Being a Mom is hard....

As I've mentioned before, I once heard a quote that becoming a mother is to forever have your heart walk around outside your body....Never have I felt the weight of this quote more than this week. Britton started first grade at a new school this week. Monday was great. He came home and said he liked his teacher and she was awesome...However, yesterday he sang a bit of a different tune. After pick up, he was quiet. I asked him about his day and he told me he learned that a sentence begins with a capital and ends with a period. He said PE was fun and he likes his PE teacher and at recess he played with Thomas (the neighbor boy) who offered to share his snack with him..."I said, No thank you, I'm not hungry" Brit told me....Then he dropped the bomb on me..."I am ready to go back to St Paul." Shocked, I said, "Brit, that's not an option, honey..You are at South now. This is where we will be until we move or you move on." He said, "but I wanna see my friends." I didn't know what to say.

Later, I found out that he sat alone at lunch and he feels like no one likes him. He is nervous and anxious and he doesn't wanna go in the school by himself. He said he got lost and he was scared to ask to go to the bathroom. My heart lurched.

And here is where parenting becomes hard...no one tells you when you have kids that the first time you see your normally confident child experience anxiety or nervousness that your heart will twist in 100 different directions and that you will feel helpless. No one tells you that the first time your child is in a new environment and is old enough to be aware that there are kids who ARE NOT scared or nervous will make you wanna keep them at home for the rest of their lives. I know I cannot do this, I know I must encourage him. We read Chrysanthemum, talked about new experiences and how scary it can be...we talked about how hard it is to come into a school where you don't know anyone. We talked about how fun it is to meet new people...we talked, we prayed. His response was that he put his arms around me and asked in his prayers for "God to bless my mother".... being a mom is HARD....here he was feeling scared, alone, nervous, anxious and he was praying for ME. Maybe it is through that blessing that God will give me the wisdom to help Brit through this time...maybe it helped him to think of me instead of his situation....whatever the reason, my heart twisted, one more time.

I went to bed with tears in my heart and on my pillow. I was torn between being angry at myself for doing this to my child and feeling helpless to fix it. I know South is where God wants Britton...no doubt about that...way too much praying was done...He didn't tell me it was going to be PERFECT or EASY though and THAT is where being a mom is HARD! Oh, so hard...

I've been told by friends who have raised their children and launched them into adulthood that it doesn't go away....the knot, the twisting...It just gets easier to put them into God's hands because he proves faithful...so here goes...God he is yours..You love him more than I ever could..you see all...watch him, comfort him, wrap your arms around him so he doesn't feel alone..help him NOT to be scared or sad....give him a classmate/friend. He is yours, but God you loaned him to me and my heart is twisted...I don't like him to feel sad or scared...

I must keep telling myself...He is HIS...He is HIS...I must trust..but MAN, being a mom is HARD.....

It is from God that parents receive their children, and it is to God that they should lead them." Dietrich Bonhoeffer..