There are days when it feels like I’m swimming upstream,
Or treading water just to keep afloat.
Hit by waves of guilt
For having to split myself in two.
And I feel like I’m sinking under the weight of all there is to do.
The hard days, the long days, the days when I’m fuelled by caffeine
And my eyes sting from lack of sleep.
Those days that follow the longest nights,
With snatched handfuls of hours and shattered dreams.
Those days when tiredness makes my head spin.
When I’m in a never-ending game of chase
And pin-the-clothes-on-the-toddler.
Those days when we finally make it out the door
But half way up the street I realise I still have slippers on my feet.
Yes, there are these days.
But these are the days that are racing past.
And oh, how fast they’re changing.
Suddenly he has learnt to ride his bike,
And her hair has grown and started to curl.
The smiles and hugs, those first words spoken,
The laughter, the fingers gripped around my own –
These are the moments to remember.
These are the moments that mend the holes in the day,
And stitch the frayed pieces of this tired mother back together.
Her babbling tells me it won’t last forever,
His chatter reminds me that this is a stage –
It is but a moment they are this way.