Conversations

There are days when it's tough. We all say it, we all know it. It doesn't have to be raining, it doesn't have to be Monday. You are lucky if it doesn't involve bad, bad news. It can be a day like today.

I was lying with Elise for what should have been her naptime. It is interesting, these restful moments with a four-year-old. Chats about kindergarten, friends, favourite foods or princesses. But sometimes it's those conversations you didn't think you would ever have to have.

"Mommy, why doesn't Daddy live here?"
"Mommy, if Daddy just lived here again everybody would be fine."

It hits me. Hits me hard. Crushes my chest and breaks my heart just a little bit more. There are more questions, I give hard answers. Answers that ease the heart of my child. There are hugs. And today there were tears. I am trying to be a water-resistant Band-aid.

Lying in her bed takes me back to the beginning. The first days, weeks and then months of Separation. The Year He Left was 2007. It stretched out. It encompassed more, much more than the huge event of the birth of our second child that same year. The tears were ever flowing. In the car, at the gym, at the doctor, and of course, in the shower. But those tears of grief and loss and worry could be alone, with just me. It didn't matter if I got stares from passer-bys if I was in public. I was still in my world and mine alone. It didn't matter if a stranger had to ask "Are you okay?" But crying in front of my children hurts. Hurts me, hurts them.

Mama can't always be perfect.

When she progressed from crib to "big girl bed" it was January 2008. I would lay with her nightly to get her to sleep. And for many nights, with her drifting to sleep, I silently cried as she twirled my hair. I constantly read her wall where letters formed the word DREAM. I would close my eyes and try.

When the tears fell today in her bed beside her, it brought back pangs of hurt and memories good and bad like it was 2007 all over. But this time she was awake. This time I didn't have time to turn away from her stare. This time she is older. And this time she put her hand on my hair, and without twirling it, said, "Don't be sad Mama, it's okay."

I say thank you, we hug again and I now I know it will be.