Sullivan woke up a few moments ago from his afternoon nap and Damon and I went into his room to see what was wrong. There were a few tears in his eyes and he seemed to be comforted quickly by our speedy response so we assumed it was just a bad dream or something that woke him up. So Damon put on his music that he likes to hear and I gave him a hug and sat down on the rocking chair beside his bed and just sat there with him for a bit. You could tell he was still in a sleepy daze by the rhythmic sucking beat of his fafel (pacifier)and the soft stroking of his beetit (blanket) with his fingers all the time starring blankly at the spindles of his crib. After a short while he said “Bye Bye Mommy” which these days always seems to signal that he is alright now and okay for us to leave. So I echoed a good bye back and followed it with an “I Love You”. And as I got up from the chair my sweet little Sullivan responded back with an “I wuv you Mommy” something he has gotten into a habit of doing these days. Damon and I usually put Sullivan to bed together at night. We put on a new diaper and jammies, read a story, turn the light off, turn the fan on and then Sullivan always asks us both to sit in our chairs. “Daddy chair” and he points to the rocking chair….”Mommy chair” and he points to the overstuffed chair where we read stories and we all sit together and wind down our day. Now of course there are times when I am not back there when the wind down routine begins but I always know when lights are out cause I’ll hear Sullivan yell out to me “Mommy Chair” and I best get back there soon so as not to disturb the night time ritual. Then Sullivan flops and gets a little silly in the bed…rolling and bouncing up and down….saying “Night Night” a dozen or so times until finally he says “Bye Bye” which is our signal to leave the room. And lately as I have been leaving the room I’ll say I Love you and he has quickly picked it up and chimes in repeating the phrase. But hearing him say it today just seemed so much a part of his routine and filled me with this enormous feeling of joy and pride. Over the past several weeks it seems all that I have been filled with is frustration and fear over all the bad things I may be teaching my son. All the bad behavior he must see on a day to day basis having an overly expressive mom who is juggling 3 part-time jobs. And the reality is that he probably is observing some not so perfect behavior from time to time but at least once a day (if not 20 times a day) he hears me say I love you and he gets a hug and a kiss and often some cuddle time that he usually tries to wiggle out of cause there are just far too many things to explore and experience to stop for snuggle time. But he hears us both say it and has learned at his young two year old life to say it back. I just wanted to stop and celebrate that today. I am an expert at beating myself up and I often waste valuable time reprimanding and scolding myself for not living up to my own personal expectations. But I wonder today if maybe my son is teaching me that there are alternative expectations to consider in this parenting scenario. Different perspectives that have nothing to do with achieving perfection and everything to do with living in the moment and making sure that those you care about most know that you love them and that they are valued. So for now Sullivan has ventured back to the land of sweet dreams and I’m sure when he wakes he will get back to his full time job of boundary testing and expressing the intense frustrations at the limitations of his age which I hope to respond to with LOVE. If LOVE is my only response to him than I imagine everything will be alright
Oops, I spoke too soon….I hear some cries from the other room….guess there is no napping today for our little Sullivan. No nap equals major crankiness…Lord give me strength to remember the beautiful lesson you just taught me.