Sacrifices

I never knew how much my mom sacrificed. Growing up it never occurred to me that she had any other options.

In the first few blindingly beautiful and romantic months of motherhood, I didn’t consider anything a sacrifice; I was born to be a mom. Instead it took weeks and months and years of living my life in manic states of anxiety, or fear, or concern, or debate, but always in a state of unfathomable love that I realized the sacrifice that my mother made.

Sacrifice. It seems to have snuck up on me in the middle of the night and hit me with more intensity than I’ve felt in a long time.

My life isn’t mine or at least it doesn’t feel that way. It feels out of control but in a very rigid and predictable way. I don’t remember that girl I used to be. I wonder who that girl would be now if she didn’t have children. Would she have a career? Would she find satisfaction in that career? Would she be happily married? Would she travel? Would she sleep in on Saturday mornings? Would she appreciate 45 minutes at the gym and a happy number of the scale? Would she have kicked those nasty vices and habits by now? Would she appreciate her family?  Would she wish she was a mother?

Do you know what accompanies Sacrifice? Guilt.

Guilt might possibly hit harder than Sacrifice.

The Guilt tells me I should count my blessings every second of the day. The Guilt says you have two healthy and beautiful children; you have a loving husband and you both have {fairly} secure jobs. You have a roof over our head and a little money in the bank. It’s so much more than most people have. The Guilt asks “What’s wrong with you?  Do you know how lucky you are?” And the selfish, Sacrificing part of me screams back at the Guilt “Are you blind? I’m living my life for everyone else. I can’t even tell you what makes ME happy anymore.” Then the Guilt replies “But you made that decision to become a Mother. YOU made THIS decision.”

And when I watch those two beautiful children sleeping in their beds or snuggling on the couch together – I know they are no mistake. I know the decision I made was never the wrong one. In fact, that decision I made…it was the hardest one I could have made.

With Sacrifice and Guilt comes Acceptance.

Accepting that whatever my life holds is the way it is meant to be. Accepting that the change I was hoping for at work, well…the time just wasn’t right. Accepting that I do not have as much control as I think I do. Accepting that it won’t always be this hard and this lonely and the sun will shine again.