My days don’t belong to me.
Somewhere between watching my kids at the third park of the weekend and four basketball games, I realized I hadn’t had a minute of my own weekend. Not an extra wink of sleep or a task completed or even catching up on an episode Real Housewives.
Nothing.
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Lots of things you can’t do twice.
My days will belong to me again one day.
Until then, I’m not missing any of this. Not a nighttime snuggle, morning doughnut face, scooter race, sports game, snowball fight, 100 snack requests, or anything in between.
My days belonged to me before this family life. I had the time to myself with meals and sleep uninterrupted, weekend adventures without tiny humans. My heart wasn’t nearly as full—not even close.
My parents never took time to themselves either.
I had an awesome childhood and only realize their sacrifice as I live it myself.
Now they’re retired and all they have are days that belong to them. But if you ask them which days they’d want to do twice, without hesitation, it’s those days that didn’t belong to them.
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Raising these beautiful humans is one of those things I can’t redo. All of me is all of theirs, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Hopefully, when they’re grown, they’ll be able to say that their mama was always there.