AidMama(toto): A Love Poem
To the ones who hold so much.
The ones who wake in the night, who soothe, who carry, who serve.
The ones who cross borders and time zones, who measure their love
in lunch bags and love notes, in bedtime stories told through flickering screens.
To the ones who move through days filled with big emotions—
toddlers, teenagers, and every age in between.
The meltdowns, the negotiations, the endless, ENDLESS requests:
"Can I have a snack?"
So. MANY. Snacks.
Emotions and snacks, emotions and snacks—
a rhythm, a cycle, a relentless drumbeat of need.
To the ones raising children while serving their own communities—
who fight not only systems, but the weight of expectation,
who are told to serve, but not to question.
To the ones who navigate governments that watch too closely,
who live under surveillance, who have learned
to keep their voices measured, their phones clean, their fear silent.
To the ones who do "The Work" with no safety net,
who are both of a place, and never fully safe within it.
To the ones recently placed on "administrative leave,"
whose homes are being dismantled in "30 days."
Who must pack up lives, pull children from classrooms,
figure out pets on a plane.
Who must keep working while unbuilding,
writing reports on shuttered programs,
telling partners, telling governments, telling people—
"I’m sorry."
To the ones who carry the weight of that "I’m sorry."
Who become the face of broken promises,
the embodiment of funding that will never arrive,
the quiet grief of communities that trusted them,
who hold the rage and heartbreak and still—
they smile.
They hug their children.
They pack the boxes.
They make the snacks.
To the ones working in countries where it feels like a concentration camp—
where voices are stifled, smiles are forced,
where freedom exists only in the quiet spaces between the rules.
To the ones whose communities find ways in the cracks
to keep their cultures alive.
Who pass down vitality, life, stories, myths, songs—
whispered over dinners, tucked into bedtime prayers,
slipped into the hands of their children like secret treasures.
To the ones whose burdens are privileges.
Who carry ancient gifts, old medicines,
who transform grief into wisdom,
who take what was meant to break them
and turn it into strength.
To the ones who hold tiny hands in one world,
while holding another world together with the other.
Who sign forms, who write reports, who push against the bureaucracies
that demand evidence, results, deliverables—
as if love and care were ever meant to be counted.
To the ones who are not “Aid” first, “Mama” second.
Who are AidMama(toto), inseparable from the ones they hold.
The cord between them and their children is unseen,
but never severed. They carry them—
into every meeting, every field visit, every restless night.
To the ones who pump milk in the back of cars,
who whisper “I love you” into patchy mobile reception,
who leave parts of themselves behind with every departure,
who return heavy with stories that cannot be untold.
To the ones who know the cracks in the world
and do not turn away.
Who see the suffering, the injustice, the cycles, the harm,
and still wake up and try again.
To the ones who carry grief in their bones,
who hold too much, who feel deeply,
who wonder, somewhere in the exhaustion—
"Wait… where are OUR snacks?"
To the ones perched in between worlds,
who hold the contradictions with tenderness—
knowing we are part of the system,
knowing we want to change it,
knowing we are weary, but still here.
To the ones who wonder if they are failing,
who question if the scales will ever tip in our children’s favor,
who fear they are not enough.
Oh, AidMama(toto), you are enough.
Even in your exhaustion, your love is enough.
And to the ones who are not “mamas” at all—
the ones with angel babies,
the ones who do not have uteruses,
the ones who have adopted,
the ones who mother in ways unseen.
To the ones who are not free in the places they live,
who work with their whole hearts
but must always watch their backs.
To the ones for whom it is extra hard—
to be Black, to be Indigenous, to be queer, to be disabled,
to be neurodivergent in a system
that sees only light and whiteness.
To the ones who work alongside those
who carry this same burden,
who hold this weight together,
who are exhausted from trying to explain.
You are AidMama(toto), too.
Even if you aren’t a "mama" at all.
That word is just four letters, strung side by side.
What you do is love.
And love has no bounds.
Inclusion has no bounds.
And when the rupture feels too great,
when the work swallows you whole,
when the cracks threaten to break you—
Lean in.
Lean into us, into each other.
Lean into the knowing that we are not alone.
That we hold, and are held.
That this work is heavy, but together, we carry it.
That we are seen, heard, known.
And in these cracks—
We find each other.
We find our way.
We gather courage.
We are not alone.
We are AidMama(toto).
And dammit, we deserve our snacks.
*MamaToto is a Kiswahili term meaning "motherbaby," emphasizing the deep interconnectedness between mother and child—what affects one affects the other.
This philosophy shapes my life as a single mother of three, a full-time PhD student, and a part-time aid worker. I am learning Kiswahili, drawing from my time living in East Africa, and co-raising my children with my best friend and former Dada from Tanzania, whom I sponsored, along with her daughter, to join us in Canada. Together, as two single AidMamaTotos, we support each other in caregiving, work, and community, embodying the relational care at the heart of MamaToto.
