I watched my son sleep in the car after school and drove more slowly than necessary

Dear Delyara, His mouth had fallen open a little. His head kept tipping gently with the turns. He had been holding it together all day, I think. Not in a dramatic way. Just in that child way where you don’t yet have the language for overstimulation, hurt, embarrassment, effort, and emotional fatigue, so the body just gives up and sleeps the second it can. I kept looking at him in the mirror at red lights and feeling that old maternal ache. You cannot protect them from life. But there are moments where you still get to carry them through its tiredness. And sometimes that feels enough to break your heart quietly in the most ordinary places, like traffic.