How To Not Feel Sad That Kids Grow Too Fast

(Inside: It’s easy to feel sad that our kids grow too fast. Yes, we lose time, but there is something we will never lose…read on.)

A sad thought enveloped me as I kissed my third-grader’s cheek.

I can’t remember the last time my oldest son let me kiss his lips. At some point, he offered his cheek instead and that’s how it has been ever since.

I also can’t remember the last time my middle son asked me to snuggle with him to help him fall asleep. He used to ask me every night, but then it became more sporadic until he stopped asking. The last time came and went and I didn’t realize it was over.

Then, there’s my baby, my youngest son. I can’t remember the last time I held him all balled up on my chest.  At some point, he grew too big and stretched out his legs and that moment was over. I didn’t even know to savor the last moment.

I hate how fast time moves.

Hours, days, months, years…they quickly are gone forever. My heart holds a lingering sadness for how fast my kids grow and the sweet moments that I didn’t even realize were the last time slip through my fingers.

But who wants to look back on pushing your toddler on the swings, sending your oldest to kindergarten, or the toothy grins and feel intensely sad because kids grow too fast?

I’d like the remember those moments with more happiness than sorrow because of the Amtrak going at warp speed we’re all on…

So, I search my thoughts. I pick them up and peer underneath and around.

Because I’m looking…

For how to not be sad about passing time.

I search for perspective by starting with a question.

I ask myself, of all my dreams, what’s one of the biggest? With no hesitation, my brain answers: to be a mom. 

Yet, to fully experience my dream  – to fully experience what the broad sense of the word “mom” means – I have to experience every aspect of it: joy and pain. It makes sense, without the fear, we can’t experience courage. Loss highlights what we have. The top is made more beautiful by the difficult climb. So, to fully experience and understand motherhood, I have to experience it in its entirety.

As I continue my search for perspective, my head tells my heart that what I really long for is not that my kids stay little forever, but that the love and beautiful connection we share last forever. 

Which it can…

Of course, it can.

Because I still have those sweet moments with my boys that connect us…they’re just different.

My oldest sauntered into the kitchen with a slightly puffed-out chest and pride on his face the first time he put on his full football gear. He lingered near for me to notice and declare how big and strong he looked.

My middle son wakes before his brothers, sneaks downstairs, and asks me to play Clue with him.

My youngest runs to me bursting with excitement to proudly show me the frog wriggling in his hands.

The precious moments still exist. The connection and love are still there; they’ve just grown up with my children.

So, the sweet mom moments are never really gone. I look forward to how my heart will fill when I see my sons in suits ready for prom. Or the joy of a son securing his first job. Then they’ll be the amazing moment of seeing my boy holding his own child. Those future moments will give me all the mom-feels I experienced the first time one of my babies nestled in the curve of my arms.

And I know – the present I am in, the elementary school kids, the book fairs, the youth sports, the grilled cheese sandwiches, and Nerf Guns – I will someday look back and miss them. 

I’ll be able to see when I’m outside of this current phase of chaotic, busyness…how precious the moments I’m experiencing right now were.

Mommas – we are always immersed in the life-changing, amazing mom-moments… in our past, right now, and will be in the future. The sweet mom moments were never lost…

And never will be.

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Your brain bounces between your day at work, what time(s) your kids need to be at practice, your teen’s missing school assignments, that you haven’t called your mom lately, the load of the laundry to be switched, “What’s for dinner?” and “Why are 3 of my brain-tabs frozen?” 

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Sad kids grow too fast? You will always have a chance to shop for your kids, no matter their age. Here are some ideas:

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