Yesterday was a day I stole from Real Time, to re-calibrate with my youngest daughter, to borrow a word from Ms. OLM. It has been clear to me for the last week of being home that we have been out of alignment, missing the mark, not connecting, and though the day's plans involved more Appalachian golf for Dan and precious time with dear friends for us girls, my heart was screaming, "STOP!" - this isn't working, this can't keep going in this direction, gotta change something here...So, Ani and I stayed home while Dan and Eliza went without us.
It was a really hard decision to make, derailing our plans like that, and it was rough for the first 10 minutes. Ten minutes. A day of healing is well worth ten minutes of deep empathy, active listening and riding-it-out, in my opinion. Ten minutes for a day of talking, laughing, thinking, considering, snuggling, talking, listening, and snuggling some more. We painted. We read. We built. We snacked. We walked to the garden and there she invited me to sit in the shade with her before we headed back home...
Carefully, she unpacked her bag of her dearest treasures.
I soaked up every peaceful moment with this child of mine. Every thought shared and every kind gesture...It has felt stormy around here and it was deeply restorative to be reminded of love and yes and peace in each others' presence. Today was not smooth sailing, but we had something to fall back on, some new memories of how it can work.
2 comments:
It feels soooo good and right to take action in fixing it.
I mean - we can go along for a while without even realizing we're a tiny bit off, and then when we realize that it is, it's easy to at first suppose that it can and will fix itself.
How brave and loving to say "Not good enough!" and to put plans aside and decide that Now is the time.
Lovely words and feelings from this post.
xxoo
(and thanks.)
Oh yes - such wisdom in know things are off...and that it can't continue. I've been fighting those feelings lately and when I can acknowledge that things are off - and take a step back and open my heart to love my boy the way he deserves (as opposed to recede) it melts all the negativity between us and we come back together and can start anew. Parenting - it's a tough gig, but LOVE heals everything. You are doing beautiful work, mama.
Debbie
xoxo
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