As I write this it was 366 days ('08 was a leap year!), 2 hours and 45 minutes ago that I first laid eyes on Elaine. She was blue and wasn't moving much; the cord had been wrapped around her neck twice, and her blood sugar was dropping quickly, so her first few hours outside her little cocoon weren't the easiest. She had to briefly have an oxygen mask and was then whisked away to the nursery so they could give her bottles of formula to raise her blood sugar quickly.
Our first ten days together were a touch challenging -- Elaine wouldn't nurse, most likely because of that formula business right at the start, so she lost too much weight and I was put on a strict regimen of finger-feeding her every two hours, around the clock. I won't carry on about how awful that is, but it's pretty awful. Around day 8 the strain began to take its toll, and I was reduced to a blubbering, milk-leaking heap of new-mom hormones, convinced that my baby was rejecting me and that my prospects as a successful mother were, to put it mildly, abysmal. But on day 10 she latched on, and the clouds lifted.
I had to open with those details to set in stark contrast everything that has followed. I keep waiting for the hard part to begin, and it hasn't. I know it will -- there are already distant rumbles of a rather spirited toddlerhood on the horizon. But for now, on Elaine's first birthday, there is nothing for me to do but celebrate the happiest year of my life. It has been full of surprises, almost exclusively good ones. She makes me giddy with happiness every single day. She makes me love my husband even more than before (an embarrassingly extravagant amount to begin with) because seeing what an incredible father he is (no surprise to me) and seeing how much she loves him (less surprising still) has been a wholly wonderful new chapter of marriage.
I have been surprised by how every single tiny thing Elaine does makes me want to celebrate. She smiles at me for the millionth time, it's as rewarding as the very first. She places her fingertip on her nose when I ask her where it is, I almost faint from joy.
I have been surprised by how much the world loves babies. I didn't know this and am ashamed to say I didn't appreciate them enough before I had one. Watching the way people -- strangers -- are drawn to her, and how they want to talk to me about her and about the other babies they've known, is one of the more hopeful things I've ever experienced.
I've been surprised by how even when she's being a teensy bit of a pill, it doesn't budge the way I feel about her at all. I might feel a flush of frustration when she whips a handful of her dinner on the floor, but it's not anger and it's not directed at her. I just want to help her relax so she can get the food she needs into her cute little belly.
I've been surprised by how much other stuff I don't care about anymore. I don't care if my career takes a break, I don’t care if we don’t have lots of extra money laying around, I don't care if my social life now consists only of daytime activities, I don't care about my clothes, I don't care if I have a stressful day at work, I don't care if I'm in tip-top shape. I have this at home.
I've been surprised by how indulgent I am. I used to think I wouldn't buy anything for my children until their third birthday or so, since babies can pretty much entertain themselves with their own toes for half the day, and other people are happy to do the "spoiling" for you. But now I see toys and things that I know she'll love to poke and shake and bang and dance to, and suddenly our checking account is bottomless. (I hope I surprise myself by discovering a limit to this tendency before I've plumbed those depths, and before we have a full-blown spoiled brat on our hands.)
I can't believe how content I am to just sit and watch her doing next to nothing. As babies do, she'll turn a new object over in her hands and just look at it (and maybe shake it). As amazing as it is that this is stimulating and entertaining for her, it's at least as incredible that I'm entertained by sitting with my hands in my lap observing her.
I've been amazed by the sisterhood of mamas.
I've been surprised and terrified by how quickly time passes, and Elaine's speed-of-light changes along with it.
I'm surprised by the way a hard little knot of fear and sorrow forms in my chest when I think about the fact that someday I will no longer be breastfeeding, no one will crawl cooing across the floor to see me, my cuddles will not be enough to chase away tears. Totally sappy and stupid, I know, but it's hard to grasp that practically everything with children is just a short phase.
The thing I most enjoy remembering about Elaine's first year is that every single person she spent any significant amount of time with absolutely loved and adored her. From Brandon and me to her aunts and uncles and cousins to her Nana and Poppy and Grandma Jill and Poppy Ray to Krista to my friends to the checkers at Trader Joe's -- her world has been a sea of adoring eyes and open arms. I can't wait to see what joys, surprises, and love the next year brings.
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