That seems to be a very popular phrase right now...
But it is that moment for me today. That moment when I'm struck with the reminder of how quickly time slips away and how little of it I truly have.
Today it was the reminder of how, soon enough, my home will be without children, for mine will have grown and moved on. In that thought, I can't help but see how they do not belong to me, but are a temporary gift. A treasure I get to enjoy for a little while, but will soon, too soon for me, be ready to flutter away like a butterfly from a cocoon.
The saying goes that if you let it go and it comes back it is yours, but if it doesn't, if never was. Will my children come back? Will they leave my home know that they are a blessing to me or will they leave feeling thankful that they are no longer the bane of my existence?
Some would say that the very fact that I question this proves that I am a good mother and my kids will be fine. I don't believe that. I can think things all I want, but my actions should express those thoughts as well. I hope they do.
A part of me looks forward to my children's futures and all that might be. Another, possibly selfish part of me, wonders how it might be to have children who are with you all their lives and then no longer are, because they are their own. To live, at that point, as a separate unit from the one they were raised in with you.
I don't want to be that mom who can't let go and clings to my children for dear life. I don't want to be afraid of them becoming fully their own people. I want to inspire and encourage them as they become what I cannot stop them from being.
Yet there is that part of me that fears how much my heart will break when they do.
It is partially with these thoughts that I question why I'd have anymore. I've never planned any of them, though I do know how they happen. I've never tried for a child, though, thankfully I've been blessed with them. However, I'm still capable of being gifted with more and of course once gifted, I'd simply be thankful for them. But do I want to be, again?
I've been the sister to a newbie as a teenager and practically as an adult. I know the way a relationship can be between siblings spaced so far apart. I know that it can emotional positives and negatives, as anything can.
As I think of my oldest and how it once was for her and how it might be, especially if I had another girl at some point, I wonder how she would feel. Granted, just as she is growing into her own person, who will some day have her own separate life, I am also my own person and I am free to do things.
I just feel empty at the thought. Empty at the idea that it doesn't really matter how she'd feel in the long run, because, though she is my child, this is MY life. Empty knowing that someday she will be, they all will be, less a part of my life than they are right now as they venture off and make their own. And I... I will be less a part of theirs. Maybe not in our hearts, but it certainly won't be like it is now.
I suppose I'm not one who likes change, especially not big changes, and to many I still have plenty of time. Today, though, I realize how much a vapor time is. It makes me thankful that I've chosen to homeschool and enjoy the precious years with my children. To not work outside of my home so I can be with them. Not all the time, but much of it. It is appreciating the time I do have that I need to put more focus on. Because I am richly blessed.
