growing up and letting go.

July 07, 2014

Oh, you guys. Dropping my baby off at school is killing me. It's kind of funny because you know how it's easy to say something without having experienced it? For example, before you're a parent it's easy to form opinions or judgments of how a child should be raised... and then you have your own kids and realize not so much. Plus, kids are not cookie cutters. You can have one experience with one child, think you've got this parenting thing down, and then bam! Here comes a one hundred percent polar opposite child and you're starting from square one.

Regardless, I swore up and down that I was not going to have a "baby". Meaning, the one that is so cute and adorable and cannot do anything wrong in momma's eyes. The one that is wrapped around momma's finger and whenever he does anything all you can think is - he's a baby. There is always a reason said baby is behaving like so. There's no rationality to it, it's just that all you see is baby. I said this to Dusty, I distinctly remember a conversation with my dad over the phone while I was pregnant, and I'm sure I told countless other people my determination to not have the so-called baby of the family. Oh, was I ever naive.

Because well, that's JJ. My big baby. Dusty teases me because I am a million percent that way. Now, in hindsight, I see how it happens. I see how momma's just want to hold on to every last ounce of baby. In a million ways, the third child is glorious. There's less stress, less worry, and I'm so much more laid back. In other ways, I understand how quickly the time passes and know I. cannot. stop. it. Realizing each milestone is the last makes me want to cling all the tighter.

So when we exit the freeway to school and JJ whimpers from the backseat, "stay momma? stay momma?", practically begging to stay with me, it simply breaks my heart in a million pieces. Leaving him with his teacher, crying, is almost more than I can take. Even though I am told he perks up within minutes and has great days, I can't hardly stand it.

Years ago, I would have laughed at me now. But motherhood changes you. It stretches you in ways you never could have imagined. It challenges you. It makes your heart feel feelings you didn't know existed. In some ways it makes you crazy - good crazy and bad crazy. You are entrusted with these little beings, yet ultimately are not in control - of the things that could happen {and believe me my mind has thought every thought}, of the choices they make, of the way others treat them, of how their life will turn out. My mind knows I have to give their little lives over to God, but my heart has a harder time doing it. It's this giant balancing act that I've yet to get a grip on.

So, as I go, I try to take things by the moment. It's so much easier said than done and I continually screw up. God, thank you for these three precious blessings. Help me to live free in the moments and truly release my tight grasps of control. Teach me, as I go... even in the midst of my failures. Give me grace, as I go... even when I can be an emotional roller coaster. Guide me, as I go... and as they grow.