I missed her, sent her love and light and then I dropped it.

Day 1 without my peanut and I survived. Only got weepy one time today, and didn’t let any of the tears actually spill. That’s impressive. Right? I promised myself that as I experienced the ups and downs of the 5 week separation from my daughter, I would be grateful each time I benefitted from her being with her father.

Today I had an audition at 4:40 pm in Manhattan. On a normal day I would never be able to make it home to pick my daughter up from after care. When this happens, I usually have to call in a favor to get coverage. My friends are terrific and it’s never a problem, but knowing that today she was with family while I worked made me feel a little bit better.

Several times today I started to call her to see how she was doing at her dad’s house. I stopped myself each time. I’m not sure why, but I just knew that calling her would have upended the routine she’s starting to build at her other home. I worry about everything. I worry if she’s happy, I worry if she’s homesick, I worry if she was able to fall asleep last night, or had a tummy ache today and if she’s feeling secure and having fun or if she’s sad and crying.

That’s what I do as a mom, I worry about the big stuff and the teeny tiny things. It made me think of the movie Eat Pray Love when Richard gives Liz this advice about her ex-boyfriend David, “So miss him. Send him some love and light every time you think about him, then drop it.” Richard goes on to share wisdom about what Liz will be capable of manifesting should she free up all this space she’s using to obsess about a guy.

It’s a loose translation, but it works. If I only obsess about my daughter for the next 5 weeks then I have wasted time and energy. I will think of her many moments of every day. My heart will ache with missing her, but I will do my best to miss her, send her love and light and then drop it. If I can do that, then maybe I will be able to manifest some amazing gifts in the space I open up.

The ache will be there whether I obsess about her needs being met or not, so I choose not. Mommy loves you little one.  Sweet dreams.

Dropping Off My Heart

It’s D-Day. For me that’s drop off day. The day I drive my daughter to the airport so she can go spend five weeks with her father. FIVE WEEKS! It seems to be an impossible length of time. She’s spent the last year with me and now she’ll be away for five weeks. Some people think this must be the coolest thing that could ever happen to a single parent. All the sudden you get weeks of free time to do whatever you want! Score! Right?

Not quite so. There are benefits to some time off. I will get a chance to recharge my batteries and I’ll be able to do things I might not try if she were here. The double edged sword of it all, is that dropping her off is like dropping off my heart. When she leaves the world dims. Things just don’t seem right anymore. It’s takes an extra effort just to get out of bed, or to even care about the things that previously excited me.

Do I go through a mini state of depression? Absolutely. Do I cry? Hell yes! I do my best to send her off happily because she deserves this time with her dad. It’s been hard enough for her not to have him around. She needs to know that he loves her and to be the center of someone else’s world for a change. I know that I can’t be her everything, nor should I be. I do the best that I can to fill in for all of her needs in his day to day absence. It’s NEVER enough.

My kid is like any other child. She wants us to get back together and live as one happy family. It’s not going to happen. The best I can offer her is to be supportive of  her getting the love she needs from her dad. When she goes away I practice getting the love I need for myself. That means taking good care of me – exercising, eating right, resting, meditating and playing. It’s an effort, because right now all I want to do is curl up in the corner and cry.

This is my third year dropping off my heart. It hasn’t gotten any easier. Each year I’ve wished there would be someone to catch me after she happily skips away with her father, and I begin my fall. Instead I drive alone on the airport roads to my exit, hoping the tears don’t get so bad that I need to pull over.

I drive home or wherever I’m going and do my best to craft the appropriate responses to people’s inquiries. I don’t think they want to hear how deeply my heart is broken.  They definitely don’t want to see the raw wound that’s ravaging my heart. I don’t even want to see it! I start to pick up the pieces. I know and I’m grateful that this is temporary heartbreak, that my little girl will come home. The fatalistic side of me wonders what could happen while she’s gone, but I quickly replace that with the image of her running back into my arms five weeks from today!

