Tough love is tough on who?

It's so difficult to sit across from my son with a stern look and dry eyes. He's such a little boy, toying with my shoelace. Always will be, I suppose. He can barely speak he's so emotional and so in need. In need of so much he can't even wrap his brain around it all. In need of something as simple as a hug and in need of things he isn't even aware of. But, he's in need. I so badly want to make it all go away and replace it with laughter and smiles, that's what I'm in need of.

But, tough love is what I've always heard about, and believed in. You can't just love them, they'll use it as ammunition. But, it's so difficult to love someone so conditionally when you have always loved them without reservation or explanation. There's no rhyme or reason why those cute things they do make you love them even more. No one even asks why or what makes your child so endearing. It's your child, just as simple as that. To attempt to define it would be time taken from other, more important, tasks. So, why bother?

Now, I'm supposed to reserve my love for good behavior and gestures of love in exchange. This is a love that I need. For almost half my life, this is what I've gotten out of bed for. Those days before I had children and all I wanted was to stay in bed and be non-existent, that was no longer an option once I knew what was there for me. A toothless grin, a work of art created with markers (the same markers that "accidentally touched" his face), a cartoon-rehearsing-cheerio-eating-sleepy-eyed-kid. Something. Chaotic or not, it was something. In those days, it's funny how I thought permanent marker on the wall was a problem! HA! Naivity can take you much further than you could go, otherwise...

I digress.

Now I'm forced to hold back on being loving and give it out sparingly? How? How do I do that when that is the one thing that he surely needs more than anything else? How do I sit across from him with a stern look and dry eyes?

That's a tough way to love, alright.

C