Goals

I have always questioned my abilities as a mother. I spent the first few years in my new role as Mom second guessing every decision and every choice I made. Everything I did, I scrutinized and picked apart.

In reality, I worried constantly, wondering which mistake I made would be the one that would screw up one, or all of my kids, forever. Honestly, I used to joke that as long as my children were alive, relatively happy, and required the least amount of therapy possibly to recover from their childhood, I had done my job.

Well, with one kid dead and two in therapy every week I had some serious self-evaluation to do.

I had to reevaluate my goals and expectations for parenting and what I truly wanted for my children.

Of course I still want all of the same things I use to want, but now I have to become more realistic. I have to face the reality that this world is broken and really awful things happen and we can't always get what we want, even if it is that our children simply stay alive.

The year and a half on this earth after losing my precious Deral, has grown me in ways I never would have imagined or thought possible.

I have been stretched until I thought I should break and then stretched some more.

My values have shifted and I have focused my life and views on different things.

My expectations as a mother had to change if I were going to keep my sanity.

I have to learn to tune out the guilt and shame. I have to silence the voice that is so loud in my mind telling me that I failed at the most fundamental task of parenting -keeping my children alive.

My new goals for motherhood is teaching my children to find joy.

I want my living kids to know that no matter what they go through, no matter the devastation they face or the disappointments that come their way, there is joy.

My goals for my kids are no longer happy, healthy, and breathing. My prayer is that they know the One who made them, they are completely and totally loved, and that they find peace in their hearts, no matter what.

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