6 months

it seems impossible 

that six months of life have passed

since you were mine

a piece of my heart exists 

outside of my body

i experience loss in ways i have never felt before

i feel grief so intense on my chest

that it sometimes takes my breath away

i spend a lot of time not thinking about anything

because i don't want to think about

losing you

i make ill planned decisions and rash judgements

because i don't want to think

about any one thing for very long

i have encountered 

so many situations 

i push those dearest to me away

trying to feel less of an emptiness in losing you

as a new mom

i should be showing off my newborn

i should be experiencing each of your firsts

i should be soothing you when you cry

and feel the joy in your laughter

i have not figured out how to define my life

living with the loss of you

i want to tell everyone who asks about my children

about all eight of them and brag

all about this new baby i have

how adorable she is

how she is 6 months old now

how she is starting to giggle

and babble sounds 

how she is sitting up

and starting to eat baby food

about how chubby she is getting 

and how deep brown her eyes are

and how dark black her hair is

and how beautiful her skin tone is

AND...

that she doesn't live with me...

and my heart sinks

this isn't the way it should ever have to be

as much as i want to tell the world all about you

i can't

it is too painful,

it is too difficult

and then i feel guilty that i have a beautiful daughter

that i am not able to share with the world

a part of me that i don't claim

it is such a difficult balance of 

joy and pain

sacrifice and reward

happiness and sorrow

fear and understanding

unconditional love

love i will always have for you

redefined through my life

and experiences

that shape me as 

your birth mother

Happy Birthday!

today my oldest brother celebrates his birthday
he is an amazing father and a wonderful person
I wish him many more happy years to come

disappointment

caused by predicaments in life
continue to provide me with
the opportunities to appreciate
where I am in my life

sometimes it is rather difficult
to not get caught up in
the way I think situations/circumstances
should go and just allow
them to work out
the way the were intended to...

back to school

this time of year

i always have a surge of mixed emotions

it is so hard to grapple with the reality that my kids are growing up

i love being their mom

and sharing their lives with them

i do not look forward to them growing up and becoming adults themselves

whenever they head back to school

i take the opportunity to reflect over the past year

i get to reminisce about the good times

learn from the not so good times and set goals

to make this next year even better

with each passing year 

i cannot believe how fast time flies

on monday, i took my oldest to school she is a sophomore

yesterday, i started back to class

with a whopping 24 credit class load 

and 500 hours internship (crazy!)

today, i brought the next five to their first day of school

an eighth grader

a sixth grader

a fourth grader

a second grader

a kindergartner

and in a little over a week

my youngest will start preschool

trying to juggle 4 class schedules

balancing homework, responsibilities, practices,

carpools, routines, and bonding time...

this is what keeps me going,

not having enough time to do anything

but reminisce and 

make the best of it

earth shattering reality

I am a mother to a child who does not know who I am...

I love this child as much as life itself,

yet I am not the person she looks to

I am not the mother who feeds her

I am not the one who comforts her

It is an absolutely devastating reality
My heart breaks into a million pieces
when my baby looks at me and cries...
she doesn't want me to comfort her
she cries for another mother to comfort her
This child doesn't need or desire me in her life
the way I so desperately need and desire her.
 I don't blame her for this, 
it is all she knows, she is just a child
I am confident that someday,
this will change
but for right now,
this sucks,
it is so unbearably hard,
and it hurts more than I could have possibly imagined...