Feeling deflated and defeated

I love my kids. I do.

I love being a (step)mom.

What I don't love is the fact that my daughters cannot pick up the phone and call their mom when they want to talk to her. I have an amazing relationship with my mom. We talk a couple times a week and we text almost daily. But my girls don't have that relationship with their mom.

While I try to step up and feel that void from a mom not being there, I'm sometimes the root of the backlash from it as well.

A relationship between a mother and daughter isn't the same relationship that a stepmother has with her stepdaughter. There just isn't. There's that unique bond between a mother and daughter that words can't begin to describe. While I know that I will never have that unique bond, I am trying my hardest to have some kind of maternal bond with my daughters.

However, it kills me on the inside whenever they get so excited about something that reminds them of their mom, (a piece of clothing that they have held on to, a phone number so that they can call, or a text message that they ran across in their phone) only to be harshly reminded that they don't have a way to get in touch with their mom.

This past weekend while Meagan was cleaning her room she came across a book of emergency phone numbers that I had made the girls for when they go to other people's homes and they need to call us. Their mom wrote down her number (at that time) and Meagan got really excited because she could finally be able to talk to her mom. This excitement quickly fizzled when we realized that the number that she had given them was not a current number and had been disconnected for quite some time. Even the newest number that we have isn't a number to get in touch with her.

The heartbreak that I see in my child's eyes when she can't have those few minutes of bonding with her child eats me up.

When we ask Tracey how she feels about it, she just says that she's so used to it that it doesn't phase her anymore. That this is something that she expects. What child should think like that?

When we hit rough patches like these I find myself over-exerting myself to give the girls an extra boost. I'm not trying to buy their love, but I guess it's more of keeping them occupied so they won't be filled with so much sadness. It's my way of building that bond that will hopefully give them the memories to fill those that aren't happy.

I constantly worry that I'm not a good mom. Everyday I have to remind myself that I am. It's a tough road coming into someone's life and step up to be a parental figure. It's not an easy job. But it's a job that I wouldn't trade anything for. Some people are meant to have kids from conception. I'm not that person. I'm meant to be a mom to two girls, whether it's through birth or through marriage, I will always be their mom.

It's been rough butting heads with my youngest because of this. Conversations become tense and emotions are on 10. When we get to this point I panic and I freak out. I question myself and if I'm really meant to be a parent. There are days where I just have to scream and let it out and then there are days where I just have to be brought back down to reality.

I love my kids.

 I love being a mom. It gives me a sense of pride and something that I can brag about. What's even better is I can brag about something that not everyone can relate to. It makes my story unique.

Every day isn't going to be roses and it isn't going to be hugs and kisses and I love yous all the time. There will be the days where there are the I hate you, the screaming, and the tears. But that's all a part of being a parent.