Sleeping with Bread Monday: with Parental Joy and Sadness

In the last week, when did I experience the most joy as a parent?

There is something about your child growing to love something which you love which makes your heart bursting-full. We all experience those moments throughout the lives of our children. It might be one of the more narcissistic aspects of parenting, but nevertheless, I believe it is a universal parental feeling. I had one such moment this week. Marley had drawn a picture of the earth, the moon and an alien in a spaceship. She wanted to share it at school and in order to do so, she was required to write about the picture. Here is the picture and her words (as is and then translated into grown up English.)

Ifyouhlldallangfllofaryoucansrvavforabou30secis.
(If you hold a lungful of air, you can survive for about 30 seconds.)

This may not have any meaning for most people reading this. I, however, experienced a moment of pure, unadulterated, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy-frenzied joy. This--this is MY daughter, without a doubt! (My husband probably would feel a similar sense of joy if he read my son's latest book project for his English class. He read a biography of Jimi Hendrix and stated that he chose the book because Jimi Hendrix is his favorite singer and guitar player.)

In the last week, when did I experience the most sadness as a parent?

There is something sad about persistent maladies and the impact they have on your children. Tonight, as I was trying not to lose my cool while I proofread my son's book report, I was getting a little testy. It isn't unusual for me to get frustrated when he has a project due--that could, and probably will, be a subject of an entire post. He was cooperating, though, with my suggestions. The work wasn't bad. I shouldn't have been as irritated as I was feeling. At one point, I asked my son to please turn out the dining room light. It was hurting my eyes. "Oh great," he exclaimed, "you're getting a migraine when I have a project to finish!" Well, so far, the actual migraine hasn't shown up. The pre-migraine crankiness and light sensitivity has, though. Those symptoms aren't a guarantee that a migraine will show itself, but it makes me sad that my son would know the symptoms and recognize, before I even do, that one might be coming. With a migraine, he recognizes that he will get to experience his mother being cranky, his having to help take care of her and his having to be responsible for an uncooperative little sister. It doesn't sound like a lot of fun, does it?














Thanks for joining me today!

P.S. I wrote this last night and dated it today because I knew I would be busy this morning. Later, in the wee hours of the morning, I wrote an entirely different sort of "How I'm Doing" post over here at my family blog. It ain't pretty but somehow, in the name of emotional honesty, I felt like I needed to disclose it here.

Also Sleeping with Bread this week:

Pam over at MarillaAnne
Sheila at Musings of a Mommy
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