Similar Dreams

Primero and I shared similar dreams last night. Both involved Esperanza. Primero dreamt that Esperanza, her boyfriend and his youngest sister were all staying in his bedroom. He said I was there with the little ones but we were more like statues, just sitting in the living room watching TV. He mentioned how his youngest sister kept running up and down the basement stairs and how Esperanza and her boyfriend got into a fight and the boyfriend left. In my dream, Primero had aged 10 years but the rest of us were the same age. Primero was living with his girlfriend and was contemplating popping the question, so he came over for dinner to talk to me about it. After we discussed this topic he said, “You know I also came here to ask you a favor.” It turns out Esperanza (who was still 18 in my dream) just found out she was expecting and when she told her boyfriend, he threw some money at her, told her to get an abortion and then split. Esperanza was scared and needed help. Dream Primero concocted a plan to have Esperanza move in with me and switch to a night shift when the baby was born so she could watch the baby during the day and I would watch the baby in the evenings and at night. I readily agreed to the plan and, in my dream, Esperanza and I spent the rest of our living days raising her son and my two little ones.

 

When we compared dreams this morning, Primero noted how they were similar and I said we were probably both thinking and worrying about Esperanza. Today I wore the Mother necklace the kids gave me for Christmas. Under the word “Mother” hang four colored charms denoting the birth month of each child. When they presented me with the necklace it already had the appropriate charms on it. I love the necklace and even though things are rough with Esperanza right now (I mean, she basically hates me), my feelings haven’t changed. I know I’m a fool, I’m sure there would be no shortage of people to tell me so, but I’m stubborn, I don’t give up easily. Because I feel badly about the outcome, I keep thinking of ways I could have prevented what happened from happening. I’m sure there are things I might have done differently, but I honestly don’t know if those things would have resulted in a different outcome. Perhaps it would have only prolonged the inevitable and made being in the house unbearable for so many members. As always, hindsight is 20/20 and looking back isn’t always healthy. So, I’ve begun looking forward. I hope there can be some reconciliation but I don’t know that it will happen any time soon. As I told Primero, I’m not going anywhere and what has happened isn’t going to keep me from participating just as I have been doing these past two years. Whether we like it or not, we are tied together as family. Primero can try his hardest, when he is angry with me, to make me feel like an outsider and not a member of his family, but he won’t succeed. The same goes for Esperanza. I won’t stop caring about her just because she is angry with me and wants to cut me out of her life. The fact is, she can’t, at least not entirely. I suppose she can decide to not attend family functions when she knows I will be there, but hopefully she won’t, hopefully she will still attend and enjoy her family as she should. I suppose only time will tell.

 

I have spent enough time beating myself up over everything and so I am now trying to as gracefully as possible, disentangle myself from the mess. It’s not something I’m good at doing, but I have been trying to shift my focus back onto Primero and the younger kids. On Saturday I took Chica Marie on a mini girls day out. We grabbed a quick lunch at Wendy’s (her request) and then went to see the new Disney movie “Zootopia.” The movie was good, Chica Marie was ok. She wanted popcorn and a soda, so we got small ones to share. She ate almost all of the popcorn and would have drunken all the soda, but I moved it away from her so she wouldn’t have to get up to pee in the middle of the movie. About half-way through the movie she asked me loudly if we could leave because she was bored. After the movie when we were back in the car she told me the movie was boring and could she have more junk food. I suppose it’s too much to ask for a little gratitude from a 5 year old, but it certainly didn’t make all the effort seem like it was having the affect her therapist had hoped for. Her mobile therapist wanted us to spend more alone time together in hopes of strengthening our bond. Instead, she asked why she couldn’t see her other mommy and wished she had spent the afternoon with her grandmother instead. Sigh. This Saturday I am hoping to have some alone time with Primero. He has gone off with his uncle a lot lately, and I know his uncle is trying to spend more time with him, but it’s starting to become a bit too much. Initially, Primero was doing it to get away from me because he didn’t want to deal with the elephant in the room. Now I’m not so sure. I know it’s not cool as a teenager to spend time with your mom. But, sometimes we just need to reconnect, especially with all that has been happening. We shall see how things go.