The decision to found a NFP
I sat in front of the news with tears streaming down my face. I don’t watch the news often. Network News, especially, leaves me either angry or sad. So, I avoid it. I’am no glutton for punishment. (Though my husband would disagree with me there.)
I was meant to see that particular broadcast. There was something in the mannerisms of the Somalian baby. I recognised them. I see those very expressions in my own infant when he is desperate for a feed. When the breast finally brushes his lips he is relief embodied. This frail baby, when offered barely dribble of water, radiated the same perfect peace. Moments later his relief dissolved and he reclined in his mothers arms unsatisfied.
Perhaps it was the hormones. I mean my baby was only 4 months old at the time, I still had a lot of chemical help floating in my blood stream whispering ‘nurture the babies’. Regardless of the catalyst, those few moments of video broke my heart. Literally. My heart burst wide open and I saw my child in that baby. (I still think of that boy when I awake in the wee hours of the morning. I pray his hunger is satiated.) I knew his mothers misery. Tears flowed unimpeded and I looked over at my husband and in that moment he knew what was coming.
“I HAVE to do something…”
“I know.”
And then, it began. Nameless. Even writing this I still haven’t coined a name. But the mission, the vision, the calling are so familiar to me that I am sure they have been with me my whole life. No mother should have to watch her children wither and die en route to a refugee camp. No mother should have to decide which child to feed. And I believe, deep in my bones, that if we (the mothers who are fortunate enough to not face these decisions) could see a way to preventing such anguish, we would. Our children deserve a kind and gentle world. And they are all our children.
I discovered, when my heart broke open wide, that my life’s work is in making the connection between those who thrive and those struggling to survive. To find the way to amplify the work we already do and the compassion we already show. If we can extend our emotional neighbourhoods to those who really need our compassion, solidarity, voice and means we will change the world.
