Of Moms and Sons, Moms and Daughters

I have to point you all towards the blog of one of my friends, as I think she has written an extremely thoughtful post.
She is always one of the best bloggers on parenting issues out there, but this post really resonates with me. It's just past Mothers Day, and my head has been filled with this year's media bombardment about the "Mommy Wars" So much so, that the frenzy enabled me to forget about the personal issue that Moxie brought home so well here today.

Like Moxie, I had a great relationship with my mom. Unfortunately, I lost her way too early (I was 24 when she died). I still miss her.
Having been the only daughter with 4 brothers, I always thought of myself as a "boy mom" and so quickly adopted WS's expressed preferences of a son when we started the adoption process. JR, of course, is an amazing child, very much a boy's child. A "momma's boy" according to his father (and grandmother), but all boy.

But now, as we contemplate #2, I find that I want a daughter. Not for, as you pointed out, the pink dresses and the Princesses (oh, please, spare me the Princesses) - but for the adult daughter. The relationship that I know I would have had with my mom, had she just been around long enough to see me to adulthood and parenthood.

Like Moxie, I also already worry about being the MIL to my son's wife. What will she be like? Will she let me in to share any of her life? Will I be able to respect her boundaries and the sacredness of her relationship with my son? Will we forge a relationship separate from just our love for JR? Will I be able to let go?

My MIL is a perfectly fine person, a devoted mother and grandmother. She has a very close relationship with her own daughter and I know she'd love to have a closer relationship with me. I'm the problem. No matter how hard she tries, she is just NOT my mother and I'm still, all these years later, mourning my own mother too much to let anyone else in.

It is such an awesome responsibility and complicated undertaking, this raising of children, isn't it?