The picture to the left is Ryan and I in the NICU, he was 2 days old with the little IV in his hand (he had low blood sugar) on my shoulder as I rub his back. That picture still remains to be my favorite picture of Ryan and I. I remember in that picture thinking I could not believe I was sitting here with this baby, MY baby.
In the years Peter and I dated I knew that Peter was OK someday with or without children, there was no option for me. When we got engaged I told him that having a child was not something I would negotiate and if he could not agree to that then we could not be together. Clearly you can guess his choice, we agreed we would have 1 child and reevaluate from there. I was married at 35 as no spring chicken we started to try and have a baby and as I have told in the past I then experienced infertility. I was told by 4 doctors I would never conceive a child on my own, only with medical help. After many bumps in that road I miraculously became pregnant with Ryan.
14 weeks of bed rest and too many complications to count I did not care I loved being pregnant. I never understand people who hate pregnancy, I just don't get what there is to hate? The thought that I am growing another human being was insane to me and I relished every twitch from him. I remember vividly in some of my last weeks pregnancy laying in bed with him just having the greatest time in there and pushing out his foot right by my belly button. I would push back and he would pull away and then do it again and again, he was so human to me, so real, this was my baby doing this, the baby I was growing, what a miracle. I remember the night he was born laying on the operating room table for a second thinking OMG this is insane, there is a baby in there? They are cutting open my body and a whole human with a beating heart and a working brain is coming out into the world and he will live and work perfectly, how is that possible?
Not to minimize people who adopt child or chose to live a life without children but until you are handed the child you created, who grew inside you, you truly have not lived. It is the most crazy yet surreal moment, the most love you ever felt in your whole life overwhelms you and you know at that moment you would die for this person. All you can do is cry with joy and thank the lord above for giving this wonderful gift to you. In that moment every thought of infertility was gone, every second of depression over not being able to conceive has left your head and every bad second you had ever experienced does not matter. These thoughts of extreme love never seem to minimize either, I looked at Ryan today at 4 years old on this Mothers Day and I thought to myself "I wish I could express to this child what he is to me" and then I thought "how do people not feel this for their children" I thought of the horrible people in the world like that Casey Anthony that would chose to kill their own child (yeah allegedly, whatever) how do you do that? How, I will never understand.
This past Friday Ryan's school had a Mothers Day tea and while I got stuck at work at the last minute I sent my mom to stand in. They told how they surveyed each child about their mom, the first question was "What is something your mom says all the time" The most popular answer in the class was "no" or "wait" but Ryan's answer was "I love you." This not only melted my hearts but made me realize that I am doing good. My son does not think of me as the mother who reprimands him of which I clearly do or the mother who brushes him off with a "wait" but I am the mother who loves him and tells him that all the time. That is one of my major goals as a mother, not only to raise a good, polite, law abiding, decent child but to raise a child who feels love every day of his life and therefore can love others and someday be a wonderful parent to his own child
While Ryan will never know this, I always wished for another child, I wanted again to feel a child inside of me and bring another human into this world to love as much as Ryan. I realize though that through everything there is a grand plan that I do not understand and maybe someday when I meet God he will explain. There must be a reason I was given Ryan (and only Ryan) who is just hands down perfect. Me and him are so close, we really seem to just be on the same wavelength or something, we really understand each other, he is so much like me. Sometimes when I comfort him or really have a good talk with him I know he feels that too, we are very connected, I can see it in his eyes. God knew who and what I needed exactly
Ryan, The day you made me a mother was truly the best day of my life. I love you every single moment and thank you so much for being mine, there is no one better XOXO
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