My little ones…but don’t tell them I call them that.
I like to think of them as my little ones, truth be told my oldest is almost as tall as I am and the rest of them will no doubt get there sooner than I would like. My youngest will be one in about ten days, and I find myself wrestling with my feelings of having another child. My husband is adamently against it, though I know should I become pregnant he will love the baby as he loves all the boys. (yes, we are taking precautions) A part of me wants to slap myself silly, as raising four boys, while not hard perse, it certainly isn’t easy, and it most certainly isn’t cheap. But there is a place in my heart that I can not deny exists. A place that watches C struggle with getting ready for middle school, a place that watches J struggle to overcome his picky eating, a place that watches A learn to read, and a place that watches H learn to take those first steps-a place that breaks every time I watch my little ones reach a new milestone.
My husband tells me to enjoy their new accomplishments, to be proud of them…and I am, oh how I am. Yet, I am sad as well, never again will C, so close to being a teen, crawl into my lap when he doesn’t feel good. I will never have J curled up next to me while he struggles to read Dr. Seuss. A will never step on that bus again for his first day of kindergarten, and even H, my baby, has given up on his 2 am feedings. My children still need me of course, and when milestones are met, others wait in the wings-other milestones they have not reached and still need me to be there for.
But there is that place in my heart that yearns for them to always be babies, that longs to keep them with me and never let them go. I read somewhere that having a child is like cutting out a piece of your heart and setting it free, if that is so I have four small pieces of my heart here-four beautiful, sweet, intelligent pieces that I get to hold and laugh with everyday. And I am lucky I have an equally beautiful, sweet, intelligent man to share it all with.
