Consequence Free Irresponsibility? Let me muse....

I saw this post on a friend's facebook wall earlier today. I stole it. I don't know who the author is. I will leave it up to my friend to tell her friend that I have used it. I hope that covers my arse legally for my thievery. 

From a friend...

A Love Letter to Motherhood:

What is motherhood but the very best chance to learn what you are made of? It will strip you down to nothing. Make you doubt yourself a thousand times. And it will make you roar with a fierceness you’ve never before seen. It will search your heart for your greatest fears and the bravest of all your intentions and set them out on display.

It breaks you. It saves you. It steals the girl you were. All of her. You’ll never sleep like her or be as carefree as she once was, but she’d never believe the courage or the selflessness she’ll one day possess in you. Motherhood replaces her with someone who understands love on a level the girl you were never could.

It’s okay to sometimes wish you could go back and live a day in her shoes. A day to bask in the decadence of irresponsibility. But if she could look forward: If she could see herself tested, how her fears have been faced, how the question “Am I strong enough to survive this?” is answered with a resounding yes, time after time. She’d feel damn proud to become the woman that awaits her.

~M

Since today is Monster's first (!how time flies!) birthday I thought, "How appropriate." Especially since earlier, I was discussing with another friend the fact that sometimes- even though we love our children with every single cell in our bodies- we wish we didn't have kids. What if I could go back, for one day, ten years in time?

Just for one day. Just for one day to NOT worry about saving for their education, their school uniforms, their food, their shoes, their sports fees, their overall health, happiness, and stability. 

Just to spend a day not thinking about someone else before I do something completely ill advised. Not to worry about the repercussions of doing something so incredibly stupid that when I look back, I take a deep breath and thank God that I walked away from it. 

Just to have that one day where if I spent my entire paycheck on strippers and beer, or my cell phone bill- it wouldn't mean my kids went hungry for the next two weeks. 

 Just one day of total 'consequence free' irresponsibility. 

Luckily for me, and my children, I know a pipe dream when I hear it. I don't want to be without them. They make me smile on the worst days, cry on the best days, and get me through the years. I need them much, much, more than they need me. 

They need me to clean for them, cook for them, do their laundry, hug them, cuddle them, love them. But they could have any other person in our family do that if need be. Nobody could ever fill the gap each one of my kids would leave in my heart if I didn't have them. 

Without them, my world would be: as small; as narrow minded; as pointless as it was when I was 20.

I can say, without even a glimmer of doubt in my mind- I would rather worry incessantly about, well, everything than go back in time and change even one day with these wonderful, messy, snot nosed, huggable, whiny, laughing, screaming little dirtbugs. Yes, I called them 'dirtbugs'. They are, and I wouldn't trade them for anything (except sometimes I am tempted to trade them for coffee).

So, I can look back at these last ten years and know that I love my kids more than I could have ever imagined. Happy Birthday to my Monster. I love you (even though you still aren't potty trained).