If you know me, you know how hard I push myself for both of my boys. I love them equally even though my situation with bringing Devin into this world was totally different than my situation with Draven. I have yet to fully see what kind of little person Devin will be, Draven steals my heart over and over again every single day.
He makes me smile when I've dealt with a mountain of frustration throughout the day. He never fails to remind me that everything I've done and continue to do has always been for him and Devin. He's also a tremendous help (he's my saving grace when Devin goes from 0 to 100). Most importantly, he always being himself and that's what makes me truly proud.
We went through so much together, even before Thomas came along and that first year as a mom shaped our entire future. Those were some of the happiest days of my life but also some of the most painful. Thomas was our sunshine after the storm. He's the best thing that could have ever happened to us.
I was always apprehensive about having my baby around people we didn't know that well. I remember talking to one guy and as soon as he mentioned bringing Draven to play with his little boys, I went ghost on him. I didn't want to be one of those moms that had different partners around their child. You can't trust hardly anybody anymore and that's why no one watched Draven besides my mom, aunt and Maw Maw until he was able to talk. Thinking about strangers being around him still has me on edge to this day (he was never allowed to go to daycare until he started pre-k last year. You don't know how close I was to homeschooling him). To this day, Thomas is the only man that has ever been in his life. That's the only father he's ever known.
I've even had a full blown break down on my mom and Thomas because I felt like they were pushing me into sending him to daycare. With tears running down my face and my whole body shaking, I told them over and over again how afraid I was of someone mistreating him when I wasn't around. I understood that he could have benefited from the social interaction with other kids, but people are out here killing and raping kids every single day and that terrified me. You never think that something like that can happen to your child and that's when it happens and your entire world comes crashing down.
Hearing him ramble about his day is what I always look forward to. No matter what I'm doing, I stop and take the time to listen even though he's just going to tell me about what color play dough he played with or what kind of snack he had because I know that one day, those will be some of the most crucial conversations we'll ever have. I know from experience that stuff happens in school that can completely change a child for better or for worse. Asking about his day while he's 4 will hopefully make him feel like he can trust me just as much when he's 14 or 24 or 34 and even if he's 94. I still want him to be just as honest with me (and I want to always make him feel like he can be).
My goal is to skip that "my parent is my enemy" stage because I know how much my mom and I hurt each other. Draven has always been my right hand and I don't think I can survive that kind of heartbreak if our bond was to suddenly be broken. I want to continue the days where we curl up and watch movies from my childhood and hear him ask questions about when I was a kid. I hope that we're still singing along to Panic! At the Disco together when he's 16 and blasting their music in through the speakers of his very first car. And I hope that he will still randomly walk up to me, no matter how big he gets, in the middle of the day and say, "Mom, I love you," or, "Thank you for being my mommy and taking care of me." He's simply the light of my life and I don't know where I would be without him.
