grow up.  Believe it or not, I adore having teenagers (and teenage girls for that matter!).  They are funny and witty.  My son is just entering his teen years and he is truely the most beautiful and soulful person I have ever met in my life.  Sometimes I would lie awake at night and worry about these three.  They are old enough to remember everything of how our lives were before and how our life is right now.  These kids have seen their parents go through a divorce, they left the only home they knew and suddenly their life was one where buying groceries was a hardship for me.  Right in the midst of all of this they lost the most wonderful part of our family to cancer.  They never once stopped to ask “why me?”.  They have never once used any of these things as an excuse to misbehave or not get good grades.  I am a bit humbled by their strength.
My son made the middle school football team.  He is one of the youngest players on the team. This past week he was so sad and overwhelmed trying to figure out how to juggle a new school, homework, practices, and worrying about the upcoming game.  I am a woman and I think we can do anything men can do…but there are times when I have to confess that I can’t fill the place of a man for my son.  Especially when it comes to sports stuff.  Emotionally I wanted to hold him and protect him but in my mind I knew to be strong..  For days he would go to school and my heart would literally break when he got out of the car.  I could see him struggling. The other day when he got out and I drove away, the tears just started pouring out.  How much I wanted to take his pain and worry away.  I saw what my mom meant and how true it is that as moms we can only be as happy as that saddest child of ours.  
Last night at the game right before he ran on the field , he turned to find me in the stands. I smiled at him and nodded, the kind of gesture that even from a distance he knew was me telling him he could do this.  I watched as my little boy stood up a little taller and took to the field.  He did really well and when the game was over and we were driving home, he was so animated.  My sweet, happy little boy was back.  He needed to get on the field to believe in himself, I had encouraged and pushed him lovingly and cried to myself quietly. There is no denying the love between a mother and her child.  Someday my children will understand what I meant all the times I shared the same words i had heard so often and have experienced to be so true that “a mother is only as happy as her saddest child”.