May is the month of our Blessed Mother, Virgin Mary, a time that naturally draws our hearts toward motherhood, nurturing, and all the quiet ways love takes root and grows.
It’s also the month where the earth itself reminds us what growth looks like; May showers bring spring flowers. In Texas, where I am from, this isn’t without a mess. We get a dusty coat of green pollen that coats and sticks to our cars, windows, and houses. Then the rain comes and washes it away. It’s a process that is faithful. You know it’s going to take place in order to bring forth the beautiful new growth and gorgeous landscaping, but it is frustrating and irritating in the process.
And I can’t help but see my life in that.
As a mom of five, two of my own flesh and three incredible bonus blessings, I’ve come to understand that nurturing isn’t always soft and easy. It can be just as messy. Sometimes it looks like long conversations and others it’s teaching how to set boundaries. And it’s not always giving them not what they want, but exactly what they need… even when, in the moment, that feels like “nothing.”
Those are the moments of rain to wash the muck away. And then the change begins.
They choose kindness and show up for others. They believe in themselves and flourish.
But life, in its wisdom, doesn’t leave us in one season for long.
Just as you feel settled in watching your children grow, you find yourself stepping into a new role you didn’t fully prepare for.
Caring for the ones who once cared for you.
There is something deeply humbling about that shift. Being with your parents and in-laws realizing they now need nurturing from you as they once gave it so freely.
I find myself here now.
Walking alongside my mother-in-law in the final stages of her life. Supporting my father-in-law as he navigates not only profound loss, but his own physical suffering.
This nurturing is quieter, slower, more sacred in a way I didn’t expect.
In the messy of nurturing growth in my children I feel the inner beauty of nurturing the final journey for my mother in law. In this I find myself looking again to our Blessed Mother.
She nurtured life in its beginning, walking with Him in his ministry, and she endured the pain of his journey to the cross.
She knew what it meant to love in every season. She didn’t rush past any of it.
And maybe that’s what this month of May is really inviting us into. To nurture what is in front of us, whether it’s children growing, relationships stretching, or loved ones nearing the end of their earthly journey. Trusting every season has purpose and believing that even when we cannot see the fruit, God is still showing up.