Mothers Day!

We all have or had wonderful mothers in our lives, I have been fortunate also to enjoy the love and support of a wonderful Mom also!

She is a caregiver and has been her whole life, but that is who my mom is.

She grew up in a large family and was one of the younger children, but living on a farm in rural North Dakota, was a hard life and lots of work, where she learned to never be afraid of hard work.

Married to my Dad shortly after completing high school, and starting a family within a year, she is the mother to 6 of us, 5 boys and then our baby sister, who is 16 years younger than I am. I am always amazed how well she did with 5 boys to take care of, and moving around in the earlier years in SE Wisconsin, and living in a number of mobile homes during that time.

When I started 5th grade we had moved back to North Dakota, and began a life of farming on the Coit Family Farm. Where I remember her helping with washing the bulk tank, and other dairy chores, all the while feeding us all and doing loads of laundry day after day. Even caring for my grandfather Neal Coit, while he lived with us in the family farm house.

Then we were all blessed, with the arrival of a new baby our younger sister Valerie. Granted we all pitched in to care for her as we were all overjoyed with finally a girl in our family. But it was more to care for and she still had to feed us all and keep us organized and handle all the stresses of a farm life and in North Dakota.

As us children grew up and went on to college and our own lives, she has always been there to support us and help us when she could. But she needed to be busier and soon had a job as a County Home Health Care Provider, which meant she would visit her clients that she was assigned to care for by the County.

She spent 25 years, driving on North Dakota roads in all kinds of weather, going to the homes or apartments that her clients lived in, checking on the status of their health, blood pressure, medications they were taking, and assisting with bathing them if needed. Then she also cleaned their homes vacuuming and washing floors and cleaning up after them, doing their laundry and then even took the time to visit with them, share a cup of coffee or tea, and listen to what was going on in their lives!

Mom, also gave time to her church and her friends when ever they called to ask for some help.

I know my Mom's biggest fault is she never could say "No", she would always try to help in some way.

I have always marveled at how much she can give, and how genuine of a caregiver she truly is!

Mom, you deserve the time to rest and enjoy your family, now that you are retired, and to take care of yourself and Dad!

I am proud of who you are and what you have done and I know I am not the only one who recognizes everything you have done for us kids and all your friends and those you have cared for!

Love You Mom, and I hope you had a great Mother's Day!