Perspective is an interesting beast. It is wonderful when you have it, destructive when you don’t, and often times painful to obtain it. I have been given some perspective recently about being a mama and a wife.

You see, I’ve been worrying about Bud’s sleeping habits all week. He got off of his schedule when we were visiting North Carolina and has been up throughout the nights since we got there and even back here. I’ve done tons of research, talked to a few friends, and spent countless hours praying for wisdom.  Biggest lesson I learned, when you don’t have sleep, things seem to be a pretty big deal. For instance, I pouted for a solid 15 minutes last night because there wasn’t a new episode of “New Girl”. I teared up because I didn’t have any more pumpkin candy corn left in the house. (I had already depleted my hide-out stash).

Then perspective came.

Our dear friends are pregnant with their first child and he is getting deployed for a year and will miss the birth and most of the pregnancy. Sam and I thought we had a tough situation when we were afraid he would miss the birth of our son, but he was in Virginia in training… not Afghanistan. Perspective.

I know that people have said having a child really puts tension on your marriage but praise be to the Father, we haven’t experienced that yet. I think a lot of it is because of perspective. I know that Sam could be deployed and his command knows that he’d like to go on this next mission. Knowing that he could leave us for a year in the near future makes every moment seem extremely valuable. Even if he never deploys, what a wonderful existence we are living in right now treasuring each moment. We had some friends over last night and he is about to deploy as well. (There is a huge group from Fort Lewis leaving so that’s why a lot of our friends are heading out) but we were talking about the different perspective we have in our marriages.  My friend said, “I don’t get frustrated when I see his socks on the floor because that means he’s home.” Perspective. 

I read this article this morning. I wept. I wept for this family. I wept for families like them. I wept that God had blessed me with a healthy child but a healthy child I needed to daily let go of. Every night when Sam prays for our family he always says, “Lord take our boy and do what you will with him. We know he belongs to you.” and I always have to pray, “Give us the strength to truly lift our boy up to You Father and not hold him so tightly.”

I have been holding Bud so tightly and fretting over little hiccups like sleep habits. I am not underestimating the importance of good sleep and because we are committed to that, he is back on track and we are all well rested. But I have to keep perspective and in the midst of learning how to parent, constantly praising God for our son who so far is healthy and safe and loved. He can see, he can hear, he is reaching milestones, and he can kick his chubby little legs. He is breathing his sweet soft breath on my cheek and nuzzling his adorable neck into mine as I get to cuddle him so closely. I have to remember how amazing this is in the grand scheme of things.  I have to keep this perspective.