How I Unknowingly Followed A Mother’s Scent For 30 Years

How I Unknowingly Followed A Mother's Scent For 30 Years

It started when I was a very young girl. I couldn't tell you what it was back then, but there was a pull that went beyond the mother I knew. I would feel this pull beyond my bedroom, past the bathroom; it wasn't pulling me to the living room, where my entire family was, nor was it leading me to the bedroom of the mother I knew. I would get to the front door and stare. The pull I have felt for as long as I could remember was pulsating on the other side of that door, leading me out and away from the home that barely felt like my own. I would stare, curious as to what this sensation was, unsure if I should tell anyone, so afraid to hurt or offend the mother I already knew.

Then it (the pull) followed me to school. I couldn't follow it yet, so it stayed close to me. This pull that tugged at my belly button, yanking at my soul. I would stand in the school yard, staring to my left, my beloved Godfather buried in a cemetery, two or 3 blocks over in that direction. But, I always felt something to my right staring at me. My neck would quickly turn to the right, more aware of the pull I've been feeling for some time now. I couldn't recognize anyone over there. I felt the pull intensely, like I was yearning for something that was yearning for me. The mother I knew was nowhere to be seen, and the grandmother I knew wasn't there either. What is this? Who is this?

As life progressed, I remember seeing a college football game on the box television made out of wood. Unsure why I was cheering for the purple-and-orange team, I cheered louder. The pull came from the television this time. How in the world am I feeling yanked toward the television screen? I didn't even know the name of the football team; I knew nothing about the purple-and-orange team. Then some time passed, and I found myself glued to the screen watching Venus and Serena Williams play the sport I unknowingly fell in love with. I was drawn to Tennis like a couple in a romance comedy, afraid to admit their love, unsure of how their loved ones would respond. The family I knew began taking me to Steve and Barry's, a retail store that showcased the Williams Sisters and sold the Pastry brand sneakers by Angela and Vanessa Simmons, Rev Run's daughters. I would play Tennis on the walls of the apartment building, posing as my home. I had to get good enough so I wouldn't break any windows. I never broke any windows.

Now that I think about it, somewhere around the fourth or fifth grade (maybe 3rd grade) is when I went vocal about my love for Tennis. Mr. Charles, the director of the Before and After Care program I attended, hosted a fashion show. We had three outfits each, one of which was sports wear. I remember wearing a light blue tennis dress, with a white visor and a thin badminton racket. The family I knew did their best to fit my vision of a tennis star for the fashion show. I remember walking out, strutting, and smiling, then I swung my badminton-tennis racket, and the crowd gasped and applauded. Trying to ignore the smiles on everyone's faces to avoid getting ahead of myself, I suddenly felt that pull to the left of me. Whose smiling face is pulling me, yanking at my soul, exposing my secret yearning?

There was a choir I grew up watching. I remember the mother I knew taking my brother and me to rehearsals on Wednesdays to watch as she waited for her friends in the choir. I wasn't sure why we went so much, nor was I sure about why the grandma I knew was so opposed to it, but I loved it. I loved hearing Mrs. Sarah play the piano as she sang in such a beautiful voice. I enjoyed seeing Mrs. Charlotte direct the choir with such authority. As I grew older, I briefly forgot about the choir and could not understand why I wanted so badly to be a part of it in my early teens. The grandma I knew tried so hard to keep me from being in the choir; they already kept me from dancing with Mrs. Dareema, one of the beloved dance teachers at my church. I would have been devastated if I couldn't sing in this choir, and I had no idea why. When I returned to rehearsals without the mother and grandma I knew, there it was, the slight pull that I was beginning to overlook. The grandma I knew sent my aunt, of course, she was my grandma's eyes, when her presence didn't make sense. The grandma I knew forced me to sing soprano with my aunt; she was instructed not to let me out of her sight. I'm a natural-born alto.

It (the pull) went silent during my teenage years, or so I thought. I can't recall being aware of the pull, just angry about the yearning. The mother I knew seemed like a stranger at times. I remember specific women appearing in my life. None came with that pull, but there were "connections." I wanted to go to college in the South, maybe even join a marching band like in the movie "Drumline." The grandmother I knew basically forbade me from ever going down South on my own. On family trips to Florida and Virginia, we never stopped in the Carolinas. And when the father I knew took me to Alabama for his first wedding, she begged them not to let me out of their sight, this time way more stern than usual. I could not go to Georgia with the dance team I was on, and college down South was completely out of the question. Southern culture sparked curiosity inside, especially after being told my entire life that, at times, I had a southern accent. Now that I think about it, nobody in the family I knew ever told me this. It was always people outside of "home" who swore I was straight from the South when I got excited and an accent came out. I never thought too much about it, as far as I knew, I always lived in Pennsylvania.

