My Glass is Two Thirds Empty and I'm an Optimist!
03/07/2009 08:18 p.m.
when i was pregnant with my second child, i was terrified that i could not love him as much as i loved my daughter. she was my whole world and i did not know how i could possibly find room in my heart for him. i was worried that he would somehow be second best and that i would be a terrible mom to him because of how much i loved my first child. but from the first second i held his tiny hand in mine and felt his breath against my chest, i knew that my worries were unfounded. somehow my heart just doubled and i had more than enough love for him. he was special and wonderful and i could not imagine how i had ever thought my life was complete before him. it was the same for my third child. triple the heart space, triple the joy.

those who know me, know that i live my day to day life without my older two children. it was not my choice. it was theirs. there is a certain kind of rejection that is impossible to overcome...when your child tells you she doesn't want to live with you, doesn't want to visit you, doesn't have time to talk to you or read an e-mail.

but it still have my third child. this incredibly loving bundle of energy. this child who tells me every single day that i am the best mommy in the world, that he loves me the most, that i am beautiful and smart and funny and that my hugs make his whole world perfect.

even as his love completely fills me with that special warm feeling that only comes from being a mom...even as i smile and draw my breath to tell him that he is perfect and wonderful and makes my life perfect just by being in it...i feel those shattered fragments of my heart shifting and slicing and filling my lungs with the pain of longing and unshed tears. even as i hold him and smell his sweet hair, my arms are achingly empty and continue to reach for two warm bodies who stand well beyond my reach.

so now that my heart has stretched to encompass three and is impossibly hollow with the absence of two, how do i maintain the balance? how do i fill my youngest with that unconditional sense of self and uncomplicated carefree childhood that all children should have when i am constantly aching for my other two? how do i keep my heart open to the older two when their repeated rejection makes me wince and withdraw?

some days i just bounce between laughing in the living room and crying in the bathroom until i don't know how or what i am feeling.
I am currently Exhausted
I am listening to hubby and little man talking about their respective day