Welcome my new Midwestern readers, particularly one from Marshalltown, Iowa. Feel free to look around. Just remember that I don't tolerate nastiness in my comments.
Yes, there's something going on. No, I don't want to write about it on my blog yet. Other people are involved. People I care about and love.
Love is a funny thing, isn't it? I remember being freaked out about having a second child so soon after Hollis. People kept reassuring me by saying that my capacity for love wasn't a pie. There isn't a finite amount in my heart to be doled out among the people I care about. Rather, the heart is a flexible muscle that expands as needed.
Maybe for some people the heart contracts as well, but that's never been the case for me. Once I love, I love fiercely and deeply. It's not something that ever goes away. My husband, god bless him for the saint he is, understands this about me. in fact it's something that he tells me he loves about me. Others have too. Unfortunately, my capacity to love can also hurt.
For those I've hurt over the years and more recently, I'm sorry. It was never intended. I would never intentionally try to hurt someone. I may be thoughtless, react or lash out in anger, but I never try to hurt.
Whatever happens in the months to come, the two people I always keep in my mind are Hollis and Holden. I'm thankful that they're too young to know what, or even that, something is happening. I will always have their well being first and foremost in my mind. No one has the right to second guess that, to feel sorry for them or to judge my parenting, least of all those who don't have children.
It's hard for me not to write more, but I'm respecting the privacy and feelings of others for now. Until we all know what comes next, I'll keep living my life, loving my children and stopping to just breathe whenever my thoughts are overwhelming.
The heart is a muscle. And it keeps beating, despite the pain.
