Pull up a chair and let’s chat. (It doesn’t hurt that it’s a super cute pink chair that I saw in @thenester‘s feed.)⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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Yesterday, I posted about some of raw, hard truths of our journey with Tom Tom. Some of you took that post to mean that I’m not all in or maybe have some regret about the decision we’ve made to adopt. That couldn’t be farther from the truth. Let me give you some context.
That post was inspired by a conversation I had with Stevie about how I miss Fridays when we would anticipate ALL week about picking TT up. We called Thursday Thomas-eve and our whole family couldn’t WAIT until Stevie brought him home to us. And he felt the same way about Fridays. He would get SO EXCITED to see us that he literally wouldn’t let go of my neck for two hours. We devoted those weekends totally to him and it was a mutual love fest.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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Fast forward through Ms. Irene’s death and ALL OF US adjusting to him living with us full time. The honeymoon ended. We now had to be parents who made him do things that he didn’t want to do like eat decent food and go to school and pick up his toys.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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This transition has been amazing and beautiful and so hard.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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We miss being the fun/weekend Steve and Edie. We miss the way he looked at us every second he was here. We miss being his favorite people. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Now we’re his boring parents. And because he’s grieving and trying to heal, he tells us both often, how much he loves us and how much he hates us.
I get it.
I don’t like us either sometimes in this new role. I wish we could still be the fun weekend people. And though sometimes we are, we’re also the mean, boring parents who won’t let him have his iPad every time he wants it.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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All that to say, we are so all in. If you could know the tears we shed on an almost daily basis, the time and effort we put into helping him thrive, the therapy, the courts, the prayers, the desperation to make this right….⠀
So here’s to all of you who are in hard seasons. Yay for you for not asking that it be easier or prettier or less painful. Yay for you for carrying heavy burdens and still showing up with love to those who need you.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
I would say that what you are going through is what non-custodial parents go through when they then have full custody.. I watched my late husband go through it with his daughter and friends go through it also. If you aren’t in counseling TT included then you need to make those appointments. Depending on his age you need to sit down and tell him you miss those times also but your job now as his “parent” is to teach him how to take care of himself when he becomes an adult. Also you need to have a no chore day and do the things you did when you just had him on weekends. Prayers for you and yours… I still have children that say I hate you and then I love you… mid 30s to mid 40s .when I refuse to rescue them from their choices . I am supportive but not an enabler…hard lesson for me to learn the difference of helping and enabling
So cute!
Embracing the power to rewrite our narratives is liberating. It is about reclaiming control and forging a future free from the constraints of our past.
8 ball pool