Overthinking {& the job that never ends}

Recently, my oldest child (and only precious little baby daughter) has started to wonder about the world around her. Has starting sprouting a curiosity about things that I wish would just stay away, at least for a few more years. I'm not sure that I am quite ready to deal with all of this. I'm not sure that I even know how to deal with all of this.

How do I know the right way to approach these touchy issues with sensitivity and love? How will I know the right answer to questions that I wish were never asked in the first place? How do I allow her to embrace her curiosity about life while keeping her innocence intact? Is this even a possibility?

There are always going to be new and incredibly difficult challenges to face as a parent, and as I learn every day, there will never be a time when parenting becomes easy. There are always going to be situations that I have ever encountered and I am never going to have all the answers. Even with the internet, (blessed, blessed internet) no amount of research is ever going to provide me with a solution that will be perfect for us.

These are the times when I have to just breathe, and let go. To throw caution into the wind and use my insticts as a mother. I need to tell that little voice in my heart that I cannot and will not protect and shelter my children from every little thing in this world, and that they need to experience and discover the beautiful things along with the ugly things all on their own.
These are the times when I have to remind myself that these beautiful little beings do not belong to me. That it is my job to care for them and provide for them and to guide them in the right direction, but to let them trip and fall and get back up again without too much interference.

It's these moments of clarity that I realize that it's not the diapers and the middle-of-the-night feedings, the temper tantrums or the meal preparation and constant cleaning. It isn't even the tears shed while trying to convince my son (with Aspergers and SPD) that the water in the shower isn't going to hurt him, I promise. It isn't the doors slamming and siblings fighting and crying babies that cannot be consoled.
No, these aren't the things that make this "the hardest job in the world". Sure, these things contribute to the chaos and stress, but they aren't the things that we will remember, as we sit with our adult children around a dinner table at a warm gathering years and years from now...
What I hope that my children will know and remember is that they have two parents, whom they know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, love them endlessly and have done everything in their power to raise happy, self-aware, healthy children. Physically and emotionally. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what makes it the hardest job in the world... but it's what I will strive for, so long as I am breathing.

The hardest job in the world? Definitely.
Worth every sleepless night, every hair lost, every stress-induced wrinkle? Abso-fricken-lutely.