Sunday, January 31, 2010

Reflections on 4 years now past

Yesterday was my son's 4th birthday. All day, I was busy, getting his birthday party ready,seeing family, and waiting to see the look on his face when he discovered his new 4 wheeler! It was a fantastic day for him. The kids from my fiancee's family came to the party and then back to our house and spent the night, after playing with the 4 wheeler and playing games of Twister and the Elephant Game where the elephant shoots butterflies out of his trunk and the kids catch them with butterflies. I finally have the family I dreamed of.
It was late last night, as all the kids finally went to bed, when that realization hit me. And I can tell you, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I thought back to that early morning 4 years ago, the morning he was born. I had dreams for him, for all of us. Dreams of a happy family, with birthday parties filled with love. Dreams of watching him grow up, learn to play t-ball and soccer, read, love, learn... The dreams I had that day, the promises we made, to our son and to each other.
The next four years,almost, looking back, seem almost surreal now. The postpartum depression, losing everything I had worked 8 years to build, living with my life crumbling down around me, his father leaving us, taking with him, stealing, the so little that was left, which was so much because it was all I had left, and the pain of realizing that he could never have truly loved me, or our son, or our second son, who I was only 2 months pregnant with at the time. No one who loved us, who loved THEM would have left us with nothing, taking away any chance I had to make a living to take care of them, as he did.
The first two years after my son's birth were riddled with fear, and depression. The next two years, were frought with pain and struggle, and the fear and depression. The guilt over my sons having to be raised by a single mother ate me up alive.
And now, it's like I'm waking up from a four year long winter hibernation and it's a new spring, and my world is once again, full of life, and love, and hope. The sun shines once again, and finally, the darkness that shrouded me from the joys of my children, has lifted, and there is happiness again. There will always be the inherent sadness that comes from the fact that I failed them as natural parents go, but I can now hold hope that I've given them an even better option. A Daddy who CHOSE them, instead of one who pretends to love them while hurting them just to hurt their mother and not seeing that that's exactly what he does.

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