4 year old wishes

Kai just told me that he wishes my new home was in Philadelphia.  We were both crying at that point.

The mother

I wonder if she knows just how much sadness I am feeling.  We are very close, and I can't look her in the eyes right now for fear of bursting into tears.  Maybe she knows.

Today, Kai asked how many days Ryan is staying.  She said seven.  And she added, "You know, Kai, once Ryan comes it means  Emily will only be here for seven more days."  I couldn't look at her, and I didn't say a word.

Documentation

I spent the morning watching the kids.  Taking pictures and videos.  Lots of video.  Trying to burn them into my brain so I never forget.

The first night of crying myself to sleep.

We're at a lake house, so I'm lonely.  Away from Ryan, who I've lived with for the past two years, I'm missing our intimacy.  The kids are my only source of intimacy, closeness.  I went to bed last night and as soon as I closed my eyes, I began to test my senses, drawing a sensory memory of Von and Kai in my head; the feel and color of their skin, their smell, their hands, their heads on my shoulders, their arms around my neck, the warmth of our connected glances.  Nothing in my life is like their love.  And they're not my kids.  I'm not sure what's confused in me, but I know that saying goodbye to them will be different than any other goodbye I've ever said.  Von is 2.5, and he won't even feel so close again.  Kai will remember, but he won't mistakenly call other people Emily, and soon he won't include me when he lists his family members.  I'm really afraid of that.  I'm really fucking sad about that.  How could I not cry myself to sleep?

The first nightmare.

I had a nightmare two nights ago.  I was pregnant.  I knew it, but my anxiety about the birth grew with my belly, and soon I was feeling heels and head push on the walls of my uterus.  Sorrow, mourning, confusion washed over the dream, and time moved quickly.  Soon, I was in a large, cold, marble-floored hospital, which felt much more like a museum than it should have.  Gold rails, gold elevators, like the ones at the museum where I take the kids.  I had decided to give the child up for adoption, sure that it was just too soon in my life to raise one on my own.   Somehow, my sister was giving birth to the baby that had grown in my uterus, and I wasn't there to meet it for the first moment of its life.  Frantically, searching through the hospital halls for an answer to where my baby might be, I run into Ryan, my partner.  He knows where the child is; he is calm, and confident about our decision.  My view jumps to the child, then back to me, desperately searching for the baby before it is handed over to its new family.  And I awaken.