I suppose most people might agree it takes a village to elevate a child, and that everyone in some way leaves an impact on us even if we no longer recognize it. I know that my Mom has made the biggest impact of all on my life while always reminding me to believe in myself, treat everyone kindly as we never know what they are going thru and most important to make use of what we learn from our village so we evolve.
The reason that I say my mom has made the most impact in my life, besides all of the things that I listed earlier, is because no matter what I did my mom was the one there that kept telling me I could do anything I wanted, she believed in me when I did not believe in myself. I also have always known that my mom loves me unconditionally. Time and time again I have heard, “it does not matter what you do in your life, there is nothing you can do to make me not love you.”
My mom is different than most moms, yes, she is very strict and she always said God did not give me to her to be my friend he gave me to her to love and teach and grow into a success, and even though she had a heart attack while pregnant with me from the systemic lupus and is now fighting glioblastoma, she never gives up and makes sure I know that I am her priority not her illness. I have see a lot of my friends that have healthy parents and their parents are not involved with them, heck most of the time my friends parents could not tell you what my friends were doing, who they were dating, what they were doing online, or show much interest in their achievements.
My mom, I assure you always knew where I was, knew who my friends were, and knew what I was doing online. I swear to you it true, that up until the day she dropped me at college, she was still monitoring my phone and web activity, friends and where I went. I know that it sounds like she was being controlling, and trust me their were times even I felt that way, but as I got older and saw trouble friends got into or classmates, I realized Mom did what she did out of love. My mom knew that the world is not always a good place, that no matter how much she trusted me, my brain was still growing and developing and reasoning and that I was going to make mistakes, and she just wanted to be there to guide me so that my mistakes did not ruin my life.
I think Mom was a big influence as well because she never hid her mistakes from me, she wanted to be sure that I knew that she had the experience to know what she was doing and she just wanted to save me from that pain.
Another way my mom influenced my life deeply is because I watched her struggle, work 2 or 3 jobs at a time, have a stroke that cost her all her long-term memory, and yet never, never give up. My mom was a pediatric trauma surgeon and I watched as a stroke took away her life, she loved being a doctor, and yet as she was learning to tie her shoes, or try to remember her past, or struggle to learn to count money, she just kept fighting. When I would say anything to mom about how it was not fare what she was going thru or how hard she had to work, all she would say was, ” anything worth doing is hard” and that “life should never be looked at as fair or unfair that we should just be happy we are as fortunate as we are because some people are a lot worse off.”
The impact of seeing my mom fight for her life, to watch her no matter what was thrown at her get up everyday with a smile and keep going. I know there are days mom is in so much pain she cannot hardly move, but she still up and going. My mom is living the lessons she is teaching me, and I believe that what I have learned are the skills that I am going to use for the rest of my life.
In conclusion, I just want to say that yes, I know choosing a parent as making a big impact is probably something teens say to take the easy way out, but in my case it is the truth. My mother, no matter what adversity she faced or faces never gives up and above all else, no matter what I have done or will do with my life, she will always love me unconditionally and believe that I can do anything I truly want to do in life, and that is the most wonderful gift any parent can give a child.
