Milestones!

We are going to celebrate a big milestone soon.  When we have children, we have hopes and dreams for them.  We do our best as parents to nuture them, guide them through life to reach their full potential.  Most of all we love them.  In life they will hit speedbumps, like the bullies.  In most  parts of the World they are not tolerated, in any shape, way or form.  Then, in other parts, it seems like a passage of rites: There are generations of them?

Then there are the curveballs:  The lifechanging events, which no one should ever have to deal with. Allergic reactions to medication, not the kind one can stop or fix:  Severe Stevens-Johnson Syndrome.  When a parent has to face this, they do not think for a moment, they walk into the fire, through it and out of it.  We can not suffer for our children, paint rainbows for them, all we can do, is love them.

Equip them with the tools and skills for life, then we have to step back, giving them the opportunity to trail blaze their path in life.  It is one of the hardest things to do, letting go.  Then the most surprising thing happen.  As they go on this journey, they come back to you, talk to you and you discover, they are using what they have learnt and all the hard work as a parent has been worth it.

When our eldest was just a baby, this bit of advice was given to me.  It is the best advice for parenting, this has always been up in our kitchen, either on a notice board or the fridge.  They are now grown up, the merry go round of school activities, the birthday parties on the weekends, have all but come and gone.  They have started new chapters in their lives.  We are finding and discovering new ones of our own.

The years may have flown by, we reached milestones with our children, some we did not think we will ever be blessed to reach, but we did. Tomorrow is the promise of our future. Yesterday is the memories we created today.  Everyday is a gift, to celebrate being with the ones we love.