Having kids

I'm the eldest of 4 children & the only one without children.  C has 2 kids, L has 2 kids (as of today!!) & M has 2 kids, one biological & one step son.  Society definitely says that I should have kids by now.  I am 35 years old, I am happily married, I am educated & I live in the burbs.  So why don't I have kids?  Having kids in my opinion isn't something that you just do.  Kids are a full time job, they are needy (rightfully so), they are precious & when you have them your life should revolve around them.  They should be first, after God.  Your actions, your thoughts, your everything HAS to be about them.  I've been there & I've done that.  I'm a good mom.  Mothering comes very naturally to me.  It's what I do & it's who I am.  I do want a child & everytime I think we are ready to try something happens.  One of us gets laid off, one of us needs to have a certain medication out of our system for "x" amount of months, one of us says "man, we are broken people, do we really want to bring a child into this messed up world?"  Sometimes I think we've gotten to an age where we've had time to overthink all the possible things that could go wrong (I mean ALL the things).  We don't want to get it wrong.  We are scared to death of messing a kid up like our parents messed us up.  Then I have to remember that I am not in control of my life.  Everything does not have to be mapped out & planned.  God knows what we all need & God knows if Troy & I will become parents one day.  That is for Him to decide & not me.  I am not in control.

I have been blessed with the most amazing neices & nephews.  The oldest will be 11 this year & the youngest was born today.  As my sister lays in that hospital bed tonight recovering from her C-section the instinct inside of me that wants to mother comes out.  It wants to protect, take pain away--both emotional & physical--it wants to curl up beside her to tell her that she doesn't need to worry.  That she will be okay, she is a good mom & that she has help, she is not alone.  That I will help her, she can count on me.  My sister called me today before her scheduled C-section & I told her that I would be at the hospital in the morning to see her & to meet my new nephew.  I told her that I loved her, but inside I was a mess.  Was I a bad sister for not being there the second he was born?  She was about to have surgery & I wasn't going to be there.  Her husband was there and his family was there, but her family was not.  Her mother (not me) was not.  She was having her second baby & she was there without family.  My other sis, C, was caring for my neice, my dad was at work & my mom was living in a hotel.  L doesn't talk much about her feelings & really she was probably fine, but I wasn't fine.  I felt sad for her, I felt sad for my other sibs who've experienced child birth without their mom next to them to share that amazing experience & I felt sad for myself.  The voices in my head started talking and they said "Oh, Alicia, you can't do that.  You can't have a child & he/she have no grandparents.  You can't have a child & be alone at the hospital." 

Maybe my sister is stronger than me.  Maybe I'm just a big ole emotional sap who needs to suck it up, but for now I will just live in the moment & feel sad for what my sister didn't have tonight.  I will struggle with feeling like I should've been there tonight instead of in the morning.  You see, that struggle, that guilt is what the eldest of a drug addict faces.  I was put in a position where I had to be the parent. I should've never had to be the parent to my parent's kids.  EVER.  I have gotten much better about trying to be a mother to my siblings.  It has not come easy though.  There have been fights & arguments, them telling me to back off because they never asked for me to be their mother.  That's true, they did not ask for it & neither did I.  I've felt isolation because of it.  I've felt unappreciated & I've felt so confused as to what my role should be at this point.  What should I say?  What should I do?  How should I feel?  How should they feel?  Ultimately, I can answer those questions, but the one I will always struggle with is "How should I feel?" Feelings by defintion are an affective state of consciousness, such as that resulting from emotions, sentiments, or desires (thank you, free online dictionary by farlex).  My emotions will always want the best for each of my siblings, my seniments will, too & my desire is that when one is laying in a hospital bed that they have the gentle touch of their mother's hand to tell them everything is going to be okay.

I hope my siblings know how much I love them.  I imagine if I had my own child the feelings would be very similar to the ones I have for them. I would jump in front of a moving car for any one of them, without hesitation.  I can be picked on, but Lord be with you if you ever, ever speak ill of one of them.  The wrath would be like a lioness protecting her cubs (is there such thing as a lioness?).  There is nothing they can say or do to change my mind about them.  The devotion is unconditional & never ending.  This post is deciated to each of you.  L, C & M, I love you more than you know!

I cannot wait to meet my new nephew tomorrow!

Have a great night everyone!

Alicia