And you probably have too if you’re a parent.įor a really long time, sayings of this variety made me want to punch the people who said them in the face. I mean, if I had a burrito for the number of people who’ve felt compelled to insinuate that I’m not appreciating every single moment as a mother, I’d be very unhealthy, extremely full, and horrendously stinky, because I’ve heard things like this a lot. “You’ll wake up one day, and she’ll be about to get married.” She’ll be a teenager in the blink of an eye.” I’ve also heard, “It’s over before you know it.” Not just in "aHappy birthday to all of us.Įvery day is a day of re-birth for each of us.“Enjoy it,” the lady behind me in line at Target says, “It goes by so fast.” We must only look over our shoulders in awe. It's only in retrospect that it flies by, I think. It doesn't go fast when we are really in it, eyes and ears and heart open. More subtle confident knowing and.less anxiety, doubt and stress. The way love wants a little more distance at the same time as it needs more intimacy, It's humbling to see my role shifting over the years, metamorphosing through so many roles as they grow and we recalibrate the spaces between us. He doesn't go to bed without hugging me, leaning his head on my shoulder, still, while I rub his back, still. It's humbling to be the grateful recipient of his big bear hugs first thing in the morning, after school and in the evening. The last 16 years don't feel fast.they feel like decades and lifetimes of time-traveling for me, a surreal movie in my mind of all the beautiful and heart-wrenching moments when I thought things were so hard and yet I-we-made it through and I play the movies of me younger and caught in the storms of worry and exhaustion.Īnd here we are.my older son college bound in just 2 years. It's humbling that loss is inevitable part of life. It's humbling that we can't kiss all the boo boos. It's humbling to see our children suffer or struggle and understand that our close, loving support of them as they pull through is a necessary rite of passage for both of us. It's humbling to realize we are being raised by our babies and children, unknown to them, through our struggles and conflicts and resolutions. It's humbling to experience the power of repair with people you love most on earth. It's humbling to fess up when you mess up. It's humbling to wrestle with and let go of expectation. It's humbling to surrender to the moment. It's humbling to know that you don't know the answers only questions. It's been an incredible, exquisite, painful, profound, bewildering, mesmerizing, maddening, magical, heart-filling and breaking, challenging, empowering, inspiring, creative journey that keeps unfolding in chapters and stories that I have learned to see as deeply humbling. My baby wasn't a "fussy" baby but a magnificent human being, my precious baby who was communicating something to me about who he was and what he needed.įrom the time we are new parents, there's so many voices, so much, so many tips and lists and strategies from a culture of over-advice that hijacks our intuition. I held him through the storms and discomforts, walking, rocking, singing, silently, constantly, tearfully, lovingly, curiously, devotedly, nursing him when he searched, holding him when he arched, cradling him when he dozed off.Īnd I worried that he didn't like me, that I wasn't able to understand his call sometimes, that all my choices would backfire down the road.all the voices clanging and cautioning me to put him down or I'd spoil him. He slept in 45 minute intervals all day and night, and felt everything, light, sound, whispers, lawnmowers, doorbells, carseats, strollers, as an assault to his senses. My older son, 16, wanted a 4th trimester when he was born.
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