Quiet

When the kids aren't here, my mind isn't settled.  I know they are well taken care of.  I know they are having fun.  But I feel like a piece of me is missing.  Actually I feel like 4 pieces of me are missing.  You would think it would be fun.  A whole weekend to myself to do nothing but eat what I want, sleep until when I want, watch whatever I want and whenever I want on TV.  But the truth is, I can't even tell you what I do when they aren't here.

This is Easter weekend.  We would normally spend this weekend doing fun things with the kids...dying eggs, going to an Easter egg hunt, possibly going to the zoo, and just hanging out and being a family.  Instead, all weekend I've been catching up on projects, doing chores, grocery shopping; basically wandering around in circles trying to keep myself busy until Sunday morning when the kids come back home.

I wish I could rewind back to the way things used to be...before the stress, before the anger, before the shame, before the sadness.  That is where I wish we could be.  I don't want to go back to the past, I want that to be our present.

This is not what I want...this quiet house with no one in it.  I want it full of life.  Full of happiness.  Full of hope for what is to come.  I think about my life everyday and wonder if this is how it will be for the rest of my days, and I realize that if it is, I will be okay.  I can do this.  I am strong enough.  I can be happy.

I wonder if he's happy.  Happy with the way things are now, instead of the way things used to be.  Not the most recent past, but the happy, fun, full of love past.  If he's happy, I know I can do this.  That's all I want.  I wish he would hear me when I tell him that.  I think he's so much stronger, filled with so much more hope, so much more love, and so much more laughter when he's happy.  He deserves to be happy.  My kids deserve for him to be happy.

I was painting Isaac's closet today and a few separate times I felt myself choking back tears.  I tried to pinpoint the thought, memory, or emotion that was causing it, and there was nothing.  No one particular thing was in my brain...the only thing I heard was the quiet.

The start of it all...

I don't remember exactly when I started feeling like something was off, but it was somewhere in the neighborhood of the beginning of 2010.  I've always had an eerie ability to know something bad was coming...that something just wasn't right.  It was then that I started having odd dreams, waking up in a panic, just feeling off.  That was also right around the time that I found out I was pregnant with Isaac.  Isaac Matthew, my sweet little oopsie baby.  Don't get me wrong, after the initial shock of the positive pregnancy test, I embraced it.  But I would be lying if I told you I wasn't scared shitless at first.  Here we are, two kids already in a 3 bedroom house; debt, stress and normal family issues that I'm all but certain that everyone has, and now we're throwing this brand new bit of life into the mix.  We had two kids, no diapers, no naps...we were finally getting a taste of what it would be like to have a little bit of freedom.  Freedom to be adults, to share time alone with each other, freedom to enjoy the things we had yet to experience.  We were so young when we married, so young when we had Nathan.  I wouldn't trade that for the world, but I also know that there are things we were both missing...that both of us wished for.

I remember telling Stephen with a hint of a smile in the corner of my lips, and looking into his eyes and seeing pure fear.  Pure sadness.  Pure guilt.  He tried to hide it, but I knew.  I have been with him for half of my life...I can normally look at him and know where others can't.  I remember telling him how scared I was, and him telling me that it would be okay. "We'll figure this out." he said.  Just a few weeks prior we had a conversation where we both agreed that we may have another baby, but we were going to wait.  Wait and see what life handed to us first.  And then life handed us this.

Some nights I sit with Isaac while he watches Elmo and I just stare at him...I think about what our lives would be like without him.  His smile, his sweet hazel eyes, his dimple that he gets when he laughs.  I wonder what it would be like.  Would we be where we are now?  Honestly, I don't know.  And honestly, at this point I don't care.  Because no matter what, I can't imagine my life without him.  He is part of my heart.  Part of my soul just like his brothers.

Just like his dad.

Keeping it a secret...

I've thought about writing a journal.  A place to put my thoughts.  But I type so much faster than I write...I feel like I can keep up with my thoughts better this way.

I needed a place to air my grievances.  To get it all out, put it out to the universe.  It's not fair to family or to friends to make them a constant part of my daily life drama.  Maybe this is better.  And maybe, if someone stumbles across it, maybe then it can help someone else.