I have one child who tells me he loves me approximately 42 times per day, every day. He hugs me, rests his head on me, loves when I cuddle him and dance with him. 🥰
My other child does not like to be hugged by me, does not say I Love You. When I say I Love You, she responds with, “Okay.” When I hug her, I ask first; she will shrug her shoulders. She is stiff, uncomfortable. She just wants to describe in great detail the saga of Flash, or tell me again how many rings a planet has. I am bothering her. I can count on one hand the number of times she has hugged me on her own and said the words I Love You in the almost fifteen years since she was born.
When we started learning sign language, I came up with a solution that works for us:
🤟🏻.
She will use the sign for I Love You if I ask her.
I don’t know if she understands why it’s important to me, or if she even actually cares. But it means the world to me.
💗
I am thankful for this.
And so thankful for both my babies.
What a sad and lovely post. I'm envious you can so freely express your love to your children. My daughters make me trip up when I try, and I think what is most sad of all is they aren't meaning to do it. They are simply restricted by their own lack of ability to express their filial love.
ReplyDeleteThat is even sadder.
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