Last Thanksgiving was a solemn day for our family. My daughter, Marie, had been hospitalized after a PTSD episode and subsequent suicide attempt. Steven, who had decided he was no longer going to take his medication, was hyper, ornery and argumentative and wanted nothing to do with his family on this special day.

In preparation for the day, (and prior to going out with my other children and grandchildren for our traditional Thanksgiving movie,) I had cleaned the house as my husband had shopped and prepared the food. Hoping to get to the store to buy a centerpiece for the table, time slipped by and I was unable to do so. “Doesn’t matter anyway,” I said to myself, glumly. Setting the table, an unfamiliar feeling of sadness overwhelmed me. Here I was, years into raising children with difficulties, and it suddenly dawned on me that their problems weren’t going to go away, no matter how optimistic I tried to look at things.

Just as despair was starting to sink in, there was a knock at my front door. There stood a middle-aged woman dressed in a neat, black coat with soft, fur trim. I didn’t recognize her at first, but as soon as she introduced herself, I remembered that she had a child in the same class as my son, Steven, some ten years before. Forcing a smile, I asked her how she was. She had been thinking of me on this fine Thanksgiving Day, she said, and she remembered the difficult challenges our children faced. The thought prompted her to do something nice for me, so she made me a beautiful floral centerpiece from the mums in her yard, bright and happy yellows, oranges and reds, tied with a bow! Looking at it, I couldn’t help but smile. It was beautiful! It was hopeful! It was joyful! She said she knows how hard it is to raise one child with mental illness, and that she has admiration for me raising several. I thanked her and began to cry as I hugged her tight. She had no way of knowing that that centerpiece, coming at the time it did from a woman who was almost a stranger to me, re-affirmed my faith.

Yes, some of my children may have difficult lives, but they also have the everlasting optimism of their mother to pull them through and cheer them on!