TEN LESSONS MY MOTHER TAUGHT ME.

When a loved one departs, it’s the memories that they leave behind that give us comfort. Day after day my siblings and I exchange pictures and share stories of our Mom. Daddy was not able to say anything at the funeral. I had earlier asked him if he wanted to write down something so we could read it. He told me, “Miriam, time is not enough to tell people about your mother, it was all good.” Retelling these stories has affirmed what Daddy told me, “It was all good “.

I’m sharing with you 10 lessons my Mom taught me and so far I have shared about Moms journey to faith in Christ, her marriage of 58 years and her love of marriage, being a giver like mommy and I have encouraged you to plan ahead and never have an empty purse. Today’s Lesson is ;

Lesson 5- Do not complain

If there was something mommy was not, it was grumpy. Mommy was always pleasant and she had a great sense of humor. I watched Mommy go through challenges but she never complained.

One of the biggest challenges Mommy went through happened in 1987. Daddy was 49 years of age and an Acting Judge of the High Court. He had served in the Judiciary for over 16 years rising through the ranks to become a High Court Judge. Daddy had to retire early due to a change in government. With my older sisters in University me in primary school; Daddy had to figure out what to do next. He still had young children to care for. His friends urged him to leave the city, come to terms with his fate and go back to his village in Tororo. My Auntie in New Jersey advised him to the emigrate to the USA so he could start a new career and care for his family. Mommy reasoned with Daddy and they decided to stay in the city and have Daddy go into private legal practice. At that time it was unprecedented for a former High Court Judge to go into private legal practice. Daddy has the distinction of being the first retired Judge to humble himself and do just that. He had a good friend , the Late Owori who had a law firm in Mbale called Owori & Co Advocates . He joined hands with him and started a Law firm in Kampala.

When Dad was a judge we lived in a beautiful home with a large main house and other buildings in a prestigious neighborhood of the city ( Nakasero). The house belonged to the government , all the furniture in the house belonged to the government. When he retired we immediately had to move out of the house. The new Judge who was moving into our former home was a very kind man. He came to see Daddy and asked Daddy when he would be moving out and where he would be moving. Daddy confessed to him that he had been forced to retire abruptly and that he had not yet figured out where he would take his family. The Judge offered to let us stay on the property until Dad had found an alternative home. We moved out of our large home in to the much smaller guest wing.

Life had suddenly changed. In a moment, the Benz that used to take us to school was no longer in the parking lot, the guards who stood at attention and saluted Daddy were withdrawn. The guests who flocked to our dinning table for Sunday luncheons stopped coming. As a young child I was confused. I asked my older sisters why we were moving out of the main house-‘’our home ‘’ into the guest house. Why was there a stranger in my bedroom, why did I now have to share a bed with my sister? Where were the guards? Why was I now walking to school when before I was chauffeured and accompanied by a police man ? what happened to the nice food Mommy cooked on sundays? Why were we eating millet all the time?

The good life had vanished in an instant. In a moment we went from high status to outcasts. But Mommy would not complain, instead she would say to me, “Miriam, sing!” Mommy’s favorite song was, “What a friend we have in Jesus“. Whenever she was low, she would call for me and I would hold her hand and sing my heart out . Mommy never blamed the government, or the friends who had vanished. She watched as her life went from being the esteemed wife of a High Court judge to being the wife of a struggling lawyer. She watched her husband pivot and she took it all in stride. She never complained.

When Mom’s health got worse, she would go to the hospital often. One day she cracked a joke about it. She said, “getting old is very funny, when you wake up, you have pain in your legs , when they take you to see the doctor and he asks you what the problem is you can’t answer , this is because by the time you reach the hospital it is not about the legs only, it’s about the head, the eyes , the ears, the feet, the arms…so what do you tell the doctor? which one do you pick?”

Being the youngest girl in the family, I usually offered to spend nights in the hospital with Mommy when she was admitted overnight. Mommy would be struggling for oxygen and would need to use the nebulizer, but in between the rounds she would start to talk to me and make fun. I would have to remind her to stop and rest and at-least pretend to be a patient. She would never complain. Mommy became friends with all the doctors and care givers. She would never let the situation bring her down. She chose not to complain but to take everything in stride .

One time I took Mom to the Immigration office to get her a new passport, it is then that I noticed she was having problems with her eye sight . She could barely hold a pen and sign for the passport. I decided to quickly arrange to take her and Daddy to the eye clinic for a check up . When I asked her how long this had been going on, she explained to me that it had been going on for some time. I never got to know about it because she did not complain about it. We finally got her and Daddy to have cataract surgery and her eye sight was restored. Mommy was always such a good spot. Even with all the pricks and needles, the frequent visits to hospital, multiple checkups and medicines, Mom never complained.

Pastor Gary Skinner in his book titled “ Where Faith Lit the way “ writes ;

“ Who was I to complain and to feel alone in suffering…what right did I have to complain…was it not true that out of adversity and tragedy, God would fashion victory and success?

Truth be told, in this world we will have troubles but we can be cheerful even in our darkest times knowing we shall overcome ( see John 16:33). So, when you go through suffering , do not complain, sing !

I recall Mommy telling me when I was going to hospital to have our first born baby girl Esther, she said “ Miriam, do not scream, instead use that energy to deliver your baby.”

Sometimes we scream, we shout , we pull out our hair, but there is an inner strength that we receive from God when we quiet the soul and let Him take over our suffering . Be still and know that He is God. (Psalms 46:10 )

Losing a mother is so painful, when we sit together like we did last night with Daddy and my sisters and brothers , neices and nephews, we want to scream, bang the wall, cry until our eye balls come out but you taught us not to complain but to sing, so Jack often picks up his guitar and he starts to sing and we all sing along. We will not mourn like those who have no hope.( 1 Thessalonians 4:13)

Do everything without complaining or arguing

Philippians 2:14-15