This is so I don't forget this moment in time

Dear Lil E,

Where there was once a woman and a man in great love and laughter and shared dreams became a wife and husband, then with greater love and hope and anticipation, became parents, there are now many changes. There is paperwork and division and moving on. But what has not changed is all that you are at the center, that great love for you, that great hope for who you are becoming everyday, that great anticipation for all of life that is falling, tumbling, tenderly stepping toward, calling at your door. What has not changed is that we, who you know as Mommy and Daddy, love you more deeply than words on a page or screen or whispered in between ni-ni lullabies could ever convey.

Some of this, you understand. You are easing into life in grandma and grandpa's house and the routine that has changed from our apartment ten blocks away. You have grasped that there is daddy time and mommy time and that you sleep here for now. For now, until we can get back to a place that is our own, but will once again, be different.

You ask questions, and as I've promised you and myself many times, I answer them succinctly and honestly and as appropriately and calmly as possible. You sometimes cry, as do I, and I hold you tightly against me and tell you that we will all be OK very soon. And we will.  You act out and I am the same, firm mommy with rules and expectations I know you can handle at age three. You snuggle into me and I hold you close and say silent prayers that God will close you in her palm and keep you safe.  You laugh and we are all distracted and spilling over with goobiness as you dance and play the harmonica and sing silly songs and delight over rhymes and make jokes that don't make sense and laugh from your small, round belly.  You blurt out an "I LOVE YOU!" and we melt, over and over and over again.

I am thinking, praying, centering on a new definition of family, of who we will be or can be or might be on the other side, in our own space again, in lives that are not just changing but have changed.  It won't be the same, but there will still be us. And there will still be Caillou and the musical instrument bin and bubble baths and stories and songs before bedtime and your babydoll Tiger and plenty of snacks in the pantry and time to play hide and seek with mommy and time to play golf in the park with daddy -- all those things that remind you that you are at home whatever walls surround you.

I am telling you this because I am still holding that hope as I hold you, close to my chest, that things and we are getting better. That we are healing. That the pain and hard work and chaos of changing will give way to goodness and light and peace, so that this family, in its former and evolving and new existences, will be whole just as it is.

You, I love.
Mama.

Comments

[foodmomiac]

You just made me cry in the middle of a huge meeting at work (which I am obviously not participating in very well).

[Sarah]

Oh, Jessica, Lil E is so very lucky to have you as his mama...Love to the both of you--Sarah

[zoe]

ok. i'm at my desk bawling my eyes out. he is so very lucky to have you...for you to have each other.