Being Mom

It's been a while since I have posted and while I have so many reasons, I spend tonight reflecting upon this amazing opportunity to be a Mom.  Anyone who has had the opportunity to be a Mom, Mommy, Mother or even to love a child know the conflict between protection, love, support, and growth.

 As a Mom I want to see my boys succeed and struggle when they struggle.  There lies my problem.  Reece is a great student, his teacher tells me often how easily he picks up on things.  His strongest area is math by far, and he is constantly surprising Gregg and I , not only with his ability but with his desire to continue stretching and challenging his knowledge in math.

With that said writing and reading are the complete opposite.  Yet I find myself succumbing to"Mom I'm too tired to read tonight" or "Daddy is going to just read one of my chapter books tonight!"  This is clearly one of his tricks in his "backpack" to avoid working through something which he struggles with.  Ugh, I know full well in my heart that while reading and writing are not his strong suits the more I allow him to not practice every night, the more he will struggle.  I know full well that it is my job as a parent to help provide my boys with the resources to ease their struggles.  Furthermore, I am a soon to be teacher specializing in language arts with many tricks in my own "backpack" which help struggling readers.  Shoot, we have read books to Reece every night since the day he was born.  I get it, I understand the importance of literacy and here I have a child who not only struggles with it but also doesn't enjoy either. 

While after school usually consist of little free time and rushing to get the boys dinner, baths, and bed time, Gregg and I made a concerted effort that we would tackle this together and as soon as Reece gets home from school he writes a few sentences in his journal, and completes his homework, including his 15 - 20 minutes of nightly reading.  Well here it is May and the journal hasn't been touched in easily a month and we find ourselves letting Reece read a shortened amount before bed when he's exhausted.

So I began this post Mother's Day night thinking wow I am really failing in my efforts, but now two days later I ease up a bit and realize that life happens.  Sure we are busy, but that is really just an excuse to not pushing through.  As a teacher I know that the long term struggle is fair greater than the small tugging which Reece is clearly capable of working through now.  It is my job as his mom to continuously help and encourage him not only with his strengths but more importantly with his struggles!!  Raising children is no easy task and I find myself constantly needing to remember to turn off the cruise control and refocus.  This is certainly one of those times!