Thinking about the future, his future, often keeps me up at night.
Not because of “set limitations”, or what he will be when he is grown.
But because I don’t know who he will be when I am no longer here.

I hope and pray that he will still be surrounded by people who love and adore him.
By people that care for him, and push him.
I clamp my praying hands together tight and send them up to say that I hope he lives his life happy, and to it’s fullest.

You see, I would categorize myself as many things.
A wife.
A mother.
A friend.
A writer.
The list goes on.
But if I had to write traits down for myself, “Strong” wouldn’t have appeared.

Through lost loves, lost friendships, lost family, losing our first born child… I didn’t see me as strong.
Through fighting for health, and guidance, and willing ears, and services for Beckett, I wouldn’t have said I was being “strong”. I’m just doing what you do when you love someone so intensely. With your existence.

But then I realized, I push, and I battle, I learn, and I educate, and I advocate like a Mother. Because Beckett needs and deserves a strong one. A steady hand for his own guidance. A willing ear, and all the acceptance this often troubling world will offer.
And I will be that. And whatever else he needs.
So I try not to think about the “after” anymore. Because we are doing what we can to make his world blissful, and easier, and broadcasted, for others to see his colorful, beautiful light. And that is good enough for us, for in the now.

I am what I am, because my beautiful boy is. I often take his lead. And he is the hand the guides ME.
This kid, but 5 years old, has taught me more than any book or lecture ever could.

So, I wouldn’t have used “strong” to describe myself before. But I do now.
Because he is.