I knew the day was coming. Almost every mother of a son I know eventually becomes dwarfed by her baby boy, switches to standing in front of him instead of holding him for pictures. I saw that my husband was taller than his mom, that my own dad was taller than my grandma. I knew deep in my heart that it was going to happen, but I still was not prepared for the day my son became taller than me. 

I’ve always been tall, nearly six feet, and forever banished to the back row of every group picture. Pants and legroom have always been hard to find, but few shelves have been too hard to reach. I’m tall, my husband is tall, and even though our kids have always been the tallest toddlers on the playground, I was sure I had more time until I had to start looking up at the boy who has forever looked up to me. 

I was hugging him before bed, telling him goodnight, but it felt awkward, twisted, mangled. Instead of pulling my boy into me and squeezing him, I felt joints, knobs, limbs. I realized that, to my great shock, he was, ever so slightly, squatting. 

RELATED: You’re Right Here In My Arms, But Sometimes I Already Miss You

We faced each other, and with pride and horror, I realized I wasn’t looking into his eyes anymoreI was staring at his nose. My boy, my firstborn, my tiny preemie whose head I sniffed incessantly in the NICU was now standing tall enough to sniff my head. 

He saw my eyes well with tears and went in for another hug, just as we’d hugged for 13 yearshis arms around my waist and mine around his shoulders.

The universal symbol of mothering, of nurturing, of care and protection. The stance that told him he could fall into me and always find peace, the embrace that enveloped him and told him he was loved. We tried to hug this way, but as before, the elbows and shoulders and squatting made it look more like a geometry problem than a symbol of care. 

“Baby, you’re going to need to go up on the hugs from now on. You go up, I’ll go down.” 

So we hugged again, a little differently. He wasn’t as unsteady as with his first stepsthis time it was me who was unsure. He wasn’t burying his face into my stomach to soften his tears, he was wrapping his arms around my shoulders to soften mine. Instead of resting my cheek against his hair and breathing in whiffs of his sweet shampoo, I now laid my head against his chest and caught the notes of his cologne. 

My son was now holding me as firmly as I’ve always held him

RELATED: When Your Little Boys Aren’t Little Anymore, This is What You Can Look Forward To

He’s still very much a boy, but the man he’s becoming seems to be peering through the cracks sooner than I’d thought he would. I’d worried about the day he became taller than me, afraid that once he had to look down at me he wouldn’t respect my authority or take me seriously. I was afraid if I had to start going down on the hugs, I’d become less important, that if I couldn’t wrap him up in my arms, he wouldn’t come to me . . . or maybe even need me. 

But since he’s grown to be taller than me, I’ve realized my position as his mother hasn’t changed with my position in our hugs.

He still says goofy things and falls up the stairs, still laughs at potty humor, and needs to be reminded to take the trash out. He’s not a man yet, and he hasn’t lost his need for me yet. I still have work to do in mothering him, just from a different position. 

He no longer needs me to feed him, to bathe him, or to help him sound out words. But he does still need me to teach him to cook, to help him pick out body wash that he likes, and to talk over the day’s problems with. He doesn’t need me to rock him to sleep, but he does need me to shake him awake. I no longer have to find a babysitter so I can go to the movies, now I can go with him. We don’t need a booster seat when we go out, but soon I’ll be in his passenger seat. 

RELATED: Dear Teenagers, Be Patient While I Let Go

My arms go down now when we hug, now that my son is taller than me. I still get to hug him, still get to comfort him, only now I get to feel the product of my hard work when he wraps his arms around me. The position has changed, but the need has not. The mechanics of mothering a teenager are different from those of parenting a toddler, but they’re still there.

Our hugs have changed and along with them, our relationship. 

The shift from lying my cheek on his hair, to pressing it against his heart has been a powerful symbol in the shift from parenting a boy to parenting a young man. I can’t do it all for him anymore, but he’s not altogether independent from me, either. There’s a difference, but not an absence. 

My son is now taller than me when we hug, but he still wants to hug me. And while I’ll never again lean my head down to cover and envelop him, from here on I get to press my ear to his chest and hear the beating of a heart I helped mold. My boy may be bigger than me now, but it’s never been more clear that he’ll never be too big for me, or my hugs. 

So God Made a Mother book by Leslie Means

If you liked this, you'll love our book, SO GOD MADE A MOTHER available now!

Order Now

Check out our new Keepsake Companion Journal that pairs with our So God Made a Mother book!

Order Now
So God Made a Mother's Story Keepsake Journal

Jennifer Vail

Jennifer is married to the very handsome man she's loved half her life, with whom she juggles 3 hilarious, quirky, sometimes-difficult-but-always-worth-the-work kids. She is passionate about people and 90's pop culture, can't go a week without TexMex, and maintains the controversial belief that Han shot first. She holds degrees in counseling and general ministries, writes at This Undeserved Life, and can often be found staying up too late but rarely found folding laundry.

Instead of Counting Down the Days until My Marine Came Home, I Counted My Blessings

In: Motherhood
Mother and two children holding "welcome home" signs next to soldier daddy, color photo

It was a relatively mild morning in October—cool even, considering we were in the middle of the Mojave Desert. We stood atop a concrete amphitheater overlooking a grass field in the middle of the small USMC installation known as Twenty-Nine Palms. All the unit’s seabags were lined up in neat rows, each one stuffed to bursting. John held our daughter Eleanor who had just woken up from a nap in her infant carrier. Blearily, she looked around and then smiled when John paused his conversation with some of his friends to coo at her. I sat with our son Sawyer...

