My Job is Simple

Angela of Little Bird wrote a guest post today over at Birthing Beautiful Ideas. Here are the last two paragraphs:

"At least I can feed and rock and soothe B. . . .

"I can’t go to his sister.  I can’t pick her up, rock her, stare in wonder at her darling face, marvel at her growth.  B will be one month on the ninth.  She would have been seventeen months on the fifteenth.  I miss her.  I miss all of the nights I didn’t get to sit up for hours, nodding off in the darkened nursery with her sweet baby weight snugged in my arms.  I couldn’t comprehend the precise nature of what I was missing until I had B, and the knowing makes the missing more acute, sharper, so painful, the sorrow like lead weights that have settled on my chest.

"I am my own worst critic, yes I am.  There is pressure – internal pressure, not external – to be thankful for every breath, every cry, every moment of joy, but that is impossible.  I am trying to give myself permission to feel tired, overwhelmed, emotional, elated, drained … like a normal mama.  There is no rule about this babe being perfect simply because the one before died.  He will cry, he will frustrate, he will have bad nights.  I need to stop fretting about whether or not I am doing things correctly and remember my job is simple: to love and nurture him as he grows and becomes the person he is meant to be."

Yes, that. I'm trying to remember.