Whatever works

The hardest part is when they both need me but I can’t meet those needs for them both.

When they’re both crying for me, pulling at my arms and my heart.

I try my best to give them both all I can, but it sometimes can’t work out like that.

Not when it’s just them and I.

No matter how hard I try.

So often I’m trying to desperately settle one so I can tend to the other.

But one doesn’t want to be tended to with the other and vice versa.

And they set each other off sometimes.

And that sets me off sometimes too.

So my only choice is to settle them separately.

One at a time, in different rooms.

And the guilt. Oh the guilt.

I hear the other one through the walls and I feel my palms sweating.

And the settling of one always takes longer.

I don’t think it’s because of the cries meeting each other through the walls either.

I think it’s because I’m so unsettled by the scenario.

I feel completely overwhelmed by the pulls and like I’m failing both of them even though it’s only possible to settle one after the other.

But I don’t want one to have to come after the other.

I want them both to come first.

Because they both come first to me.

Neither should have to come second.

But sometimes one has to.

And I just have to do what works.

And it does work.

It’s just that it’s hard when what works looks like this.

There are no winners.

⠀

But then there are the times when I settle them both together.

When they are not happy to be left on their own but are both are happy to have me together.

When we all lie in a tiny toddler bed, one on either side of me but both as firsts.

And while it may not be “perfect”, it feels perfect to me in every way.

They fall asleep in my arms, together.

And I feel so settled as I watch them sleep.

I delay the transfer of my youngest to his cot so that I can enjoy the moment with us as each other’s firsts.

So this works for us too.

And it’s easy when what works looks like this.

We all win.

⠀

What works for us can look different every day.

And what works can be harder some days than others.

But it’s about making a hard moment, hour, day or week in this hard chapter a little bit easier.

That’s what works for us.

And I’m here for that.