Keep Reading

I Am an Adult with Autism

In: Living, Motherhood
Mother and three children in wildflowers, color photo

Thirty years. That’s how long it took for me to get the right diagnoses. Thirty years. Of struggles. Of shame. Of depression and anxiety. Of bullying. All without knowing the true causes and what was really going on. I never would have believed you if you told me a few years ago that I was autistic. It wasn’t until all three of my children were diagnosed with autism that I started to see the similarities and begin to question. At first, I thought there was no way. Wouldn’t I have known by now? It just can’t be. So I threw...

Keep Reading

I Hope My Daughter Loves Her Future Mother-in-Law

In: Motherhood
Bride holding mother's hands

I’m a proud boy mom. I catch bugs, I catch balls (in the house), and I try my best to catch my boys’ every fall. I love it. I love being a boy mom. There is one part I don’t like: everyone telling me they will leave as soon as they meet “the one,” and their wife’s family will push my husband and I out of the picture. “A boy is yours ‘til he finds a wife, a daughter’s your daughter all her life.” I’d heard it too many times from older moms who chuckle as if the rhyming covers...

Keep Reading

Adoptive Parents-To-Be Deserve to Be Celebrated Too

In: Motherhood
Couple making heart with hands

My husband and I are on a very exciting journey—we are in the process of adopting our first child! Wow, we are stoked beyond words. Albeit we are on the front end of the journey at this point (as in just now about to complete our home study). Yet we are knee-deep and in the thick of it all. After struggling with infertility for about two years and many doctors’ appointments later, it became clear that natural conception is not how we will become parents. We never thought we would encounter infertility. Infertility has been hard and a grieving process...

Keep Reading

I’m Thankful for the Community We’ve Found

In: Friendship, Living, Motherhood
Community on street having a picnic

It was the end of the school holidays, and the return to school after Christmas was looming. The children had had two weeks at home. The general sense of routine was lost for the boys, with late nights and relaxing days watching YouTube while playing their Switch. I was eager for routine to make a reappearance through school. As we headed into the weekend before the start of school, Josh had a cough and then a fever, and it became clear this would not be the week I had envisioned. By Monday morning the boys appeared more lethargic than usual,...

Keep Reading

Our Kids Need Us as Much as We Need Them

In: Kids, Motherhood
Little boy sitting on bench with dog nearby, color photo

During a moment of sadness last week, my lively and joyful toddler voluntarily sat with me on the couch, holding hands and snuggling for a good hour. This brought comfort and happiness to the situation. At that moment, I realized sometimes our kids need us, sometimes we need them, and sometimes we need each other at the same time. Kids need us. From the moment they enter the world, infants express their needs through tiny (or loud) cries. Toddlers need lots of cuddling as their brains try to comprehend black, white, and all the colors of the expanding world around...

Keep Reading

Your Kids Don’t Need More Things, They Need More You

In: Faith, Kids, Motherhood
Mother and young girl smiling together at home

He reached for my hand and then looked up. His sweet smile and lingering gaze flooded my weary heart with much-needed peace. “Thank you for taking me to the library, Mommy! It’s like we’re on a date! I like it when it’s just the two of us.” We entered the library, hand in hand, and headed toward the LEGO table. As I began gathering books nearby, I was surprised to feel my son’s arms around me. He gave me a quick squeeze and a kiss with an “I love you, Mommy” before returning to his LEGO—three separate times. My typically...

Keep Reading

Take it from a Mom Who’s Been There: It Gets Easier

In: Motherhood
Mother with teen daughter embracing and smiling outside

My view from home is changing as my oldest is now married and my youngest is wrapping up his college career. But dear mom of little ones and even those not-so-little ones, I want you to know that I remember. I remember the side-eyes and the judging glances from older moms as I juggled toddlers doing their toddler thing. All these years later, I still feel the harshness of their stings. I remember the gloom and doom declarations of “Just wait until they turn three, or ten, or thirteen . . .” Those almost gleefully delivered little quips that made...

Keep Reading

This is How to Support Miscarriage Moms

In: Grief, Loss, Motherhood
Woman with arm around another woman sitting in field

When you hear the term miscarriage, what do you think? My initial thought was the loss of an unborn child, but have you ever really wondered what truly happens when you are having a miscarriage? Our first miscarriage occurred immediately after our wedding in 2019, we had a chemical pregnancy after conceiving while on our honeymoon. This means we had a positive pregnancy test, but by the time we got to our OB/GYN, I had the heaviest period of my life, resulting in a negative serum pregnancy test. That was hard enough to go through but was nothing compared to...

Keep Reading

Mom, Will You Pray With Me?

In: Faith, Motherhood
Little girl praying, profile shot

“Will you pray with me?” This is a question I hear daily from my 9-year-old. Her worried heart at times grips her, making it difficult for her to fall asleep or nervous to try something new. Her first instinct is to pray with Mom. Perhaps this is because of how many times her Dad and I have told her that God is with her, that she is never alone, and that she can always come to Him in prayer and He will answer. Perhaps it is because she has seen her Dad and I lean on the Lord in times...

Keep Reading