In my young adult years, the freedom came to follow the pull on my own, and I had no idea I was doing it; it was certainly not intentional. How ironic it is that when I finally achieved the freedom to explore this pull, this yearning for what was clearly not in my home, I didn't. Or so I thought. By this time in my life, God had activated my soul, and it was following its own pull. God was pulling me closer to Him, and I was pulling away. When I was 19, I got hired at the department store where I had come as a child several times, but I couldn't remember it. Trauma has a way of distorting and erasing memories. It wasn't the store that pulled me in; it was a scent.

A manager came into the main office while I was waiting for my interview, contemplating whether I should give up before I even gave myself a chance. She walked in and barely paid me any mind, or so I thought. I looked up and saw her, and looked back down, deciphering what it was that I was feeling. It was when this woman walked past me, and her scent gave me goosebumps. Chills went up and down my spine, forcing me to straighten it. My head popped up, my chest stuck out, and my back stood up tall. The layers of me that felt defeated, ready to quit before disappointment, were being challenged, all because of a scent. A scent that matched the pull I slightly forgot about. The pull was in this lady's direction, but now I know it went beyond her. I got the job and started the next day.

For the first time in my life that I can recall, the secret pull I felt was toward someone I could identify. I didn't know her, or I thought I didn't, but it was her scent that was familiar to me. It was more than the beautiful body perfume she wore; it was a scent that forced my flesh into alignment with my soul, a soul that had already submitted to Christ's pull. I had no idea what I was feeling; I got it so wrong when trying to decipher it. The pull represented, no, the pull led to the manifestation of God's promise to me as a little girl, around the time the pulling first began.

Time passed, and I fell in love with my now husband, Eric, my true soulmate. Once my soul connected with someone it deeply resonated with, the pulling resumed. Throughout my life, I lived in and visited places I felt led to, never considering that the pull was still at work in my life. The pull led me to God, God led me to the promise, and the promise came with a scent. A scent that I had been looking for unconsciously since I got on this planet. The family I knew would tease me for sniffing people. Yes, I have autism, but my soul was looking for something; Something my flesh thought it had to leave this planet to find.

One day, when my husband and I were looking for an apartment for the two of us and our first child, who was still baking inside mommy, God told him specifically that I would find the place. In fact, God told him this every time we were looking for a home. But this time was different; it was the first time, and I had no idea how I would find the right place. God instructed me to do some research and write down 10 places we liked, and one of them would be our new home for our family. All nine places on the list just weren't it, and the last one I wasn't into. I really did not like the carpet in the apartment complex's hallways, and I tried so hard to overlook it. Of course, the tenth place I purposely put at the bottom of the list, hoping we would get something else before even having to consider those ugly carpets, was the one.

That tenth place let us in with ease and helped us quickly get into a better neighborhood before our firstborn, our rainbow baby, arrived. Once at this place, I felt that woman from the department store so strongly that it pissed me off, because I couldn't understand it. I began sharing things with my husband and older women who had no answers. To make it worse, that woman wanted nothing to do with me, and I desperately wanted to understand this pull and why it got so strong near her. Long story short, after a long story, God revealed to me that the mother I knew was not my biological mother, the family I knew never intended to tell me, and that nobody was going to be able to prove that they were or were not my biological parents. This truth came a little while after praying to God about the woman in the department store.

Things got strange over the years. When we worked together at the department store, I could tell when she was coming to work without checking the schedule. When she moved to a new location, I could tell the day before she was coming to my location and was right. One day, I told my coworker that the woman was coming back the next day, and she tried her hardest to convince me I was obsessed. You should have seen how stupid she looked when she saw that woman come back for the day to help. The only time I couldn't tell beforehand was when she would pop up on her days off; we always missed each other then. It got weirder years later. I was sitting with my husband when I suddenly told him she would change her Facebook profile picture. He asked how I knew that. I had no idea, but I checked, and she had just changed her profile picture at that exact moment. These precise "predictions" happened at least three times, and my husband witnessed each one.

