Making It

9/4/2014

Making It

 

 There are a number moments in parenting when you don't have a clue what you're doing.  Some of these moments are horrible, some are wonderful but most of them are just flying blind and praying to God you don't crash into the ground at a high velocity.

Sure, I've done this for a while but the truth is, there are parts of the job that you never really get the hang of.  You think questions about homework are hard?  Let's sit them down and talk to them about sex, and waiting for marriage, or how walking around like a prosti-tot devalues you as a person and gives an impression that you really don’t want to leave streaked across your reputation.

While we’re at it, let’s really drill the message home that what other people think about you doesn’t matter and boost a positive self-image.  What matters is how you feel about yourself, and that you’re your own person with your own identity.  What does wearing 5 inch platform heels say? Does it really matter if they wear pajamas to school? 

Or death and the emptiness that grief leaves behind and how that loss can change their world forever. My father died unexpectedly at 38 of a massive heart attack literally days after he and my mother discovered they were pregnant with me. How different was it to be a mother separated by a death than a divorce and answer some of the same questions I’ve faced?

Believe it or not, the one I have the hardest time answering comes from my son. "Where's my daddy? Why is he not here with us?"

Now, my daughter handled it well initially. She was 10 the last time she saw her dad.  In the time since then, she’s made her own decisions about him.  Actions, or rather the lack of them, for her, spoke volumes.  Fortunately, she recognized that it takes work to have a connection with a person. That a revolving door relationship is similar to that second cousin you know you have somewhere on your mother's side and you catch them every now and again at a reunion.  You're related, but you don't have to talk to each other.

My son, is four going on forty. He wants a family and kids of his own; already. He also wants a motorcycle and a job and a big diesel truck, a "hot ride" car and he wants to play football.

He wants a relationship with his dad desperately.  I feel he deserves a relationship of substance.  Someone who can be a positive male role model.

He couldn't possibly remember that his father screamed at me every morning to "deal with the baby" before work because he'd been awake all night trying to self-medicate his restless legs with a bottle of whiskey. He wouldn’t remember that his father would fall asleep in the middle of a meal, because he took 3 Percocet instead of the prescribed 1 every 6-8 hours as needed for pain.  That he refused to work because of his debilitating back pain. The procurement of his drugs became a priority and full time job.

He doesn't remember the tug of war with the car seat and the slurred end of a 3 hour argument and how I tried to justify why the baby was safer with me. He won't remember these things.  He won't know these things. He'll know that I love him fiercely, and would do anything in this world to keep my children safe and in that fact I am fearless. He'll know that no matter what happens, I will always give everything I have to be with him, love him, and support him.

Though through my dedication to my children, it makes me think about my own mother and begs the question – Is it easier to be angry with the father that abandoned his children for his drug addiction or because he had a heart attack and died?  Either way, he isn’t there and essentially his children are still abandoned and will suffer through the deep loss of him. They still do not have him in their lives, through choice, and not chance and I’m still a single parent trying to get through each day without the Mommy Manual. 

I find so often that it’s easier for someone outside of the situation to give advice on how to handle things when they aren’t living in the middle of the issue.  I’m coming to terms with the reality that I’m going to screw this up.  I really am. I often joke that it's a parents job to mess up their kids the best way they possibly can.

 

So sometimes we stay up too late, and watch scary movies.  Sometimes we have brownies for breakfast. Sometimes we stay in our pajamas all day, sing too loud, talk too much, make up silly names for each other, and sometimes we drive around just to waste gas because it's too hot and I'm too broke to do much of anything else. 

Sometimes I yell, and sometimes I say really crappy things and feel guilty, then in the end I give in because I’m a pushover and I love them so desperately it hurts.  Sometimes we all need a time out, but mostly it’s Mommy that needs a time out. Sometimes I'm not there like I should be because I'm working or going to school, and I find that it's ok to break down and cry, but I refuse to accept that it's a show of weakness. In those moments though, when I let it out, I feel like I'm just not enough.  I try to remind myself that I need to be the person they deserve; because they deserve two of the most incredible parents any kid could want, but I am only one. 

So I go to work when I am sick, I don’t buy new clothes for myself because my son is growing too fast or my daughter needs new shoes or a fee paid for an activity at school.  I don’t go out that often because I need to be with them, near them, in case they need me. My heart is in two halves growing at different rates of speed and I am just trying to hold them together for as long as I possibly can.  It hurts and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but we’re making it.