Reality

I want Alessandra to know love, beauty, goodness, kindness, and every other gift that God has created for us to experience and enjoy.
The reality is that I can't pick and choose what parts of life she experiences and I can't protect her from everything that is the inverse of the list above.

The best thing I can do for Alessandra is not to protect and shelter her from reality.  I need to prepare her for it.  I need to give her the mental, emotional and familial stability and background that will make her able to handle all that's out there.

I've struggled so much with reality.  From about age 13 onwards I've dealt with depression, loneliness, feelings of helplessness, and all other sorts of internal struggles.  Although it was a terrible period of about 7 years that I was pretty deep into those mental struggles, I'm now far enough past it that I can really learn from it and - God willing - become a better parent for it.  I know what my struggles looked like - the sleepless nights, the interest in very angry & frustrated music, the lack of connection to authority figures such as teachers and other adults, the bad habits, the lack of any vision of my future or of what I may look like in it.  I know that adults tended to dismiss my feelings - what problems can you possibly have?  you're just a kid. what do you know about problems? just think about something else.  Teachers - it absolutely blows my mind that not a single teacher ever reached out to me.  I fell asleep in so many classrooms because I was unable to sleep with my mind racing at night.  Teachers saw me go without smiling for weeks on end - disinterested, unenthusiastic, always tired.  I think they mostly left me alone because I was getting great grades in honors and college level classes all while still in high-school.  Grades told very little of my story.  I will push Alessandra to excel academically and financially - without a doubt - but those priorities pale in comparison to raising a happy, fulfilled, confident individual.

I hope I can help prepare Alessandra so that she never deals with depression.  I want her to know the beautiful things of the world so she has them for perspective before she is exposed to the bad in the world.  I hope she feels loved, connected, noticed.  I hope she doesn't grow up feeling lonely or helpless.  I want her to know that I'm always here for her - to listen - not to judge.  I want her to know that her problems aren't *just* children's problems but that her problems are 100% real to me because they are real to her.  I hope if she succumbs to some of the same struggles I went through, I can be there for her, I can get her professional help, I can at least recognize what she is going through and let her know that I'm by her side through it all.

I realize this post isn't the most heart-warming and feel-good post to write on Christmas Day but it addresses reality and it comes from a good place.  It comes from a place of parental love.  My desire for Alessandra is to equip her for the worst things I've ever been through.  I want to do what I can so that her worst struggles aren't what mine were.  I love Alessandra so immensely. I love her in a way that I've never loved anyone else.  It blows my mind to realize that other parents love their children the way I love her. It blows my mind to think that my parents love my sisters and me the way that I love Alessandra.  It especially blows my mind to reflect on the fact that God loves me and all His other children this way but on an even greater scale.