Letting Go

I wonder if all parents feel this way.

I want to teach J to be brave. I want to let him go. I don't want to shelter him and fret about him until he's unable to forge his own way.

I confess that I still wipe down grocery carts when I shop with J, but generally I've put away the hand sanitizer and the alcohol wipes. I let him scrape his knees and hang off the deck rails, the ones close to the ground, when he pretends to be Super Grover. And when we get to the doors of his preschool each morning, I let him go.

I take M to Mother's Morning Out. Other people care for her. She touches other babies, babies with runny noses. I let her go.

But, I never, not one, single day, leave them without thinking about their dots for fingernails, their heads the size of a clementine, their bodies hooked to machines. I never, not one, single day, walk away without looking back, glancing back just like I did when I left the NICU. I need a parting glance. I need to fill my heart with them, even as I walk away. I must leave. I must let them go, even when I'm afraid.

Call me crazy to wipe down shopping carts. Call me crazy when I institute strict hand-washing guidelines in our home. Call me crazy when I fret over the beginning of RSV season. Call me crazy. You wouldn't be the first.

But, if you haven't walked in my shoes, you don't know what it's like to hold a baby whose body fits in your hand. And you don't know the strength it takes every day to make the choice to let your kids be kids. Just because I see preemies when I look at J and M doesn't mean the world sees them that way. And I don't want my kids to always be preemies just because that's what I see.

Maybe other parents feel this way too. It's just they see newborns instead of preemies when they look at their kids.