Happy, Happy, Happy BIRTHDAY!

My youngest is turning six today. Wow, a lot has happened in his little life in six years. I was on the verge of divorce when I found out I was pregnant with my little guy. It was tough to be pregnant when I had little hope for my marriage ever surviving. We managed to muddle through a tough pregnancy; I think the hope of new life held us together for a bit. I think the joy of our new little guy arriving carried us a while, but a few months before his first birthday I filed for divorce. I remember feeling so bad that my marriage had failed before his first birthday and had serious feelings of failure as my daughter started kindergarten with the burden of divorcing parents. The range of emotion at this time in my life was dramatic.

Fast forward, the World’s Greatest Husband and I were dating before my son’s 2nd birthday celebration. Motherly guilt forced me to have a big 2nd birthday party for my son, since he was robbed of the first big party. The World’s Greatest Husband helped me decorate for his big party but wasn’t invited. He helped me shop, but he wasn’t invited…. We made a serious commitment to not involve family until we knew where this was headed. My son has now known my husband for more than half his life. I am grateful that he will grow and learn from this amazing man. I think our youngest has the least amount of issues with blended life, he thinks his family is one big party! And for a six year old, it sort of is.

My blended family mommy divorce guilt lessens as I become more comfortable with how resilient our children really are. As I see them growing and maturing it is nice to know we have “history together” I’ve always said to my husband I look forward to having history with him. When big moments happen we often giggle saying “history, baby” even last week with the puke fest of 6 out 7 family members, we commented on “history, baby”. So here we are celebrating history once again, and on Friday too! We will celebrate our oldest, 15th birthday. Hopefully we will continue to create a family unit where brother, sister, parent, step or biological work together to support one another. I love when I see them all giggling, sharing or even talking in the dark at bedtime… it is what families do and although we aren’t traditional we are a family… celebrating a little history today.