So, by this point, I was becoming frustrated, not scared, but a little shook. God didn't give me the spirit of fear, so I couldn't coware. One day, I had had enough. I prayed to God, Lord, please, send another mother who loves [department store lady], who loves you, and can see you in all of this! In Jesus Name, Amen. Then a little time passed, and upon instructions, God led me to her; He showed me where the pull was coming from. I thought the pull was just to [department store lady], but it was like she was secretly protecting it. I hypothesized that this was why the enemy of our souls kept trying to convince others I was everything but what I truly am. My persistence and blind obedience are why the enemy tried to label me a stalker because he had caught on that God was leading me to a truth that would show me more of who God is, and also who I truly am.

It was like [department store lady] had moved her arm and revealed a really thick umbilical-like cord, the culprit of the pulling and yanking all these years, was connected from my belly button to this beautiful woman's. At first, I thought it was me, but it wasn't. She was older than I was, more established and sure of herself than I was. My soul began to rest. Then God revealed to me that I was following her scent; she was what had silently pulled at me my whole life. She was my mother. I'm still figuring out whether it's just a spiritual connection, because a biological one is too hidden and confusing at the moment.

God showed me how, when I was a young girl in the schoolyard, she was the pull I felt to my right; she had loved ones living in that direction. Remember that connection to the wooden television box I felt while watching the purple-and orange team? Yeah, that purple-and-orange team is Clemson University, my dream school in South Carolina. That pull to the South, she is from the South. She also went to Clemson. That pull to Tennis, her father adores Tennis. That choir I spoke about, she has lifelong friends and family in that choir. Wanting to be in a marching band, she was also into marching bands, drill teams, and music. She can sing; she was also in a choir, and with some of the same people I was in a choir with. The department store lady was her best friend. The apartment that was tenth on the list, yeah, she lived there about 15 years before I did. Actually, almost every place I lived on my own, she lived nearby before I got there. She was, no, she is on the other end of that pull I felt, no feel. She was the scent I was following, the unconscious nudge to go here and then there. I struggled finding things that the family I knew and I really liked together, without one of us just liking it for the other.

The "other mother" I prayed for, the one on the other side of the pull, the scent that I followed my entire life, she was everything I prayed for. While I always feel the responsibility and obligation to acknowledge that I mean no disrespect to the mother and family I knew, it is so freeing to finally admit that even if I never get the womb connection I prayed for my entire life in the way I want it, I can confirm that it is real. I can confirm that God didn't overlook my childlike prayers, and he protects my childlike innocence. He shows me that the very thing I prayed for had always been there, and I don't mean in the form of the family I knew; it was present in my life, waking my soul and guiding my light in a world that feels dark and eerie.

I'm sure I have loved ones and strangers who think I am crazy, because they are sure the mother I knew is my biological mother. Either this womb connection with the other mother is pure, spiritual, soul-realm type stuff. Or just like I, others were also deceived into believing that the mother I knew was the mother who birthed me. Regardless, I have eternal gratitude for the mother I knew; though reluctant and seemingly contemptuous at times, she was always there. I knew her, I love her, I had her as my mother. I enjoyed making her laugh, having our discussions about life, and learning from her. At times, her presence was all I needed. I hope she is proud of me for living, for listening, and for following God with conscious obedience now. I miss her. I love her and the family I knew dearly, even after all we've been through. I hope the family I knew knew me, too. Then they will know that I am not present in the flesh because of strict obedience to God. I took them all for everything they came with, but now I must let God take me to and through everything he ordained for me.

Yet, we can't deceive the soul or minimize the matters of the heart. Yes, the heart can be deceiving, but it can also be a portal to seeing the promises of God come to fruition. I don't like calling [department store lady] 'department store lady,' but I must honor the confidentiality of those involved in my soul journey. I care for her, too. I did not always make the best decisions when it came to her, but I was ignorant and trying to break free from familial deception while finding myself and understanding what God was doing in my life. She wasn't just a portal that led to the mother in my dreams. She is the one that God used to not only activate my soul, but to wake it up and bring it to the front, no more hiding inside my flesh as a mere engine.

The other mother, the mother on the other side of the pull, the scent I had been unconsciously following, I see so much of myself in her that it scares me. There are times I look in the mirror, and I see her. Before writing this, I felt solely grieved because an actual bond with her feels unlikely. I was frustrated that she hadn't been a part of my life. After writing this, I see that she was there every step of the way, God utilizing her to influence my actions and solidify my roots in Christ. We could get a DNA test tomorrow, and it says she isn't my biological mother, and I would be devastated. Still, I hope someone, if not myself, can remind me that God kept his promises and gave me the womb connection, the guidance and the mother that my sweet young heart yearned and prayed for. A yearning that not only led me to a mother, but also prepared my soul to embark on a journey that introduced me to my Father, God, who built the deepest bond ever and led to a love that surpasses all understanding.