This has been a hard, hard year with our first-born son. Sparing all the details, its enough to say this:
in all ways imaginable, we have been battling the best of how God's made Elijah in the worst ways possible.
Which means we face insolence in place of its better kin of audacity and bravery. Or moodiness in place of a sensitivity for deep feelings.
Which also means he has been fast to say what cuts to the quick and to push far in excess of our boundaries of reasonable.
But here's the barest truth I can give:
I love my first-born son. I am honored to say - especially in light of the many ways I encounter my failure - he is making me a better mother, better wife, better human being.
I try not to dwell on the hardest days, those that feel as if I'm on a never-receding, mountainous incline, for I know that if it were easy I'd surely be doing it wrong. Rather, I focus on the result of any day I get with that precious little boy: interminable love.
I grew him. Gave him life. Bled for him. And would do so again. In fact, parenting - whether for father or mother - is often like a never-completing birth: though the life is now outside of us, it never seems so far away from our hearts that we are ever free of it...and so we learn to give life in new ways. Every day. And in this profound way, he is always my joy.
Today, Elijah Amos turns 7. I celebrate being on this journey with him - sometimes as an adversary to his basest will, yes, but never so much so that I stop being his mommy...
who loves him audaciously. Bravely. And with a sensitivity to his deepest feelings.
Which also means he has been fast to say what cuts to the quick and to push far in excess of our boundaries of reasonable.
But here's the barest truth I can give:
I love my first-born son. I am honored to say - especially in light of the many ways I encounter my failure - he is making me a better mother, better wife, better human being.
What a gift!
I try not to dwell on the hardest days, those that feel as if I'm on a never-receding, mountainous incline, for I know that if it were easy I'd surely be doing it wrong. Rather, I focus on the result of any day I get with that precious little boy: interminable love.
I grew him. Gave him life. Bled for him. And would do so again. In fact, parenting - whether for father or mother - is often like a never-completing birth: though the life is now outside of us, it never seems so far away from our hearts that we are ever free of it...and so we learn to give life in new ways. Every day. And in this profound way, he is always my joy.
Today, Elijah Amos turns 7. I celebrate being on this journey with him - sometimes as an adversary to his basest will, yes, but never so much so that I stop being his mommy...
who loves him audaciously. Bravely. And with a sensitivity to his deepest feelings.
Elijah, you are truly a gift from above - and I'd trade not a single day of incline, my love, for you are - without doubt or exception - singularly worth it.
Happy Birthday.
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