Finally

Before I would put Sophia to bed at night, we had a long list of things we would do to help her be less scared about sleeping alone. Some were the usual, check for monsters, turn on lights, close doors, play music. Some were more unsual such as put guard stuffed animals by the doors to make sure nothing bad could come in and to turn the switch off behind her ears to stop her from thinking of things like monsters and ghosts and missing her mom and dad. I think I turned the switch off behind my ears too. Except my switches don't stop me from thinking, they stop me from caring. Since the parents came back, I have stopped caring about what they do with or for their kids. I am not sure why or how this happened, it just has. Maybe it was that I realized why they are the way they are, as I wrote about in my previous entry. Or maybe it was because I relinquished all care of the kids to them when they returned and some of the care may have gone with it. I don't know what it is and I don't really care how or why it happened. All I know is that it did. I have tried so hard for this to happen since I have been here, to not care about if they feed the baby in the night, to not care if they sleep with S, to simply not care because they aren't my kids. I was never able to do it, I cared too much. Since their return, I feel this weight has been lifted off my shoulders, this burden is gone. They aren't my kids. They have never been my kids. They will never be my kids. And I am glad. They have already been taught things that I would never teach my kids. They have been allowed to do things I would never allow my kids to do. And I wouldn't want them as my own. The past couple days when the mother has told me stories about the baby or the shoes she bought her or how many times she woke up in the middle of the night, I finally don't care. I smile and give a fake laugh and then walk away and I don't think about it again. Whatever caused this release, I don't care. It is gone. I feel renewed and refreshed and am more ready to embark on my new journey. Six weeks. That's it. Six weeks left of work. And I am much less sad about leaving the girls than I was before because of this release. Maybe that is why it happened, to help me to cope. But I am completely, 100% ready to make this change. I haven't been more sure that I was making the right decision since photography school. And trust me, that says a lot. And for the first time in a LONG time, I feel completely at ease, no stress, no sadness, no fatigue; just content, excited and happy. And it feels great.