Overwhelmed

I just read this piece on NPR “ORPHANS’ LONELY BEGINNINGS REVEAL HOW PARENTS SHAPE A CHILD’S BRAIN” and it makes my heart hurt.

I struggle every day with inadequacy. Am I doing enough? Am I paying enough attention? Do they know how much I love them?

I wonder if my girls only think of me as the one that does the cooking and the cleaning and all that clickety-clack typing on the computer.

And then I read an article like this and it makes me want to run (swim) and run some more to Romania and scoop up the kids in these pictures and hug them and laugh and smile and play dolls and build blocks and sing the ABCs and color and run and jump and giggle…

And then I find myself wanting to go upstairs and look at my two girls as they sleep and know that no matter how shitty a parent I sometimes think I am, we’re all pretty lucky.