Solo Single Mama

I was up until two in the morning cutting out dragons. Each of the forty cub scouts will create their own - but the pieces needed to be cut out of foam:


These are them. 714 pieces cut in all.

I wouldn't have bothered, I don't have that inner drive to be super mom. However, little D has this certain twinkle in his eye when he's excited about something. When he was little it never went away, his eyes were always sparkling. As he's gotten older it's been more difficult to find ways of connecting; bonding. More impossible for him to ignore the missing father when the other boys dads are at the meetings. So, if cutting dragon pieces so he can be proud of his family at the Cub Scout banquet is what I need to do - so be it.

When I crawled into bed in the wee hours of the morning, fingers numb, I thought I would drift into a deep slumber until the alarm went off.

Wrong.

I woke up terrified of the person suspended above my bed. Face covered with a ski mask, hands and legs flared out as if ready to bat jump onto my bed, my assailant was poised for destruction.

Within seconds I knew it was only my ceiling fan, which I'd forgotten to turn on to avoid this night terror. However, it took my eyes a few minutes to adjust to my brains' information. In these few minutes I chanted the mantra; "it's not real, it's not real, it's not real." All the while laying perfectly still, barely breathing, just in case it really was real.

I don't know which is worse, the spider nightmares or these new hallucinations sitting on the edge of my dreams. When it was spiders I would bolt out of bed to avoid the spider jumping onto me. The action enabled my brain and eyes to work together and release me from the delusion instantaneously.

These new delusions have me frozen in terror, unable to move. Sitting on the cusp of sleep and wake too long for comfort. These are the mornings I sip my coffee with the nagging fear that one night I'll wake up and my brain will have stopped telling my eyes it's not real. I will have slipped into the torment of my mother's world - plagued with hallucinations and paranoias I cannot release myself from.

My dear brother was released from his torment. A week ago last Saturday. The news has filled me with sadness, relief and guilt. I cannot quiet our childhood memories; two lighthearted kids ruling the little neighborhood until the streetlights illuminated. Until the fateful year, when our world went to shit. He had it so much worse, and never recovered. I am so sad for that little boy who never had a fighting chance. Sad, yet relieved his inner battle is finished.

My relief and glimmer of joy has left me distraught with guilt. My busy life, leaving little room to dwell, my only saving grace.

Whether it's good or bad he is gone, may my big brother rest in the peace he couldn't have here on Earth.