I feel like I have been taking my kids for granted lately. I have been blessed with two beautiful, happy, amazing, *healthy* children and I do not thank my lucky stars for them enough. I feel selfish and stupid.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I wake up every day and go to bed every night telling them that I love them on top of the 400,000 times a day that I say it to them. I hug and kiss them as often as I can get my arms around them. I can't help but kiss a baby repeatedly when I hold them, even if it's not mine. I'm a lover!
But some days it just doesn't feel like I'm thankful enough. I don't appreciate them enough.
If I appreciate and love and feel thankful for them, am I still allowed to get frustrated and even angry at times? Am I allowed to want breaks and countdown the hours and minutes until bedtime?
It seems like a fine line to walk. I certainly don't feel like this everyday, or even all that frequently. I love being able to spend my days with my children. I love being the one they wake up to, the one they fall asleep to and the one who is always there for them, no matter what. Believe me, I know how lucky I am and that my days as a stay-at-home mom will end someday and I'll ache for them back so badly.
Even so, it will be priority for me to be there for them no matter what. I'm struggling to find how to support them without holding them back or forcing them before their ready. It seems like I teeter back and forth over this for quite a while and then one day, *POOF*, it's a non-issue. One day they just do what they want to do and I'm standing there, baffled and amazed, watching them do it. I get pats on the back telling me what an awesome mom I am and I don't even know what the hell I did to be so 'awesome'! Especially when every day I feel like I'm failing miserably!
So tomorrow, believe me when I tell you I'm going to hug my kids a little tighter, kiss them a little longer, tell them I love them a little more often and be with them in the most present way possible. Because it's hitting me a little harder right now that they're growing up and will only be this little for such a short time. And all this "insanity", "turmoil" and the problems of my everyday life will be a memory that I look back on and wish that I had done just a little bit more.
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Please pray for my friend's daughter, Mabel, as she goes in for her 3rd EEG tomorrow.
Of course you are allowed to get frustrated. I get frustrated at all 3 of mine on a daily basis. Even Desmond. Heck, I got frustrated at Desmond occasionally while he was still in the hospital, not the first one, but once he moved to the rehab hospital. In fact I would say all the parents that were there consistently got frustrated at their kids every so often. They are kids, they are frustrating, sick, well or otherwise.
ReplyDeleteHeck I'm homeschooling the boy, and I still look forward to my breaks, and seriously I would keep both the other two in full time day care at least a few days a week if I could afford it even being a stay at home Mom. Kids are exhausting, and looking forward to bed time and a nice break is never a bad thing, sometimes it is the only thing that keeps us sane. Especially after they do something that just makes you shake your head and wonder what they were thinking.
I love my three. I love being around my three, but really little kids are tough, even perfectly neuro-typical little kids. Because they need you all the time to help with something or another. You can love them to the moon and back, but still need a bit of a break from that constant need of you. It is tough to be on the whole time they are awake, because they might need something that they aren't able to do themselves yet. Or even worst something that they think they are able to do, and then you have to go in and "help" them so that they don't make the kitchen explode.
And I think everyone wishes they had done a little bit more, but really happy, healthy children who know they are loved will have great memories of their childhood, even as their parents think up things that they (the parents) could have done better.
Thank you Sarah! You have no idea how much this reply meant to me. ((HUGS)0
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