My turn...

As a good 95% of my Facebook and bloggy friends are fellow May '06 mommies, there have been ten days of birthdays so far. It's pretty crazy to be a part of that group, and every year, one by one, all of our little babies get a year older. So I've already read a few posts by my friends reflecting back on their five year old, now it's my turn.

As usual, when I try to write one of these posts I can't seem to think of what I want to say. I can walk around all day "writing" in my head, and then when I sit down to the computer, I go completely blank. I guess there's always the danger of getting overly sentimental and end up crying over a stupid blog post. Totally not my style, but stranger things have happened.

I've found myself reflecting over the past few days, not only about the last five years of Elijah's life and how much he's changed, but on myself and how five years of being a mommy has changed me. It's sort of even hard for me to remember what life was like before I was a mommy. I suppose I did whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. I could eat, shower, read, nap, whenever. I didn't have to wait for someone to take a nap, I didn't have to fix anyone elses lunch, wipe their behind, give them a bath or help them get dressed. More than that I was certainly never personally responsible for another human being's happiness and total well-being. I've never had it be my number one priority to make sure someone feels 100% loved and safe every single day. It's pretty crazy, and hard. Most of these things take up my entire day, especially now that it's all x2. And instead of the responsibilities lessening, they're growing exponentially. For the past two years I've been responsible for a child's education, his entire academic future. And as equally important, his spiritual education. No wonder I'm so tired at the end of the day!

After pondering all those things, I had to sit back and look objectively and the job I've been doing. Am I good mommy? Did I do it right? Sometimes it feels too easy to screw up and not do a good job. Sometimes it feels like I can never do enough, never give enough of myself. Sometime I'm selfish and don't want to be mommy for just five minutes. So how can you tell if you're doing a good job or not?

I guess you can look at my kid, and I have to admit, he's pretty awesome. He's smart, sweet and one-of-a-kind, and if you're just going off of that...I guess I've done a pretty good job.