A Mother’s Pain
Cindy Sheehan
The only thing I ever wanted to be my entire life was a Mom. I never even
thought of having a career because I always wanted to have babies. My own
family was pretty dysfunctional when I was growing up and I just wanted to
have a family of my own to love and nurture.
When Pat and I found out that we were pregnant with Casey, our first, we
were ecstatic. We had been married for over a year when we decided that we
wanted to start our family and we were pregnant the first month that we
tried.
Casey was born on Memorial Day, May 29th, 1979. I couldn’t take my eyes off
of my darling newborn son. He was so alert and his eyes would pierce my soul
and it always seemed like he knew what I was thinking. He was such a good
baby although he liked to stay up late at night. Casey and I watched many
old black and white movies while we rocked in the rocking chair that Grandpa
Miller gave us.
Casey wasn’t even a year old when we became pregnant with Carly. After Casey
was born, Pat and I decided that we wanted to deliver any other children at
home so I wouldn’t have to leave Casey to go to the hospital to have the
babies and so that the birth would be more under our control. While I was in
labor with Carly, Casey would come in with his Fisher-Price camera and say:
“Say cheese, Mama.” And he would pretend to take my picture and then he
would leave the bedroom to go and be adored by the various grandmas,
aunties, and other friends and relatives who gathered for the birth of our
second beautiful baby, Carly.
I loved Casey so much that when I was pregnant with Carly, I wondered how I
could fit more love in my heart for another child. After she was born, I
discovered that the human heart has no limit to how much love it can hold.
With the births of Andrew and Janey our family and our hearts expanded
proportionally and we were complete: mom, dad, two boys, two girls – we did
everything together and we were a very close family.
When Casey was killed in George’s ill-conceived war for profit our family
was torn apart. Many well meaning people would tell me: at least you still
have three more children. Which is technically correct but not very helpful.
Does anyone ever go up to an amputee and say: “Well, you lost your arm, but
at least you have 3 other limbs?” I feel very fortunate that I am blessed
with such a wonderful and large family. I know many moms who had their only
child stolen by BushCo in its lust for money and power but I am the mother
of four, not three; and Carly, Andy, and Janey had a big brother, who was
always part of their lives, murdered for lies.
I wasn’t planning on having any more children, my baby is 20 and I am on the
very shady side of 50, but having my womb removed the other day was still
traumatic—I carried and nurtured the four loves of my life in there and it
was a part of me. I will recover from the surgery and it will be nice to
finally stop bleeding and get physically stronger. However,
the pain of childbirth and the pain I am in right now is nothing compared to the pain
that I felt on April 4 th, 2004 when I found out that my oldest had been
shot in the back of the head in an ambush by Iraqi resistance fighters who
wanted him and the USA out of their country. I will never fully recover from
the pain of child death. Wounds scab over; incisions heal; broken bones
mend; but a heart shattered from child death cannot easily, if ever, be put
back together again.
I am still here in Texas recuperating from my surgeries and hoping to be
back on my feet next week to go and protest George with Mayor Rocky in Salt
Lake City and be up and about when he comes back to Crawford for the Labor
Day Weekend. Apparently George Bush is a “regular guy” who meets with his
constituents, so I am looking forward to finally getting the meeting with
him that I have been asking for all year long.
I want the meeting to call George on his many deceptions.
If he or the other
greedy neocons never said the exact words: “Saddam ordered 9/11,” they made
the connections over and over and they also told us that Saddam had WMD and
that he was trying to buy yellow cake uranium from Niger. I want the meeting
with George so I can express to him in very human and emotional terms how
painful it is to bury a part of oneself. Even if it is not for lies, it is
not natural or normal to bury a child. I want the meeting with George to
demand that he bring our other children home from the nightmare of Iraq even
while the war mongers are activating more Marines to go to the Middle East
and stop-lossing other troops who just want to come home.
I want the meeting because I don’t want another mother to feel such
unnecessary and unrelenting pain.
Even though some people try to demonize me
and assign sinister motives to my quest for peace, this is my basic goal.
Not one more.
Please go to the Camp Casey website for more information.
Deanna Dee-Dee Taylor 