At first, come the logistics.
Dates on weekday nights, or carved out of weekend mornings or afternoons, when the child is with his or her dad.
In the case of a toddler, perhaps coming over after bedtime, but not spending the night. The chance of an earlier-than-expected wake-up, or perhaps a bad dream leading to the child running into Mom’s room and into her bed, needing hugs and solace, is too great. It’s not yet time for you to be seen in the house like that.
There is separation, in the beginning, between you — the date, the prospect, the friend, the lover — and her primary life as a parent.
You’ve fallen in love and been in relationships before, but not like this. She has someone else in her life, a presence, and a love, far bigger than you. And her child is who she loves first, and that’s the way it will always be.
To fall in love with a mother is to love a woman whose love for you will never be primary.
That love is reserved for her child. It more than just comes first. It is instinctual. Primary shares the same root as primal; the love a mother has for her child is beyond numerical importance or intellectual prioritization.
It is an urge, a natural instinct, to put that love first.
A mother’s love for her baby, her toddler, her pre-schooler, her pre-teen, and yes, her precocious teenager, occupies the primary place of her heart, soul and attention. Always.
To fall in love with a mother means to understand that, to appreciate it and to embrace it. A love between you and her cannot exist or function if you don’t.
But if you do, and your relationship continues, what comes next is an odd in-between of being not quite as separate but neither altogether in.
Becoming Intertwined
There can be a walk with the three of you at a park. Ice cream together after a movie, maybe.
Later you could be invited to join them for dinner, and you see, at last, the way her world operates, the structure, the routine, the homework, the putting of things away, setting the table, talking, doing the dishes, bath time, book time, bed time.
You sit alone on the couch while they read together in bed in the child’s room.
Sometimes you’ll hear giggles and wonder what they are laughing about, maybe even feel a little left out.
Sometimes you’ll think you hear singing, and you’ll slowly approach the bedroom door, and lean closer, quietly, and yes, they are singing together, and it will seem to you the most beautiful sound you’ve heard.
And she’ll come out after awhile and seen you’ve put away the dishes and wiped down the counters and organized the living room and thank you with a kiss. You’ll check the time and make a move to leave, when instead she asks you to the bedroom.
You’ll see the awkwardness and hesitancy as she closes and locks the bedroom door, just in case, until the two of you are done, at which point she’ll open the door again.
At first you’ll still leave, and then one time she’ll ask you to stay, and the three of you will have breakfast together for the first time and her child is excited to see you in the morning and asks you questions about your dreams as she tells you about hers, and when the mother sees you and her child talk like that, she falls in love with you more. There is love in multiple directions, and it can be overwhelmingly beautiful.
The Love All Around
There is something deeply moving, captivating and compelling about falling in love with a mother.
Witnessing the way she moves in the world and carries herself with the joys, burdens, responsibilities and love of motherhood gives you a glimpse into how she loves — even if she will never love you in that same way.
It forces you to recognize varieties and shades of love, its gradients, the way it shapes itself between people based on the roles we play in each other’s lives.
But once this happens, one must be ready, immediately, to evolve. Before too long more things are asked and expected of you.
To show up early in time to have dinner together, to get in the habit of doing the dishes, to know what is needed for a walk in the park or a trip to the pool, snacks, towels, water bottles, sunscreen. Whatever you do, don’t forget the sunscreen.
Part of the Circle
If you’re lucky, there’ll come a moment when you notice a transition within you. The weekend mornings of just the two of you, no timetables, no interruptions, just coffee, reading and intimacy, are what you thought you loved the most.
Then one day, when the child brings you coffee in bed, or over breakfast you talk about going to outer space, or you do puzzles and color together on Sunday morning at an hour when you normally wouldn’t have woken up yet, you start to ask if maybe this is nicer than when it’s just the two of you.
And she’ll see that in you, and she’ll love you, again, just a little more.
That’s the beauty of falling in love with a mother. There is no container, no boundary to how much she can love. Her capacity for love was so enlarged by becoming a mother, that there is more love in her than you thought possible.
But it’s not that you receive the spill-over of that love, the scraps of what remains after what is given to the child. No, you receive a love that is specially carved out for you, because of you, and who you are.
When you’re standing in line at the grocery store, and everyone is tired, and she reaches her hand behind your head and looks you in the eyes with a look of gratitude, appreciation and togetherness, that is a love that is only for you.
While you share a glass of wine waiting to make sure the child is fast asleep, then go to the bedroom early, no TV, that is from a love that exists in you and her as a couple.
When at the park, and her child, wearing roller skates, knee pads, elbow pads and a helmet, finally gets it and coasts out of sight for the first time, but you can still hear the joyful shrieks of excitement and glee, and she reaches out to hold your hand, that is a moment when her love of child and love of you intersect. Your time and space is shared, as is your love, but it’s tangibly different and special.
A mother is in love all the time, regardless of you.
There might come a Saturday night, and she’s hired a babysitter, and you’re downtown, having fun, and both lose track of time, and while you’re walking back to the car she gets a text from the baby sitter that she has to go, which is fine, because maybe the kids are older, but then one of her kids texts asking her to come home and she feels awful. “Never again will I do this and be late,” she says. And you agree and support that — because there is no alternative.
No amount of fun with you is worth doing something that she feels compromises her role and place as a mother.
Broadening My Own Appreciation of Love
Falling in love with a mother allowed me access to a person who expressed love all the time.
That in turn made me a better lover, and by that I mean in the relationship, not in bed.
Witnessing the selfless love of a mother, but then also receiving love from that same person, broadened my understanding and perception of what it means to love another person — other people — and to share in their lives, and to laugh, cry and grow together.
Did I not see that love from my own mother, within my own family? I did, of course, though it took some maturing and growing to recognize it. And I suppose I grew to expect it, since I received that love since I was a baby.
But it’s different, naturally, when that love originates as adults, between two people who began as strangers, then became friends or acquaintances, then evolve into something deeper, that encompasses physical as well as emotional intimacy.
Falling in love with a mother made me see how much one person could love another — and it made me question how I loved, what it meant for me to both feel and express love.
It is cliché, especially around Mother’s Day, to say there is no love like the love of a mother. I’ve long appreciated what that meant as a mother’s child.
But it took falling in romantic love with a mother, and watching her give love to her child and to me, to see how deep and passionate the love of a mother can truly be.
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Previously Published on Medium
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