Outside Looking In

Sometimes I feel like I'm on the outside of what my life was supposed to be, looking in and feeling like none of it measures up so well. I was supposed to be a wife and mother with a mini van, several kids, dogs, cats etc. Some days I'm not sure how I got here. Here being 40. 40, single, and my only children my furbabies. In my mind I can picture how my life was supposed to be. A loving husband who treats me fabulous, my kids whom I have fun with, play with and experience all the things in life that I sometimes feel like I missed out on as a child. I picture not making my mom's mistakes. Loving my children unconditionally and forever no matter what they do or don't do. Every day I catch myself in my mind thinking of the names I had picked for my someday babies.

There are times though that I can stop myself and force myself to take a step back and look at what those pictures in my mind truly are. In those pictures the someday babies are never older than say 2 or 3, are well behaved and rarely fussy, temper tantrum throwing typical children. The pictures I imagine are just the surface pictures. They don't contain crabby drama craving teenagers, defiant pre-teens or anything else negative. It's always picture perfect that picture in my mind. I have enough friends with children (most of my friends have teenagers or grown children) that I often see the true picture of parenting and I know that the picture in my mind is skewed at best and completely unrealistic for the most part. When taking that step back and looking at the reality, I often find myself wondering why I even want that. Hell, I've got it good. I can do whatever I want with my time and money and let's face it, it's way easier finding a sitter for your dog than your 2 year old.

I know that the reality of it all is somewhere in between the picture in my mind and the drama I see my friends going through with their children. I know like a teeter-totter that reality will rock back and forth, sometimes falling nearer to the picture in my mind and sometimes falling much nearer to a reality TV show in the making. I also know that sometimes I truly don't know what I want or what to wish for. Sometimes I can't imagine not having children and other times I can't for the life of me imagine how I can raise children when I barely manage to take care of my animals. Yes, I know that as a parent you find a balance. You find ways of making it work. I also know that should I ever reach that point of being a parent I will somehow find a way. Yet sometimes I also feel like I am so close to deciding to live child free. To deciding to give up the time, effort and associated heartache of chasing after something I may never have. But is that letting go because I want to or is it letting go because it's less painful. I really don't know the answer to that.