If you are reading this post expecting my normal charm and wit... you might want to stop now. This post will be anything but charming or witty. I find myself in a real conundrum.
I sat last week, watching time slip through my hands. As I watched the boxes filled with barbie dolls and hot wheels make their way one by one down the stairs and out the door labeled "give away", it hit me like a ton of bricks. I don't have "little" kids any more. As I saw the posters and pictures change from Minnie Mouse to fairies and horses, I felt little pieces of my heart breaking. No one else around me seems to be having the same issues with this that I do. Is it different for dads? I know kids want to grow up before they really know what responsibility comes with being "grown up" so this is all lost on them really. I know I can't keep them young forever but, right now, with the loss of mom it feels like just 1 more piece of me I will never get back. Who knew that so much of my own identity, I tie directly to my children. Who will I be when they leave my home and are on their own? Will I still be mom first and then a business woman or will I have to redefine who I am? I want to slow time down and make it crawl. There's the conundrum.
On the other side, I want to make time whiz by. Everyone tells me - "It will get better in time." I want it better now! How much time does it take?!? I don't want to feel the ache and pain of losing a loved one any longer. I don't want to look at every event and think "Mom would have loved to see the kids do that." I cried at a freakin' band concert for heavens sake. I don't want to feel the tear tracks on my cheeks any longer because I just can't get past the events of the last 6 weeks...6 months....year. I don't want to look at every event and be so consumed by the magnitude of the loss that I can't enjoy the moment.
I'm trapped between two very parallel worlds not wanting to be in either one. Those of you who know me know, I don't do well when I feel trapped. So, here I sit. The first day of school ....the first day of public school for the kids. My house is eerily silent. So silent, you can hear more pieces of my heart breaking away. Moments, lost forever in a haze.
Brokenhearted Pandora biding you peace and harmony
xoxo
1 comment:
When you said to go read your blog, this was not what I expect it to be about. After reading it, it was like wow and it really helped to know that there was someone out there that was feeling some of the same things I am feeling. I have watched my son grow over the last few years and known that he was no longer a “little one.” However, it really it me when I learned that 8 was the new age for kids to start becoming sexually active. It hit me like a bomb, my son is 8. He could be one of those kids. Now he still thinks that girls have cooties so I feel pretty safe on that account, but that means his age group is more a tween and not kid. I am not ready for that. I understand for you it is even worse, as your kids are even older, but I am starting to understand how you feel. As I watched you hold your nephew the other day, I could have cried. I want those days back. I want to change diapers and hold bottles. It seems like just yesterday, my son was getting teething biscuits all over his face. I too want time to crawl, better yet, stand still.
I know you have seen yourself as “Mom” for a really long time and it seems like that is about to change. But I have to say, I don’t think you will ever be anything else in your kid’s eyes. Forever, you will be “Mom.” And the role of Mom will always come first, even when they are 50, asking you for advice on what to do with their grandchildren.
As for the conundrum and wanting time to “whiz by,” I am not sure I can relate as well. I don’t know how to handle the losses of the summer. I don’t know about you, but I feel like a piece of me is gone and at the same time I feel lost. I feel way more that I expected to and I don’t buy into the whole time will make it better philosophy. I try to shove it away “into its box.” It just won’t fit. I think about these people who were lost everyday, when all I want to do is forget. I haven’t broken down with the tears, yet. Pretty much, I refuse to do so. I am tired of feeling sad, lost, and scared. I want normal, but don’t even know what that is or if I could go back to it even if I did. Is there an end to these feelings, I don’t know. If you find one let me know.
I don’t know about conundrum, I see it has one big emotional black hole. I don’t know what the current philosophy is on black holes. Are you sucked in and lost forever or are do you pop out the other side a millions of miles away?
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