There was a thick, white fog settled low over everything this morning, which was appropriate. It matched my mood. If the weather always reflected my outlook, though -- and if I'm being honest about everything -- this summer would be stuffed to the brim with dark and dreary beginnings.
One of the most accurate expressions of sadness is that old cliche about a heavy heart. That's how mine feels in the morning, every morning. At least every Monday through Friday morning. Some mornings, it feels so heavy, it's just about in a puddle around my feet.
I want to be cheerful, I really do. But I just can't muster it yet. Because it feels a little bit like my baby is growing up without me.
He snoozes late in the mornings -- half the time, he isn't even awake when I leave. And he's starting to fall asleep earlier at night now too. I probably spend between two and three awake hours with him these days. God, that's nothing at all.
How do other mamas do this?
I hate it. I really do.
I know I'm lucky to have a good job, I'm incredibly lucky that my mom can and will watch him, and I'm lucky to have a baby who is a good little sleeper through the night. But I don't feel lucky right now. I feel like garbage.
I told myself, during that first awful drive back into work last month when I went through a thousand tissues, that it would get easier soon. Not better, but less awful. And I guess it has, in a way. I don't have the panicky, heartbreaking kind of sadness that I did that first morning. But that's because I'm getting accustomed to leaving him... and that realization makes me want to throw myself out the window.
So these days, I guess my heart feels not exactly broken when I'm gone, but bruised. It always heals at the end of the day -- it feels whole again. But that bruises blooms again every single weekday morning, tender and ugly anew. It's making me bitter and resentful. It's making me exhausted too.
So I guess I'm just waiting for this soul-fog to lift for good. For mornings to feel bright and full of possibility -- or at least not to feel so daunting and sad. It isn't depression. It's just an awful case of missing-my-baby, and I suppose time is the only somewhat-cure.