Lisa {Mother of Kings}

I think that as mothers and as women generally we are guilty of comparing ourselves and our children to one another in a competitive and non-constructive way. Collecting out experiences in an open and non-judgemental way could be so beneficial.

I have two sons. Sometimes I am at a complete loss when it comes to what I need to do in order to help them to become men of principle... and happy ones at that.
Lisa's attitude of making moments count, and not counting moments is inspiring to me and reminds me to be grateful for the goodness of life.

You can read more about her household of Kings on her blog.

Something that I have learnt over the last twelve years is that life can change in an instant. In 1995 I married my best friend Aaron, and four years later our eldest son Jalen was born.

Almost twelve years ago my life changed in an instant, when our second eldest son Noah, was diagnosed with a condition called hydranencephaly at nine weeks old. The short version is that he was missing most of his brain because he suffered a stroke while I was pregnant with him. We were told that he probably wouldn’t live longer than four years old and we left hospital with our beautiful baby, who we now knew was severely physically and mentally disabled.

Aaron and I were blessed with four beautiful boys. Our sons Harri and Kobe were born after Noah and they reminded us that life is awesome, as they brought a lot of joy back into our family. I love being a Mum and life was hard at times, but also wonderful.

As a Mum I feel like it’s my responsibility to teach my boys, but Noah taught me more than I could ever teach him. He taught us to appreciate every single day. He taught us that it really is the little things in life that are the most important. He taught us that our family is the biggest blessing that we have, and that we needed to make the most of the time we had together, because you never know when it’s going to be taken away.

A lot of people say that being a Mum is the hardest but best job you can do, and I totally agree. Noah needed full time care and had a lot of health issues, and life was far from what I had imagined it to be, but the blessings of having such a special spirit in our home, far outweighed anything else.
Our life once again changed in an instant, when we sat around Noah’s bedside in the Intensive Care Unit as a family and say goodbye to him. It was just three months after his tenth birthday and his body shut down after years of illnesses and he passed away.

Our hearts broke that day and we had to adjust to life without our beautiful son. My heart was far from being healed when just three and a half months later my husband Aaron suffered a massive heart attack right in front of me and my boys, and passed away.

It has now been nineteen months since Noah passed away and sixteen months since Aaron passed away, and I’m still don’t really believe that this is my life. I’m now a single Mum raising my three boys on earth on my own. It’s so hard to be grieving for Noah and Aaron at the same time. It’s so hard to be grieving myself, but having to help my boys through their own trauma and grief.

I am grateful every day for my three boys, as they are what keep me going every day. We are learning together to find the good in life. We cry together often, but we also laugh together still. I’m grateful for Noah who taught us to make the most of every day, and I’m trying to remember that now and to teach my boys that as well.

Our days feel empty without our whole family here, but together we are trying to focus on our blessings, and our biggest blessing is that we know that we will be together as a whole family one day.

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