trust

Every night before Ryan takes the older two up to bed, they hug and kiss me (approximately 20 times each) and tell me that "I never put them to bed,"  or my favorite one yet, "we never have mommy time."  I mean seriously. Is that not the funniest thing you've ever heard? And then I remind them of the past thirteen hours that we just spent together...over the past 5 years...and they go up to bed.  But not before Declan wraps his skinny legs around me and says "Mommy, you come check on me after Quinn nurses. Don't you trick me mommy. Pinky promise you will come see me."  And we hook pinkies and I kiss him again and he switches hands, into Ryan's arms and off they go. Every night after Quinn is asleep, I go up and kiss their sleeping heads, sometimes move Declan over to his own bed, tell them how much I love them, and pull their blankets up. Then the next night comes and we repeat it all over again. And every night Declan trusts that I will come upstairs and 'put him to bed' even though he's already there.
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They trust me.

Isabella and I sat on her bedroom floor one morning last weekend.  We were picking out her clothes for the day. Declan was playing with his bug catcher, Quinn was unfolding a pile of laundry that I just folded (because that is the best game in the world--according to Quinn) and Isabella sat crossed-legged across from me.  Amidst pulling out shirt after shirt, and skirt after skirt attempting to come to a compromise on the sacred outfit of the day, Isabella looked over at me, lip beginning to quiver, and said "mommy, I don't want Mia to die." 
Um, hello sweet child of mine--what on earth are you talking about?
That and about a million other things darted through my head.  I told her that she didn't have to worry about that, Mia wasn't going anywhere.  She looked at me as tears started falling and said "I know she'll die one day, mommy. She is getting older. She has ruffly hands.  It means she'll go to heaven and that means you die. And if she's there, then I won't see her anymore. I don't want my Mia to die." 
Okay, so my mom is 56 years old, totally healthy, no signs of 'old-woman-hood' and yes, according to Isabella, her hands are a little ruffly (her made up word for the soft wrinkles/veins of my mom's hands). 
This all came out of nowhere. I scooped her up, held her in my lap, told her that everything was just fine, and I cried.  Right on top of her tear laden face, I dropped tears of my own.  My baby was worried about her Mia, my mom, dying.  My worst fear when I was a little girl, was my baby's fear. And I just didn't feel like she was old enough for that.  We talked, she cried, I called my mom, and then we picked out some clothes and came downstairs for breakfast.  Shortly after, while I was getting dressed, Isabella came into my bathroom. "Mom," she said "are you said about when your mom dies?"  So, we had some more dialogue and she wanted to know my feelings about death and she told me hers and it was so completely not anything I was ready for. But it happened and it was all fine, it was hard, but it was fine. 
She trusts me.
 I have to be strong with her, and I certainly have to be honest with her. She can read me like a book, that girl.  She told Mia about her worries later that day, and then all three of us were in tears.  Isabella breaks my heart with her huge heart.  She is a worrier--just like her mom--just like my dad.  And that's hard because I know just how she feels. 

This whole mom thing is hard.  For many reasons other than the death talk with your almost five year old. It's amazing, powerful, inspiring, beautiful, and awesome.  But oh, is it hard. 
Later, I perused the children's section of the library about 'feelings.'  I pulled out books on death, on faith, and on spirituality. It all seemed heavy for my little girl.  I found one that I thought may be okay, but I still don't know. It's still in the library bag.  I flipped through the pages, scanning the words about aging, being sick, dying.  Nothing that I'm ready to talk about. But she's so curious. She looked over my shoulder as I was flipping through the book and said "Oh my gosh, Declan, look at this bird! It's dead!" And there on the page, was a bird on the ground in all it's cartooned glory, dead on the sidewalk. Last year she would have asked why the bird was sleeping on the ground. This year, she says he's dead.  I put the book back in the basket and told her to tell me a silly story about her favorite things.  And she promptly did.

Trust.