A love letter to my boys

During the holiday season I reflect on the things I am grateful for. At the top of the list is my family, and more specifically: my two young sons. The following article is my love letter to my boys. From the beginning through the end of every day, they are always in my thoughts. I am very clear as to what my role is with my kids. So, here is my heart boys. Here is my love. This is to you .
Let me introduce myself, you know me as mom but I am so much more! I am your confident, I am your cheerleader, I help you blow your nose when you are sick, I give you kisses and comfort when you are hurt. I am your mother. I am always trying to be what you need. At your very young age: you cannot yet see all of me.

I am not just your friend, I am your parent. I am not here to sit back and watch you raise yourself, I am here to guide you. I am not here to fight you, take away your fun, or make your life harder: I am here to watch you grow, show you right from wrong and create the boundaries that I think will help you the most on your own journey.

I love you. It is a special kind of love. It is a love you will never find outside of family: It is a love that is insurmountable, unbreakable, total. No matter what you do, who you become or what you achieve I will love you…to the very fiber of my being. I am your mother. You are my child. Always.

I want to teach you what I know. It is something that I realize you won’t appreciate until you are in my shoes, and that’s OK. You don’t have to earn my love. It is there for you forever. You don’t need to see me as wise or even see me at all. I am still here. Waiting. Loving you.

When you are young, your life is uncomplicated. It is like an arrow shot from a bow. It is swift and focused, you will move long distances with every shot. That will change. One day your life will spread out. Instead of an arrow you will become more like a net. Your spread will be wider…your distance traveled shorter, but the effect is much broader. It will become a well studied choice to be the most effective with each cast. Instead of flailing about in far flung, random directions: you will become aware of your position, become well rooted in your accumulated life perspective and you will be able to use that knowledge and wisdom to it’s fullest potential. As you make this transition, as you become more experienced: you will begin to see why your father and I are so different from you right now. You will begin to fill our shoes. You will see a very different world than the one you are focused on today.

When I was young: I boldly stepped out on my life’s stage. I played every part, I knew every role. I thought I was wise.

When I had you and your brother: it was like I went from a high-school play in a high school auditorium to Broadway. It was that different: going from the center of my own universe to being your parent. As I did this: I went from an uncertain fledgling to a powerful eagle. Suddenly what I thought I knew was irrelevant, even silly, as I began to stretch my wings and truly soar.

When you were little, all you could see was me and all I could see was you. Now that you are older, you are looking away. Choosing your steps, creating your path. I watch you walk away from me, sometimes I can even see you run. I will forever be in this position: behind you, reaching out to steady you if you stumble.

It is a long, beautiful goodbye and there is a part of me that wishes every day was a few hours longer. There is a part of me that is so scared that I might forget a moment. The years go by so fast. I’m afraid I will wake up, in what seems like tomorrow, and your days with me will have sped by: that you will be grown and gone. I am afraid of the day that my house is no longer filled with shrill screams, thundering feet and fits of laughter. The future silence of the empty nest is always present in the back of my mind. From that perspective: I already miss you.

When you have your children, you will see that although it is bittersweet to watch your children grow and move away from you, it is a place of extreme pride to see your kids begin to mature into their destiny. To watch them become sure footed on their own path. To see your position as parent mean less and less to them. It is as it should be. You are becoming you.

Stepping out of the center of my own world has been the most awesome, incredible experience. It just keeps getting bigger, it keeps getting better.

When I see you, I see your potential. I see what you can be. That you can be better than I am. That you can be wiser than I am. That you can be your fullest potential. I see that. I try to show you, too. I pray that I succeed.

But even if your life is different. If you end up feeling like a failure. If you end up broken by the decisions that you make in your life…guess what? That’s how I got here, too.

There’s no mistake you cannot overcome. No choice in life that you cannot learn a lesson from, and no path you can explore that is a mistake. You go where you go for a reason. You learn what you learn because you need the lesson. You will ultimately be successful if you attempt to do all of this from a position of love.

Open your heart and meet every person with love.

The one thing I’m sure of is: that everyone deserves your love. But it’s important to realize that love and trust are two different things. Not everyone will earn your trust, but that feeling of love should always be there.

One day you may betray my trust, as I betrayed my parent’s trust. It helped me realize that there are choices in this life that can’t be taken back. But love? No. I will always have room in my heart for you.

I hope your life is easier than mine has been, but I respect your journey enough to realize that I can’t dictate your path. So, every day I will show you that you are loved. Every day I will set limits so that you have boundaries. And every moment I will become the most that I can muster to show you what I believe is possible in this life.

I believe you can do even more than I can (and I have been working on being the best me I can be for a very long time.) I am so excited to see the magic that you can create. The reality that you shape. The moments that we share.