It took six months for me to leave Kai with sam and go out with friends by myself. It was fun getting dressed up and I’d missed that feeling of anticipation. However, the actual leaving part was rubbish. I very almost called to cancel and could have happily spent this evening snuggling with Kai.
I didn’t though. I kissed him and sam goodbye a million times and walked out the door by myself. It was odd, to leave him behind.
Once out I did enjoy myself – I was delighted to catch up with my friend, and we did dinner and a show and cocktails (high five for the honeysuckle fizz. Nothing like a little bit of tequila to relax you. We made the opening night of Dirty Bones in soho, it was well good).
Here’s the thing though, I found it difficult not to constantly talk about Kai. He’s has my complete and utter focus, he’s the centre of my world right now. I’ve become one of those people who talk about their child all the time. I didn’t understand it before, but now I get it. It’s because I don’t have a life outside my baby really. I’m not adventuring, I don’t work in an office… everything I do is connected to Kai: how he is, the research I’ve read, the fundraising I’m trying to figure out… I can talk about Sam or Kai. My world has condensed, its shrunk to my two beautiful boys.
It makes me a rubbish conversationalist for people that don’t love those two as much as I do.
I suspect that the more I go out, the more I do outside Kai the more varied my conversation will become. I’m not sure I want that though. I’m still stuck in the ‘everyday is precious’ mentality. We don’t know how long we have, and I don’t want to regret not being with him. We’ve been trying to not live the diagnosis, and live through it instead… but you know what? While that’s awesome for enabling us to go out with Kai, it’s difficult to strike an emotional balance.
I’m still a new Mum. I feel guilty when I’m not there with him.
I guess we’ll figure it out. Till then, I’m hoping people will have patience with my deteriorating conversational skills.