God knows I feel like the world's WORST mom 99% of the time. I can think of at least 100,000,000 times I have failed my child and/or let a sweet moment pass without taking the opportunity to show him he means everything to me. But for all those times, there are the ones where I will stop EVERYTHING to give him my undivided attention.
In THOSE moments, we share that special mother child connection that no one else in the world can understand. This past year has been the worst kind of torture for me. Seeing Alex be separated from his daddy, his best friend. I never had a great relationship with my dad, but I knew when I met Steven that he would make the greatest dad in the world. That's part of the reason I married him.
Anyway, to see them apart is torture! Even seeing how Steven reacts to the separation is tough. Alex has panic attacks at the strangest times. We have gone through every emotion you can imagine, Anger, hurt, confusion, sadness, etc. The good thing is that he never holds onto his feelings. He ALWAYS tells me how he is feeling and what made him feel that way. I hope that this can continue until he is an adult...even after. I haven't always had that open dialogue with my parents, and I want that for our family.
At any rate, the only thing he has never been able to articulate to me is why he can't get things done. "I just can't" is all he says. Which, until I understood the real problem, frustrated me to NO END. "What do you mean you can't?! We don't use that word! You CAN do anything if you try hard" You know what we say. Then I realized, Alex can not complete thoughts. He can't focus. He can't concentrate on tasks! DUH MOM! I should understand better than anyone!
(Enter guilt stage left) Yep, the mom guilt enters and you think, "Why didn't I see this before? Why my kid?" You know the things we ask ourselves. But more than that I ask, God why do I have to be so high strung with him? Why am I so mean? I expect the best out of my kid. I want him to be a successful adult and contribute to society in a great way. I want him to feel good about himself and not have to deal with all the things I have had to. But at what expense? My child's self esteem? I hope not!
So, what next? We met with the teacher, we prayed, we have had doctor appointments. And mostly, I hug him more. I stop what I am doing to be with him when he needs me. I think that God gave me these moments without Steven so I could get out of the Dad shadow and love Alex better. My mom didn't get to spend much time with us, and my dad well....that's a post for another day. So I haven't been very sure of myself as a mom.
Alex is the best teacher in the entire world. He teaches me forgiveness daily. He forgives all of my mommy mess ups. He teaches me unconditional love. He loves me in all of my imperfection. My kid has made me a better person. For all the negatives of deployment, there is some good. It has given me a chance to KNOW my kid. Not just be with him, but get to KNOW him. Who he is, what he likes, doesn't like, his funny little quirks. I'm finding that he is more like me than I ever knew.
Thank you, God, for blessing me with this wonderful kid! Thank you for the joy of getting to know him and being his mommy. And thank you for the "You're the best mommy in the world" moments that make all the hard stuff worth it!
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