Childhoodtake2!

The moments where you sit with your temper and you try to find your sanity.
Where you hold on to the thought that how you react, this moment, it will stay with them.
Where you realize you are raising tiny humans, and that is hard, it is exhausting.
And in the moments you're unsure if you like them, but thank god you love them.
The tantrums that come, the constant loud, the whining that doesn't stop, the constant everything.
Because a three and six year old battle.
Because a three year old storms.
Because everything is loud.
Because a six year old is starting with attitude and talking back and taking control.
Because a no is the end of all.
And you worry, will I ever like them again?
Am I enough for them.
Will we come out the other side.
My frayed edges, my frayed body and temper and life.
Will we get to the other side.
And I go back to the beginning and realize that their blue eyes and their curls are not all that they got from us.

They got my stubborn,
they got his angry,
they got my temper,
they got his frustration,
they got my determination,
they got his love for life,
they got my will,
they got his excitement.

And I love all of it.
I love hearing their steady breath when they sleep.
I love their loving arms when they hug.
I love how he runs up to get between us when we hug,
I love his "nice and cozy".
I love her love for friends.
I love her love and her smile and her filling so full that love spills from her face.
I love how much they love to swim, to play.
I love their love for the outside.

When you are frayed, when your edges are worn,
dear loving parents,
go back to the beginning, trace their steps.
Trace the you in them,
find how you started, what made you fall hard.

My frayed edges are when I see me, I see him, in them.
I see the good and the bad.
I see the blame, the guilt that we created this,
we created them.
And then I see the love that was also created.
The love that fixes the broken, the love that will mend all of
my frayed edges.