Mother’s Day was meant to honor people like Cyndi Magee.

Magee has navigated through life juggling responsibilities like a circus performer. She’s a registered respiratory therapist who works through the night, treated patients with COVID at the height of the pandemic, has four children ages 16 to 22, and became good at not sleeping.

So good, in fact, that her husband, Sean Magee, nominated Cyndi for our Hometown Hero award, writing to the Monitor back in the days of the pandemic: “She puts herself at risk, treating others, despite the fact that her own asthma makes the prospect of contracting COVID especially dangerous. She does this while being a wife, and mother to four children, including one high-schooler who has severe asthma, and a child on the autism spectrum.”

Listening to her schedule is actually tiring. She’s tough, though, a woman from Staten Island who still has a trace of her New York accent left and a fuel supply with a deep tank.

Her shift runs from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., three days per week. She grabs a nap while her kids are in school and Sean is at work, then has family time before leaving at night for her next shift.

“You don’t have to pay for childcare,” Cyndi Magee said.

Speaking of childcare, Cyndi and Sean have been challenged while raising their children. Their middle daughter, an 18-year-old senior, suffers from severe asthma, forcing her to miss mutliple school days each school year.

“She’s home a lot,” Magee said. “She needs medications and there are doctor visits. A lot of times you get a lot less sleep.”

Their 21-year-old son has autism but is high functioning. Still, the process of enrolling him at Concord High School took time.

“There’s been a lot of teacher conferences,” Magee said. “You have to get his plan on the books at the start of the school year, and you meet with teachers and counselors and make sure it’s all in place.”

Then she added, “He’s in college and doing well. He’s not behind and is on track to graduate on time.”

Her work as a respiratory therapist over the past few years included a flood of COVID patients using ventilators to breathe. She saw the worst of the worst.

She looked like a space traveler each night at work, with a facemask and eyewear and gloves and double gowns.

“Not one part of my body was exposed,” Magee said. “But we were right in the thick of it. It was rough and busy and we were treating COVID patients on ventilators who were exposed every day. But if you wore the equipment and protected yourself, you’d be safe.”

She graduated in 1991 when AIDS was still on people’s minds. Safety procedures were fuzzy.

“That was nerve-wracking,” Magee said. “You didn’t know who had it and how to draw blood at that time, so there was the same level of awareness and the same level of nervousness. It was exhausting.”

That’s what Mother’s Day is for. Refreshing the person in a family who’s most often taken for granted. Mom.

Magee had four children in six years, battled pandemics and made time for everyone.

In this case, she said she wasn’t expecting breakfast in bed Sunday. In years past, the routine consisted of some early spring planting outside and dinner out, or maybe a barbecue.

Magee said that’s plenty.

“They are always good to me,” she said. “My son comes home this week and we will all be together. That’s what counts.”

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