Parenting Confessions

Lately I've been thinking a lot about parenting and all the thing that go into it. I will maintain that parenting is absolutely the hardest job on the planet and of course the most underpaid :)

So here's a confession. I worry entirely way too much, ENTIRELY way too much!!! About everything really but specifically about my kids...

And here recently it's really been a problem how much I worry about leaving my kids. This month and next I am going to have to leave my kids with babysitters (by babysitters...I mean my family!) on several occasions and the anxiety from it makes me just want to cancel any kind of social life I might have and stay at home.

I have a hard time leaving my children. I've gotten better with aiden as he's gotten older but I think aiden was at least 6 months before I ever left him with anyone for even an hour and a year old before I ever let him spend the night with my parents. Call it being overprotective or crazy or weird or whatever but I have a really hard time with it. My life would be so much easier if I didn't. If I asked for help more often. I have an amazing family and support system that would love to help me, would love to watch aiden or hallie for a day or both. But I hardly ever let them because something inside me feels uneasy about them being away from me. I've even felt at times like I was hurting people's feelings by not allowing them to keep my kids. And I have given myself a million little pep talks and screamed inside my head "what's wrong with you??? You trust these people!!!" You would trust these people with anything. They love you, they love your kids, what is YOUR problem?!?!" (yes I have conversations with myself in my head...) And yes I am fully aware that this is very much MY problem and has nothing whatsoever to do with the people I'm leaving the kids with. I trust these people wholeheartedly so why, why do I still worry when I'm away from them? Why don't I trust the people I've put in charge. I DO trust them in theory, in my mind I really do so why do I feel uneasy when I'm away. and the other day walking through my house it hit me...literally...

I was carrying hallie to her bed to put her down for a nap, she was asleep against my chest and I stepped up the tile steps out of my living room and started to fall. Aiden had left something on the step that I tripped over. In a single second I knew there was no way I was not going down and I spun my body to fall on my back so hallie would fall against me. I fell with one tile step into my lower back and the other jutting in to the side higher up my back. It was incredibly painful and I laid on the floor for about 20 minutes after the fall crying and wondering if I would be able to stand or if I had broken my ribs. Hallie was of course perfectly fine. She stirred against my chest when we first fell but she even fell back asleep on me while I laid on the floor. Long story short...I was fine, bruised and sore for a few days but nothing was broken. In the days that followed though I played the scene through my head so many times wondering, couldn't I have fallen down on my knees and held her away and up from my body to keep her safe? Why in that one second did I choose to turn myself where I would take the hardest fall?

I asked myself the question but I already knew the answer. My brain didn't make that split second decision, my heart did. My heart's only thought was about shielding her, not what would hurt me least. And that's when I started to figure out why I have a hard time leaving my kids.

I trust the people I leave my kids with implicitly, they are more than capable, they are more than adequate and in some ways they may even be better at parenting than me. The uneasy feeling comes from the love factor. No one loves my kids more than me and when a train is coming at them, I don't trust that everyone would be as willing to throw themselves in front of it for my kids like I would. I'm not 100% positive that they would throw their back to the stairs to keep my baby safe. I'm sure their brain would tell them to but in that split second, would their hearts??

So I've figured it out and that's definitely the uneasy feeling. The more I examined it the more I recognized it as the factor that makes my stomach queasy when I'm not with my babies. I'm waiting for the "bad" to happen. The unexpected. So I've seriously started to pray about this cause I realize I have to let go, I have to ask for help, I have to be able to trust and leave my kids and enjoy my time when I'm not with them. I've been asking God to help me with this, help me to let go, to put faith in other people, to not worry so much, to trust that God will protect them.

I prayed this prayer this morning and I felt like I had an "ah ha" moment. It's ok to be apprehensive that something might go wrong, that the person I've put in charge doesn't love my kids as much as me. But ultimately I have to let go and put God in charge, the ONLY person that is capable of loving my kids more than me. Trust that He'll protect them, He'll keep them safe when I can't. He'll never leave them when I have to.

I'll continue to pray about it and hopefully in time, I'll begin to be able to let go. Have faith and not worry so much. I'm sure I'll always worry about my kids though. About their health, their happiness, their spirituality, their safety, their hearts, their education, their nutrition, their sleeping...the list goes on and on. That's one of the things that makes parenting the most difficult and the most rewarding job in the world. The love and the worry.