I realize I’m not in control. I can’t control anything that happens to her while she’s away. I can only control how I respond to it. It’s the lesson I work to teach her every day, but it’s much harder to apply now. Who’s going to kiss her boo boos, is her dad going to pick up on her emotional nuances, what will he do to manage her homesickness, how will he reassure her when she thinks that she’s not enough and how will I cope when she calls crying – as she always does.

I don’t have all the answers. I have a lot of tears, some shed and some waiting in the wings. I’m going to breathe, get ready and take her to see her dad. I’ll be a grown up about it and I’ll handle all the questions that come up on the long ride to the airport. I’ve already handled most of the tough ones like, “What if I don’t know what daddy looks like?” There goes another crack in my heart. I guess when you’re just six and haven’t seen your dad for a year, that’s a legitimate concern. I promised her that I’d help her find her daddy and I promised myself that I wouldn’t cry until she’s out of sight.

Time to see what I’m really made of.

The Power of Vulnerability

The next two weeks are going to be really tough for me. I’m approaching the time of year where I pack up my baby girl and send her to see her father who lives out-of-state. She’ll be gone for over a month. It’s like my heart has a gaping hole in it. People always say that they’d love to have a break from their kids. I agree to an extent. With a long break like this you don’t have to deal with bad behavior, discipline or neediness, but you also miss out on the smiles, hugs, kisses and everything else that makes parenting so amazing.

I joke that I spend half of her visit crying, but it’s probably pretty close to the truth. I find it incredibly difficult to be around my friends with kids when she’s gone. It’s like pouring salt on an open wound. My friends are so sweet and I think they believe that surrogate love is comparable to my daughter’s love. I am appreciative that they don’t let me curl up in a ball and stay put through her entire trip, but nothing fills the void. Nothing is supposed to. My daughter has a unique essence that is all her own and the world seems like it’s upside down until she gets back.

The tricky part about this is that once again, it’s not about me. This trip is about meeting my daughter’s needs. She needs to know that she has a father who loves her and she deserves to spend time with his side of the family.  As much as I want to be able to be her everything, I realize that there will be benefits in her going on her trip (as long as the other household is a positive and healthy environment).

It’s hard to write this without crying.  This is where I remind myself about the power of being vulnerable and of sharing my story. I realize that there are millions of other parents also going through this same struggle. Somehow knowing that you are not alone makes it a little easier to tolerate. Not less painful, but easier to tolerate. I will do my best to fill my time with activities I can’t do when she’s here. I’ll spend many evenings out because I won’t have to worry about daycare pick up or the cost of a baby sitter. I’ll have fun, get rest and count every single second until she’s back in my arms.

This is my third summer sending her away. It never gets easier and I bet it never will. Maybe this is preparation for sending her off to college. That’s just my way of finding a silver lining.

Putting Our Kids First

I work hard not to say anything negative about my ex-husband. I believe that if I even think negative thoughts about him a few things will happen:

1. My thoughts will turn into energy, which may turn into negative actions.
2. My daughter will somehow pick up on this energy and it will hurt her (My daughter deserves to believe that the sun shines out of both of her parents behinds.)
3. Putting any energy into negative thoughts about him (or anyone else), limits my ability to direct my energy into positive thoughts which may then turn into positive actions.

One of the saddest things I’ve seen is when parents engage in bashing each other.  It’s particularly tough when the children are exposed to it. Our kids want to feel safe and secure. They want to know that above everything else we love them and that we will always be there for them. They also love us and never want to hear anyone say bad things about us.  For that reason it pains me when I see parents who have difficulty putting their kids first.

I know I’m not the first to say it, nor will I be the last. When we bad mouth each other it is a lose/lose situation. My daughter deserves to have a life free from the drama of my failed marriage and subsequent divorce. Life is rough enough without adding a mess of pain, insecurity and fear into her heart. It doesn’t matter how I feel about my ex, it matters how she feels about him. As long as I have my way, I will support her in believing that she has the best father in the entire world.

Her happiness and security are what’s important and in that respect, it’s not about me.