Just a Mom

I can’t even remember what led to it, but all of a sudden my 3 year old son was saying, “You’re just a mom.” It caught me off guard. That’s the phrase that is supposed to offend me, to make me feel like my job as a stay at home mom isn’t valued or even to make me feel like I’m not doing enough with my life. But coming from my 3 year old it suddenly had a different meaning to me.
Just when did being a mom get to be such a bad thing, a thing to looked down upon?  To that little boy, being “just a mom” is his whole world (other than his dad & siblings, of course). It means being his best friend, the one who takes care of all of his needs, comforts him, and teaches him everything he needs to know. It means that being a mom is the most important thing that I am – even though there’s a whole lot more to me. It means that being his mom is all that matters to him.
And suddenly that phrase that is supposed to make me feel bad or inferior made me feel AMAZING and of the highest worth. Because being a mom is a wonderful thing and working each day to be the best mom I can be is the best way I can spend these years. The world around us doesn’t hold that same value these days, but in that one moment, I was reminded of the value of being a mom.
So, the next time someone out in the world says, “So, you’re just a mom” to me, I’ll smile & say, “YES!”  Because I’ll hear it as my 3 year old son would say it and know that the real truth of the statement is, “So, you’re just amazing.”