“Don’t worry about posting too many pictures of Caleb.
People post way more annoying things. I mean, would you rather have your
newsfeed full of stuff about Trump, or your friend’s babies?”
That
was the advice given to me by a friend this past week. And while I am trying to
keep myself reigned in a little when it comes to oversharing pictures of my
little baby son, I’m going to have to ask for a little grace. Believe it or
not, I am showing restraint: you
should see the array of expressions – from adorable to burst-out-laughing
ridiculous—that cross his face in a given moment. Just know that whatever I do end
up posting is narrowed down from the amount of pictures I’ve actually taken.
You
see, over the past three weeks, your worlds have been going on pretty much as
they have been. Mine, on the other hand, has been flipped around and turned
inside out, and its focus has narrowed and widened all at once. Everybody tells
you that having a baby will change your life, but they don’t tell you how… at
least, not beforehand. They leave you to assume that the biggest challenges
you’ll be facing are lack of sleep and an altered lifestyle, so when you wake
up one morning and realize something is different—that these aren’t the same
false contractions you’ve been having for the last few weeks—you’re not exactly
ready for what’s about to come. You make the calls, you pack the car and drive
to the hospital “just in case”, but you’re really expecting to be sent back
home. And even when they tell you it’s on—that you’ll be holding a baby by
midnight—it still hasn’t hit you. And then things get hard and serious and
you’re not really you for a while, and even after the pain finally leaves with
that last slippery rush and they put your new, tiny person on your chest, you
still don’t get it.
No…
that comes later. And it comes slowly, hesitating for a long time on the edges
of what you know and what you can articulate. The first hint comes while you’re
lying in the dark between the two you love most in all the world, the boy you
married and this other one, the one you hardly know but you’ve already endured
so much for. You’re tired and aching, but each time that quick little breath
catches, yours does too. And that’s it. That’s when it starts. That’s when you
begin to see that the agony of labor was just the very, very beginning of how
your world is being reordered. This awareness unfolds a little more with each
day, until you acknowledge that it will be going on for the rest of your life.
It isn’t just your baby who is newborn in this world… but you.
Those
first few days, or weeks, even, might be the hardest thing you’ve ever
experienced; worse than the hours of labor. It’s during this time that you
realize that you could never be ready for this perfect new person even in these
small early things, and the terrifying weight of all those bigger ways in which
you aren’t ready sinks in. You’re so worn out that you just want these infant
days to be over, but at the same time, you’re praying that you can sink down
into them like a stone in a river and let each moment flow long and sweet over
you.
Like when you run your hand over
his back, over the fine ripples of his tiny bones, in absolute wonder at skin
so soft you aren’t actually sure
you’re touching it.
And when you take that baby into
your arms again and again in the middle of the night to nurse him, or clean up
a new mess just seconds after you finished the last one.
And when he turns his head and
looks around, wide-eyed, lips pursed in wonder at everything.
Or when you’ve done all you know to
do for him and he’s still screaming and you’re left crying hard while you rock
him.
These are the moments when all the
weight and glory of parenthood come down. It is in these moments, behind all
the practicalities of having a baby, that the fiercest kind of love is born:
the mother-love that teaches of the Father’s love. It goes beyond the scope of
conventional words and Hallmark wishes; beyond what you can know until you’ve
labored and delivered and held. And even now, newborn parent that I am, I know
I’m just seeing the beginning of this. I think it will be the hardest thing I
will ever do.
And the best.
