Stealing devotion

Graham is quite the lover boy these days.

Almost overnight it seems my boy understands the power inherent in hugs and kisses and loving coos and as a result showers me with them at every possible opportunity.

But even though, God knows, I’ve spent nearly every day of his short life teasing and coaxing out of him various expressions of affection, I feel like a bit of a fraud, gobbling up this new found goodwill as if it were my due.

How is it possible that he doesn’t sense how flawed his mother is?

Because I do have flaws, tons of them, and in those moments when he lifts his innocent, rapturous face to mine I can’t help but cringe with shame and run through them in my mind.

I have been impatient with him on countless occasions.

I remember endless nights during his infanthood when I paced the floor, rhythmically jostling him and singing lullabies with a clenched jaw and seething resentment in my heart. And just tonight I caught myself huffing with annoyance when his screaming and sniffling nose summoned me into his bedroom a half dozen times in the hours after his bedtime.

I have been selfish.

I have often taken exception to the demands he makes on my time. I have longed for the days when my evenings were my own. I have caught myself looking at the clock and counting the hours, the minutes, until I can put him to sleep. I have woken at night to his crying and bitten my tongue while I tended to him lest I shout what was in my heart: “GODDAMNIT! CAN YOU NOT JUST GO TO SLEEP?!”

I have been ungrateful.

I have sometimes begrudged, rather than celebrated, his robust health and his boundless energy, willing him to just sit quietly, slow down a little, wishing he wouldn't force me to move so quickly or to work so hard at exploring the world alongside him.

This is not to say that I think I am a bad mother: I know that I am not. I love Graham with all my heart and I care for him to the absolute best of my ability. I am not fishing for reassurance: I am merely trying to articulate how small I feel, how humbled I am, how very inadequate my absolute best seems in the face of his recent adulation.

This new phase, this sweet, sweet loving phase, has me wanting to redouble my efforts, to work harder, to be better and to earn the love and the trust I see reflected in his eyes.

But no matter how hard I may try, I can’t imagine feeling entitled to bask in my pride when he throws his chubby little arms around me and plasters my legs with sloppy kisses all the while exclaiming, "Oh mama, you beautiful. Oh mama, I love you!”

Because there is a tiny corner of my brain that registers how truly unworthy I am of such adoration and a tiny part of my heart that breaks just thinking about the day when Graham has the maturity to discern that for himself.