I wonder how easily others would rush to judgement on our lives should we be forced by circumstances to live it in a way that was exposed and humiliatingly visible. You know those circumstances and situations that we work hard to protect from the outside world, the ones that we can just about manage so long as we are permitted the freedom of anonymity . The murky stuff that brings irrational shame and unreasonable sorrow, most especially when we feel somewhat responsible for it’s occurrence . I doubt any of us can stand and deny we have many times existed in this place. I do not believe anyone should have to live in secret and shame, however I do believe that everyone should be able to choose exactly who is and who is not privy to their deepest emotions, fears and life tragedies. Over the years it has struck me on many occasions that no single person in society is more maligned in this regard than the single mother.

In my life and work I frequently meet single mothers. Fathers too, but for this blog the focus is on mums. Thank God we no longer live in a society where babies are given up, often forcibly, for fear of familiar shame when fathers are absent. I once met an elderly woman who was in this exact position. Her pregnancy was the result of a rape and the baby was passed to her much older,childless sister. This woman later married and following complications in childbirth had no further children. She spent a lifetime watching on from the sidelines as her only child was raised by another, her heart even  in her 70’s completely wrecked by the pain of it all. So yes thank God we no longer live in a world that allows such misery to exist. Or do we?

What is your opinion on the single mother that lives on your street? I fear that too often we are content whenever we understand all the circumstances and can fully justify that their single status is no real fault of their own. However we are less enthused when we see a situation that we can make presumption on. The frequent child bearer, why have more? The woman who is in a abusive relationship, why bring another child into that? The impoverished, who is going to provide? All valid thoughts I hear you say, and yes all thoughts I myself have had. However they are superficial thoughts. They barely scratch the surface of lives that most of us will never live and hence have even less chance of understanding. None of us, not one, would easily tolerate the opinions of others on our lives. Like when a relative answers our moans about a too small house with comments of ‘well maybe move instead of going to Florida every year’ .. can you relate? When people comment on our personal lives it provokes a reaction of defence that is hard to prevent. We are human, therefore we protect ourselves against attack, even if the point is valid it nonetheless can feel like an assault. I’m merely trying to draw a parallel between the seemingly obvious and the personal, a route to empathy if you like.

It’s not a question of choosing to be a single mother or not. Many do not. Many find themselves hopelessly abandoned in a world that they never imagined, fears they never had suddenly playing out in their day to day life. It’s more than that. Motherhood is what philosophers call ‘a right of passage’. Woman, on the whole, desire it. By nature the female is designed to want to explore that mothering instinct in the same animalistic way that every species does. The animals of the wild no more sit and discuss procreation than they do anything else in their lives. Instinct overtakes and they reproduce to ensure population numbers stay on the high side. Humans are the same. When all is said and done we still have this deep, base instinct within us to reproduce. Our thinking, processing brains are relying on our knowledge, experiences and sense to decide when this reproduction is best. That my friends is a flawed system . Why? Because everyone would need to be equal in their opportunities , circumstances, history and life experience for it to work. All it takes is one factor in a woman’s life to be out of whack and she is fighting an uphill battle . That maternal urge surfaces, the opportunity to be at one with another human being  looms . Suddenly the very factors that society at large find to be reasons why NOT to have children become the EXACT motivation for that woman to do so. Put simply, we all just want to belong and be loved. Righty or wrongly that maternal instinct can lie ready and in waiting to pounce when we least expect it.

So what is my point? Of all the ‘mistakes’ people make in life a little baby should never be one of them. This is the start of a life, a whole entire human being about to take their place in this world. Each life has the potential to be something remarkable. We must begin to understand better that we cannot always make sense of people’s decisions. Quite honestly many will feel the same about some of yours, or mine for that matter. What we can make sense of is the blank canvas of new beginnings . Beautiful and raw and ready to be exactly who God created them to be. None of us want to miss the opportunity that  maybe just maybe we are the influence that will help guide that soul to it’s life altering destiny. In the words of Abraham Lincoln “everything in life I am I owe to my darling mother”. Do not be the sea that casts adrift those who make decisions or choices that you do not understand. Be the boat that joins them to the mainland, allows them to see all that life can offer . Above all try to remember that motherhood for some is a draw so deep, so primal that they simply cannot ignore its pull. Love them any way you can. Even if all we can do is to stand back and judge less we will be offering the gift of understanding and freedom which can allow anyone to fly.