Motherhood is a full-time job, some say. It begins on the day you were born and continues through your independent years when you’ve started to lead your own life. But when do children start to glorify the woman who nurtured, protected and provided for them before they’re deemed as being ungrateful?

Mother’s day is here again, we’ll see persons going above and beyond in showing mothers how much of a critical role they have played in their lives. They may shower her with gifts and love right throughout the year, but Mother’s Day is only celebrated once per year; and on this day, persons will purchase roses, cards, take mommy out to dinner and believe that they have fulfilled their obligation of honouring ‘mum’.What about those who would give anything to share at least another moment with their mother? They might’ve lost her through death, or merely not have her around because of migration, negligence, abandonment or the like.Some of the people who shared that mutual unconditional love with their mother and wish that she were alive to bask in the magnificence of her presence have told the

Jamaica Observer about the most memorable thing about their mother and what spending Mother’s Day without her is like.Shanique Gaye was an innocent one-year-old when she lost her mother. She was clueless as to the void that would be left, had she shared more memories with such a significant person in her life. She used poetry as a coping mechanism in the earlier stages of her being and shared this piece with the

Sunday Observer: “My mom, Elizabeth.I hardly knew her, too young to remember, Because she passed away when I was only a year,Strangely, I remember the song that was playing as they laid her to rest: “When the roll is called up yonder” . I was crying and fussing because I wanted breast. In an attempt to get me to stop crying, they gave me a little box juice and I calmed down for a bit. It was like a truce.“Growing up I always asked the question “where is my mother?” because I always saw other children with their moms, and I’d always be with my dad. But I was too young to understand, As I grew older it became clear, But the pain that comes with this understanding can sometimes be too hard to bear.I miss her, her personality and her beautiful smile, Just thinking about her makes me shed a tear every once in a while.”Shanique is 23 years old and shared her experience of living without her mother and the faint recollection of her mother’s existence.“Growing up, Mother’s Day was a thing. Everyone made it out to be a big deal. But as I got older it was just a normal day… but I still wished the other mother figures in my life Happy Mother’s Day. I miss her everyday, not only on Mother’s Day. Even though I didn’t know her, people always told me about her personality and smile, and that stood out most to me.”Omar Hamilton, 35, admits to missing her mother every day, particularly when it comes around to her birthday in April.“More time mi nu like think bout it. When me see everyone sending in wishes on social media, it break me down a way. When mother’s day come it’s just a sad day (for me)… I remember when she usually carry me to church with her, the back to school shopping and when she would bring me to Town to buy her goods fi do har hustling… Nobody like Mama Bobsie enu,” Hamilton said..Nadine Neita, now 47, and Byron Gaye, a 53-year-old, similarly were curious children in the kitchen and regard their mothers’ cooking, and time spent in the kitchen as the fondest memories they had growing up.“The most memorable thing about my mother… when we were smaller, when she peel breadfruit, she cut a man-shape from the skin for all of us (two sisters and himself), and when she knead flour, she would give us our own pieces of dough to play with. And she would put us at her feet to sit and teach us how to read. I usually buy her gifts, so when it comes around to this time, I always feel a way that I don’t have a mother to give a gift to,” Neita shared.Gaye revealed that he is used to seeing ‘mama’ on weekends when he would journey from St Catherine to her home in Big Woods district, Westmorland. Now he gets lonely knowing that he cannot do that anymore, and having Mother’s Day without her around is not the same.And what does he miss the most? “When I used to visit on weekends for the food that she cooks,” he said with a laugh.Junior Morgan, 46, memorises and describes his mother Ruby as a peaceful, loving and kind woman. “She would give all she had and do without, so my mother did stay… It has been so sad living without her for so many years since 2001. When she was alive she had to get a card and at least a gift (from me) and she always appreciates it, no matter how small it is,” Morgan recalled.