Mama pou Mama

I

In Creole the word for 'for' is 'pou'- Darcy Ulrich Jorgensen and Fay Ulrich are model #mamapoumamas. 

I am honored to be the main character in this story: 

In 2010, my husband left me in a cloud of abuse and his addiction. I became a single mama. Fay and Darcy are a part of our church family and loved me through my divorce. No judgement. 

After the hardest year of my life, I signed divorce papers and went out and got pregnant. Seriously. In a quest to liberate myself from the pain of my marriage, I conceived my little Miles. 

I was in college full time for social work and working part time as a waitress. 

And now pregnant. 

I finally mustered up the courage to confess my new struggle to women who would pray for me. I reached out to six women from my church with the news. 

The responses were variant but Darcy and Fay's response changed my life and solidified my faith. 

They cornered me at potluck one Sunday and fired off questions. 

What's your plan? 

How are you going to pull this off? 

Are you okay? 

What's your schedule this semester? 

What's the hardest thing for you right now? 

I made a joke that my homework is always done and my house is always a mess. I was thankful once again that they loved me without judgement. 

That semester, on Tuesdays- I had class an hour away from 8AM to 9PM. So, wth drive time, I had a 14 hour pregnant day. 

The following Tuesday, I walked into my home so exhausted I was numb and I had just made the: "What do I NEED to get done before I crash?" list...

My house was spotless. 

Every article of the clothing we owned was washed, dried, and put away. 

Every inch of floor was shining. 

Every countertop sparkled. 

I dropped to my pregnant knees. 

The image that came to my mind as I wept was Jesus washing Martha's feet. I felt my feet being washed. 

Darcy and Fay continued to wash my feet by washing my floors every Tuesday that entire semester. 

Doing the dirty work for a divorced, pregnant, single mama... That's LOVE. God is LOVE. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself THROUGH love. 

Haiti Mama would not exisit had they not shown me exactly what gets a girl through: service, community and acceptance. 

#mamapoumama