I am at work. I have SOOOO much to do, reports due today by noon, fiscal year budget due by EOB today, and my cost clerk is out sick, so I have her stuff to do too. But, am I doing any of it? NO! I am sitting at my desk typing away about how much I miss my little men. I just want to be where they are right now.
Of course, that's impossible, since they are in two different places. AJ, of course, is at daycare, since Mommy is working. Jabari is back home in Arkansas with his mom, as of last Saturday. He is a total terror sometimes, but I sure miss the little hellion when he's not with us. It sure has made beditme and morning rituals a lot easier with him not being here, but I would gladly take running around like a crazy woman if it meant we would have him with us.
When we got home Saturday night, AJ went walking down the hall, looking for his big brother. He looked in Jabari's bedroom, then looked back at me like "Where is he?". He finally stopped his search sometime in the middle of the week. I feel bad for both the boys. We are disrupting Jabari's life every other month so we can be selfish and have some time with him. For three weeks at a time, we take him away from his mom, and his home to come stay with us. He seems to really have a lot of fun here, but by the middle of the third week, he's asking where his 'other' mom is and when he can go back to his 'other' home. It breaks my heart. We had such a good thing going when we lived closer and could get him on the weekends. Now, he has two different homes, two different schools, two sets of friends. The boy's not even 3 yet. I don't know how he's handling it.
Then, there's AJ. I know he's too young to understand why his brother is here sometimes and not here sometimes. He has a playmate at home when Jabari is here. Then, he just has me to play with the rest of the time. And, sometimes Mommy just doesn't have the energy to play too much after working all day, KWIM?
I try not to have mommy guilt about the things I can't change. The fact that I work, the fact that the kids have to go to daycare. (Of course, I am a big proponent of daycare, so I never really had any guilt about sending them to daycare.) But, I do feel like my husband and I are being selfish making Jabari have this kind of double life. Is it fair to him? I know that he wants to spend time with us, too, but at what expense?
Really, I just can't wait until I can transfer back closer to home and be closer to my family, my husband's family, and Jabari again. Of course, that won't be for a couple of years, so we will just have to make it work until then.
