It was challenging for me tonight as Shayla's mother and I left the house with our little 3 yr. old daughter very distraught at our leaving her to be put to bed by someone other than Gandma Joan. She cried and cried and it tore at my heart. She was running back and forth from mommy to me, hugging us and crying in desperation that we not go.
It was our good friend Tanya that was going to watch her for us while we attended an engagement. Tanya has looked after our daughter many times before now, but tonight was special in that Tanya would be putting her to bed as well. Usually she is already in bed when Tanya comes to watch her on this pre-existing scheduled night, but not tonight. Tanya has put her to bed before, but never with this miniscule amount of notice to Shayla. We explained it to her, but a little too late I think, but then again it might not have made any difference anyway. It's hard to 'sugar coat' "Mommy and I are going out somewhere and you're going to bed".
It was the kind of 'changing of the guard' that should not really occur right before bedtime if you want a smooth transition. Well, this was our fault. Her mom and I had company right before Tanya was to come over, so we spaced on getting Shayla to bed on time, which could have alleviated a lot of Shayla's stress. Usually Shayla is already in bed before Tanya gets here, and the next thing she knows is it's morning again and there's Daddy: all events happening unawares to her.
I feel for my little baby girl and I know, plan as we might that as she becomes more and more perceptive it will be harder to protect her from feelings of dissapointment or pain that are just as a part of the human experience as joy and elation. She will just see through the mirage. The trickery that worked at 3 will certainly not work at 5 or 6...and so on.
That's just it though, isn't it? We love our little ones, our offspring with our very lives and would lay down our's for them in an instant if it ever came to that, so it's only natural that we would want to shield them from pain of any kind, be it their cause or otherwise. Even when the knowing and understanding of the origins of internal pain come at later stages in their lives to give them a wisdom, a wholeness, a roundness as a person that we cannot, we still wish to shield them from it, and it hurts us when they hurt. That is the thing: their heart Is our heart. Beautiful, Difficult, Wondrous, Joyfull, and yes, sometimes painfull too, but ALIVE.
So yeah, it really Got Me when I heard the cries of my Baby Girl last night as we left the house because I knew she was crying because we were leaving and there was no way around it, and although we knew it would be fine and that she would too,...she didn't. That pain I can identify with; that pain I have known.
I think it really got me--those cries of hers--because they played on some primordial chord deep inside me the likes of which I had not felt before. To say it was 'moving' would, well, be a trifle of an understatement.