08/16/2024
To mothers the day after a Holy Day of Obligation:
How beautiful that you have come here to seek support and encouragement from other moms in the trenches with you!
I have ADD and my ten year old daughter has Down Syndrome. We aimed for the 8:30 am mass and 12:10 mass but didn’t make it. For the 12:10, we drove half an hour to the church that had it, but didn’t get there until they were putting away communion because in this case, I needed to make an emergency bathroom break along the way. We finally arrived at a 7pm mass across town late because I had a 5:30 pm new client appointment and then I needed to pick up my girls and get to the church. I forgot my daughter’s headphones that help her sensitivity to the voices through the PA system. She had to use the restroom twice, once when we got there and again just before the homily. We ended up staying in the vestibule listening to the homily and Eucharistic prayer while I held her against me swaying and protecting her ears. Eventually she started adjusting to the volume of the space and was twirling to the offertory song. I coaxed her back to the pew to be with her 16 year old sister just before communion.
I heard just enough of the homily to know that one of the readings was the visitation. Mary’s strength was Trust in God and not having to know all the answers and stepping out in faith to accompany Christ in the hard things.
The beautiful thing is God our Creator knows you and your daughter intimately. He knows each of your challenges and limitations. He still calls you to himself.
As a mother, your vocation as a child of God, wife and mother are going to stretch us. Since we are called to sanctity, and we only have primary custody of ourselves and our actions, our mission, is to learn how to fulfill our vocation while maintaining peace and Joy.
I am the mother to six children, and have been mothering for 28 years while my husband works away as a ship captain 1/2-2/3 of the years. My first four were close in age and we homeschooled while I built my business.
I was often alone at Mass with children. Happily, I had some wise spiritual guidance from moms who had been on the path ahead of me.
We must prioritize filling ourself up in order to have the resilience to meet the demands that will predictably come at us in our day to day. What fills your soul with Joy? Are you able to find moments to pause for prayer throughout your day even if it’s listening to the USCCB free recording of the day’s readings on the way to Mass? Choosing a line of scripture from that day’s readings to toss about your mind as you go about your day is an easy way for an ADHD brain to absorb and apply scripture.
If I manage to read the readings before Mass I do not sweat it if I don’t catch all of the readings during Mass and all of the homily (though that’s ideal).
The standards for focus and attention and reverence we were raised with probably didn’t give grace to the neurodivergent influence. And even if we manage to get ourselves to “do things right”. We are charged with forming the little souls before us and model for them how loving Jesus is a beautiful grace and life-giving blessing.
Knowing that attending Mass with your child will not be ideal for resting in Jesus even when you remember all the tools, (water bottle, checklist, etc.), you must prioritize a different part of your day to fill up with Jesus so you can be Christ to her in her learning and growing moments.
In my experience living with ADHD, there never seems to be enough moments in the day for everything and everything seems super important. I have found when I prioritize my soul care, my time seems to multiply because I’m less likely to be scattered and frazzled.
The Missionaries to the Poor (St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta’s sisters) serve a large number of wretchedly sick and dying people with great joy and love. They are capable of sustaining that because their daily schedule includes mass, two separate holy hours, meals and tea time with their fellow sisters and some moments of free time for private reading or napping that are woven around their services they pour out to ‘the least of these’.
Soul care doesn’t have to be just prayer and meditation. It can be listening to uplifting music, arranging fresh flowers, savoring a favorite tea or coffee, talking a moment to put your bare feet in the grass, taking five extra minutes in the shower to thank God for the gift of running water and hair to wash, diffusing pure essential oils by the kitchen sink while doing the dishes, dancing to music while folding laundry and inviting your child to join the dance party while she learns to fold.
Some inspiring reading is the biography of St. Zélie Martin and St. Gianna Molla’s letters to her husband. A book that taught me to pray and make my service to my family part of my prayer was the book, The Vocation of Holy Motherhood. Another good one is Searching for and Maintaining Peace by Fr. Jacques Phillipe.
God already knows you’re going to be distracted and forget things. Your sense that you need stillness and filling up time with Jesus is spot on. It just will look different in this season of life.
Hugs mama. Filling your cup allows you to pour into others.
