April 2, 2010 - IT'S OK!

I had the opportunity to go on a lovely trip to Half Moon Bay with my sister yesterday. It was a spur of the moment invitation and I had to leave right away to make a dinner that my sister was hosting. I really wanted to go - the thought of a hotel room on the beach, a bon fire, adult conversation and shopping was irresistible. But there were two glitches - the first, relatively easy to solve was that I'd promised my daughter that I'd take her to the zoo to see the new giraffe exhibit. My sister suggested that I just reschedule the zoo trip - my response -"yeah, it doesn't really work that way." I'd said that we would go and short of losing a limb, there was no rationalization that could get me out of it. So we went to the zoo early in the day, had a lovely time and got home in time for me to leave on my trip.

The second issue - not so easy for me to resolve. I was scared to death to leave my daughter overnight. What if she had a tantrum and my older daughter, who was staying with her didn't know what to do? What if my older daughter couldn't get her to eat? What if she couldn't sleep - would she know what to do? What if something that she had to have got lost? On and on and on I went with the "what ifs". But, I decided that I would go on the trip. I threw some things in a bag and started to head out the door, reciting instructions over and over again - I'm sure driving anyone within earshot insane. Then my daughter said "mom, why is it so hard for you to go have fun?" I felt like the world had been lifted off my shoulders (almost). Six months ago she would have been on the floor hysterical at the thought of me leaving her for the night, let alone for almost two days.

I still received a phone call at 1:30 am to let me know that she was going to bed and another the next afternoon to check in and see what time I would be home - and I could hear some anxiety in her voice - but she was sure to say "it's ok, mom - I'm ok". And you know what? It is - it's ok.

Remember - DIFFERENT IS BEAUTIFUL!!