Nobody can prepare you for what it's like having a newborn. Of course, I knew this going into it. All the years of studying child development combined with nannying other people's children cannot cover the time warp feeling of foggy living -- figuring out if it's day or night and begging your crying infant at 2am to tell you why he's upset. There's no amount of theory or research or experience that can change the every-changing puzzle of a baby.
It is a life of paradoxes - it is the greatest joy and the greatest fear; the deepest love and deepest feeling of loss; it's the greatest change and yet everything remains the same. Life is now lived in the push and pull of these opposites. I realize that even before he was born, these extremes were present - through my 20's, traveling, moving, dating, engagement, marriage... starting a family. The post-partum hormones bring all the emotions to the surface as if the reality of Life itself becomes too much to grip; the passage of time reeling past like a film strip of a movie; unstoppable, uncontrollable.
Has life always felt this fragile? Has time always passed at this pace?
It is in the early morning hours begging a wide-awake, screaming baby to fall back into his slumber that the question "Is this my forever?" runs through my head like a repetitious song lyric that I can't escape. But then I catch a glimpse of a moonlit shadow rocking on the crib wall, coaxing a little bundle side to side, and I think "I wouldn't mind if this is my forever." I will remember these hours with Mom Memory - forgetting the difficult and clinging to the beautiful. Those little blue eyes looking up at me, so trusting, so alert - untainted, innocent, in wonder with the world.
These moments feel sacred and I remember not to wish them away, even in the frustration and fury of "please just let me sleep." Our tiny little guy - only a month old - and even when I dream of him growing up, I just want him to stay this way forever.
It is a life of paradoxes - it is the greatest joy and the greatest fear; the deepest love and deepest feeling of loss; it's the greatest change and yet everything remains the same. Life is now lived in the push and pull of these opposites. I realize that even before he was born, these extremes were present - through my 20's, traveling, moving, dating, engagement, marriage... starting a family. The post-partum hormones bring all the emotions to the surface as if the reality of Life itself becomes too much to grip; the passage of time reeling past like a film strip of a movie; unstoppable, uncontrollable.
Has life always felt this fragile? Has time always passed at this pace?
It is in the early morning hours begging a wide-awake, screaming baby to fall back into his slumber that the question "Is this my forever?" runs through my head like a repetitious song lyric that I can't escape. But then I catch a glimpse of a moonlit shadow rocking on the crib wall, coaxing a little bundle side to side, and I think "I wouldn't mind if this is my forever." I will remember these hours with Mom Memory - forgetting the difficult and clinging to the beautiful. Those little blue eyes looking up at me, so trusting, so alert - untainted, innocent, in wonder with the world.
These moments feel sacred and I remember not to wish them away, even in the frustration and fury of "please just let me sleep." Our tiny little guy - only a month old - and even when I dream of him growing up, I just want him to stay this way forever.
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