Today I spent the morning reading through my old journals. I had the intention initially, of just flipping through one of them, but ended up reading page after page, and then pulling out the next journal, and reading that one almost cover to cover as well. It was interesting to look back on life, and read events that I had forgotten about, and look at my emotions at the time, versus how I feel about things now. There were events that I still felt very much the same over, but there were also events that I have either healed from and no longer feel the same about, or now that I have more life experience under my belt chuckle about and think to myself, boy I wouldn’t feel that way, or react that way now. It was the classic if I knew then I what I know now routine, hindsight is always so crystal clear!

Looking through the journals also made me realize how much I enjoy journaling, and that I need to get back into it. Writing down my feelings has always been a wonderful release for me, and for some reason I just forgot about my journals. I also realized that I do not look through them often enough, reading back through what we have gone through helps me to gain perspective on life, to see how far we have come, how much we have gone through as a family, and how we were still able to come out on top, at least for the most part.

Most of one journal documents the trying times that our family went through just before my adopted stepson’s birthmother stopped contact with him. The fights that he and her were going through, the behavioral problems that he was having due to his emotional pain, and how overwhelmed both my husband and I were with the entire situation, were all there in black and white, and reading through some of the pages was very hard. The pain that our family went through during that time, both as a whole, and individually was tremendous. We were each so overwhelmed with life, sometimes taking it out on each other, sometimes retreating to our own devices, but eventually always pulling back together as a family in order to support one and other and move on. However the ‘eventually’ did not always come as quickly as we would have liked, or as quickly, looking back, as it should have.

It was hard to look back and see some of my own mistakes, as well as to just relive the pain that we all had to go through. But as hard as it was, I am glad that I not only wrote the feelings, emotions, and events down, but that I took the time once again to read through them. Some of the memories are fun to remember, such as the first time my adopted stepson ever called me mom. My excitement was so great over hearing that word you would have thought that the little boy had just hung the moon! And after reading through all of that excitement again, will make me appreciate the title that much more, once again, when my adopted stepson comes home and asks “how was your day mom?”

I was reminded of all of our small milestones, as well as some of the big ones. I was reminded of pain and heartache, as well as absolute joy and an abundance of love. I was reminded of my own mistakes, as well as the mistakes of others which I was left to pick up the pieces from. But most importantly I was reminded of how much I love my family, and have always loved them. How through thick and thin I have never given up on them and that was absolutely wonderful to see, read, and acknowledge. I encourage everyone out there to keep a journal, but more importantly, to read through them from time to time and look back on both the good and the bad, and to see how far you have come, both as a person, as well as, how far you have come as a family.


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