#25) Mothers Unite

February 27, 2017

Dear Mr. President,

Here's something I haven't shared with you yet – my family is formed through adoption.  My husband and I were foster parents for 21 years and adopted 4 children (well, legally we adopted 3 but #4 is now 25 and still with us so I think she's ours by common law at this point.)

My kids have tremendous needs, or as I like to call them, extenuating circumstances.  And luckily, we have been mostly able to meet those needs through the combined efforts of an excellent school system, decent health insurance, and well staffed social service agencies.  I know that I am very lucky.  I also know that I am launching four compassionate, kind and well-adjusted human beings into the world; something I am very proud of.

But for this letter I want to stop and ask you to think about all the mothers who can't give their kids what they need to grow and thrive.  Let's think for a moment about the thousands of mothers who have lost a child to senseless, preventable gun violence.  The mothers who can't afford basic medications like asthma inhalers and epi-pens because unregulated pharmaceutical companies see only profit margins and not the human faces of growing children.  The mothers who lose sleep at night worrying about how their bright, inquisitive children will ever afford a college education. The mothers fighting for the basic human right of healthy, safe drinking water.  The single mothers who go it alone, financially and emotionally, because their partner can't or won't share the burden of parenting.  Who raise their children single handedly to feel loved and valued that they might, in their turn, bring more love and value to the world.  All of the grandmothers who thought they were done mothering but answered the call/need of their grandchildren and are parenting again in their golden years.  The mothers whose entire paycheck goes to sub-par childcare because they can only get health insurance by working full time.  Every mother of a black son who has had to teach him how to navigate the world differently simply because of his skin color.  And all the mothers who have faced the abortion decision themselves or have had to support a daughter, niece, cousin, or friend through the process. And let's not forget all the mothers who just get up, make breakfast, put in a load of laundry and tackle whatever's next on the to-do list.  They get up, show up, and get shit done.

The world does not need another luxury hotel or golf course.  It needs affordable secondary education and vocational technical programs.  It needs clean air, water, and soil.  It needs well-funded public schools and daycares to accommodate the increasingly varied needs of our children.  And it needs affordable health insurance and medications.

If you only take one thing away from all these letters I'm writing, let it be this:

            The hand that rocks the cradle rocks the world.

Now if you put that on an ugly red baseball hat I'd wear it!

Sincerely,

Amy Beaton