Nobody told me....

So, tomorrow, XY16 becomes XY17. It should be a time of dewy-eyed reflection, of the mourning of the passing of time that has turned the soft contours of my babies face into an unfamiliar landscape. How I want to be sentimental and romantic, but instead I feel like a big fucking failure. Having two teenagers in the house and going through peri-menopause can do that to a mom.

XY16/17 was born 3 weeks early. I was painting the room we would briefly share. I didn't finish it.I haven't finished anything since. I tried, after I got home from the hospital, but he kept needing to be fed, or held, or changed, or something. Sigh. I was single when he was born. I was really super single, starting what would be a three year falling out with my family. I had one friend, who was there at his birth, but was no help at all when it came to what exactly I was supposed to do once he came out. I was 21 years old when he was born, and I wasn't really a mature 21. I was idealistic about what kind of mother I could be, and what kind of a person he would be. Luckily I was always a big reader, so I read parenting books like crazy. I had a well formed idea of what my parenting style would be. All of these things helped, but it has been a rough road. He and I grew up together, along with my husband, who fell in love with both of us when XY16/17 was XY7months. We were all just kids together, not even like a real family, but more like three buddies who really liked each other. It wasn't until XX13 came along that we even started feeling like a family. I am extra protective of XY17, because he is my first, and because he is far too much like me. I passed on to this one a messy gene that even corrupted my formerly anal retentive husband and caused a three month rift between myself and the aforementioned best friend. I also passed on ADD, with no hyper-activity, which causes him to be sedentary and dreamy. The ADD also allows him to hyper-focus, but unlike me, he focuses on computer games, not reading. I have also passed onto him enough intellect that he always feels a little like Charlie from 'Flowers for Algernon', smart enough to know what his shortcomings are, and not smart enough to know how to work around them. Not smart enough to not become frustrated. He has what is to this day, the strongest sense of self-preservation of anyone I have ever met. He is completely missing the risk-taking gene. Thank God. Seriously, Thank You, God! He is a good boy, and I trust him. He loves his family. I forget that sometimes. He is easily irritated lately. I am scared that I have not done what I need to to equip him to be who he needs to be. I am so scared that I have screwed up. I have never wanted do-overs so bad in my whole life. I didn't have any appreciation for what it meant to raise a human being. No one should have ever trusted me with this job.

If love was enough, I would be the best mother in the world. If love was enough.... It's really not fair, that love is not enough. It's not fair that being a good mother takes consistency, and perseverance, and self-sacrifice. It's not fair that you can love your kid so much you would gladly cut your arm off for them, but not realize what they need is more of your time and attention. It is not fair that I, who crave time by myself like other people crave water, would get a kid who needs my company more than anything else to feel loved. It's not fair that I didn't figure it out until he was almost ten years old. It's not fair that I don't get do-overs.

So here I am on the eve of my oldest child's birthday. Tomorrow I will be all smiles. I will joke and make his current favorite meal. (Spaghetti Carbonara, no vegetable, Cherry Cake with Chocolate frosting, in case you were wondering) I will talk about the night he was born, and how he was the coolest baby ever. I will talk to him about what kind of a little person he was. I will remind him how he never tried anything until he was sure he could do it well. It will be a silly celebratory day, with family, and food. But I will be remembering how I got the most impossible job in the world, I will be asking God what he was thinking, entrusting me with this one, this baby. He really was the coolest baby in the world. He was the coolest kid, and he is showing signs of being an incredible man. He deserved the best mother in the world, but he got me. Not only me, but me with no experience, no patience, and for a good portion of his life, no Prozac. I hope that he is able to understand that I have always wanted to be the best mother to him I could be, and I hope he is able to forgive my shortcomings.

Motherless Mother

"Mommy, will you be with me the whole day tomorrow?'

My 4XX asks as I put on her barely pink cotton jammies, that have been washed to otherworldly softness. Her question is a common one, asked by 4 year olds everywhere. But this innocent question settles in my chest. Her love for me is a book that I am not quite smart enough to figure out. She is going through a stage that all my children have gone through to one degree or another. She wants me around all the time, but with her it's different. With her, everything is different. She is an intense, bright child. XX13 was never me, she was herself. She is the me I aspire to be. She asks for what she wants. She believes she is great, and accepts that the world will love her. She is always right, on both counts. She is perfectly proportioned, physically, never dealing with my narrow sloping shoulders, or too short upper body. I wear V-necks to make my neck look longer. If her neck looked any longer she would resemble those women who wear the brass rings around their necks. My role with her has always been clear, though never typical. She is a natural born caretaker. I walk unsteadily in my relationship with her. I used to wonder if I would have been like her if I had not lost my mother at such an early age. When XX4 came along I got my answer to that question. I could never have been XX13. She is my husband's, my sister-in-law's, my mother-in-law's, never mine. She loves me, but it is a patient, tolerant love. She thinks I am funny, and an acceptable fashion consultant if no one else is around, but she is her own, and her father's.

XX4 is Mine. All mine! Her wavy hair, her short neck, her dimples and deep-set eyes. She can't be still unless she is drawing or reading. Her temper often gets the best of her. She talks non-stop, and always wants to know the 'fancy' word for everything. 'Parched', not 'Thirsty'. 'Starving' not 'Hungry'. 'Exhausted' not 'Tired'. Oh yeah, she's all mine. She loves me with an intensity that makes me a little edgy. I have no experience with this type of mother/daughter love. Often, like tonight, it feels like a cool breeze blowing across an open wound I forgot I had. Why? I always want to ask. I do not have a point of reference for unconditional mother love. I need to be reassured all the time. I need her to have a mother, and be who I could not be. She is who I could have been. But she is also who I can never be. I will continue to be the mother I am called to be, but I will always feel the absence of the mother who wasn't there.