Mothered by Mary: An unexpected revelation

Since my middle school years, I’ve had a strong devotion to Mama Mary. I formally consecrated myself to her in college, and all three of my children have been named partially in honor of her. So I believed that the experience of motherhood would only make me feel closer to the Blessed Mother. The wisdom and insights of others solidified this expectation. 

Despite my nearness to Our Lady and my big expectations, my actual experience didn’t align. I had been told that being pregnant during Advent was a special experience of walking through it with Mary. But Advent and Christmas as a pregnant woman didn’t seem more remarkable than usual. Rather, my pregnancies have been marked by nausea, exhaustion, and prolonged colds due to my weakened immune system. I’ve similarly found it quite difficult to feel united with Mary in my experiences of childbirth and nursing since I’ve had to be induced in hospital environments, followed by long, arduous labors. While Mary’s journey to Bethlehem was surely uncomfortable and she delivered in a stable, tradition teaches that Mary did not endure the physical pains of labor but was preserved from them through Jesus’ miraculous birth — something that is hardly consoling to most women. (People are often surprised to discover this teaching, but it makes perfect sense when we understand that labor pains were a result of the Fall — see Genesis 3:16. Of course, the dogma of the Immaculate Conception means that Mary was preserved from the stain of original sin, and thus it makes sense that she didn’t endure that effect of the Fall.) 

While I’ve long cherished a devotion to the Holy Family, my experience of mothering young children has often served to widen the gap between my perception of my family and the Holy Family. 

Wildly different experiences

Everywhere I looked, the details of my own motherhood seemed wildly different from Mary’s experience. Mary almost assuredly co-slept with her baby, but modern medicine instructs that my babies should lie flat on their backs on a separate surface. Mary absolutely never had to worry about her fertility or tracking her cycles, nor did she have to work through issues of intimacy with her husband, for she was ever-virgin. Middle-of-the-night feedings are hard, but more challenging are toddlers screaming uncontrollably without good reason (something that happens with nerve-shattering frequency in my house, including as I’m typing this article). Yet while Baby Jesus would have cried from hunger or cold, he would not have thrown temper tantrums as a toddler — he, too, was free from the corruptive effects of original sin! So while I’ve long cherished a devotion to the Holy Family, my experience of mothering young children has often served to widen the gap between my perception of my family and the Holy Family. 

Of course, Mary suffered the pangs of exile, the trauma of losing her child in the Temple, and unspeakable pain at the crucifixion and death of her son, so by no means am I suggesting that her experience as a mother was all sunshine and roses or that she suffered less than I have. Quite the contrary! Yet, in my daily moments of motherhood — those moments free from major trauma but soaked in trivial annoyances — I have had a surprisingly difficult time seeing Mary with me. (I’m sure this is my fault and lack of attentiveness, not hers!) I’ve never heard anyone openly suggest that becoming a mother may make it more difficult to connect to Mother Mary — and yet, in some ways, that has been my experience. It may be yours as well.

In that moment of unusual prayerful lamentation, Mary responded with the tenderest of words to my heart: “Ahh, but I did get to mother an exquisite, most precious daughter: YOU.” 

Mothered by Mary

It wasn’t until my third child, a daughter, that something clicked. I was nursing my baby girl in a dimmed nursery, marveling at the beauty and wonder of her sweet little being. I’ve thoroughly delighted in my boys, but in that moment, my little girl just seemed so very precious in her dainty infant femininity that, for the first time, I felt pain for the Blessed Mother that she missed out on an aspect of motherhood that I got to experience more profoundly than she. Whereas most of my experience of sharing motherhood with Mary has made me feel less than her or too far removed from her sublime experience to relate, this moment made me feel sorry for Mary: I mourned for her that she never got to relish this exquisite moment of cuddling a sweet baby girl. In that moment of unusual prayerful lamentation, Mary responded with the tenderest of words to my heart: “Ahh, but I did get to mother an exquisite, most precious daughter: YOU.” 

Silent tears streamed down my face at this word of consolation, and I continue to marvel at the accompanying realizations. Somewhere along the way, as I became a mother, I thought I would see myself as mothering with Mary. Yet everywhere I looked, all I could see was the great chasm between our two experiences of motherhood. The trouble is not that I had begun to think of myself as a fellow mother, but that I had ceased to think of myself as her daughter. While I will assuredly continue to grow in my understanding of how Mary accompanies me in my own motherhood, I must never lose sight of the fact that she is, first and foremost, mother — mother to Jesus, mother to me, and yes, mother with me to my children. 

When you find it hard to mother with Mary, remember that you are always being mothered by her.

I am sure that many other women have had the opposite experience of mine, but for those of you who have similarly struggled with your relationship to Mary in light of your own spiritual or biological motherhood, I hope this reflection breathes new life into your relationship with Mary. When you find it hard to mother with Mary, remember that you are always being mothered by her. Ponder the truth: She delights in you as her marvelous daughter much more profoundly than you could ever delight in your own most precious child. Don’t wait to have a baby girl to realize that you, too, forever remain a beloved little girl in her perfect mother’s arms. 

Maria Mellis is wife to her beloved Austin and mother of three remarkable little souls. She has spent a decade teaching high school and college-level English and is currently active as a parish music director, but the majority of her time is now devoted to home and family life as she raises her young children. Maria has spent time living and teaching in Poland and loves to travel, to bake, and to play sports, especially soccer and volleyball. She is passionate about the daily opportunity that each one of us has to encounter God in the most ordinary of moments.