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therealljidol this month. No voting. Just writing and reading. This is my entry for the first topic. I hope you all enjoy!
It’s three in the morning. I hit the alarm before anyone else can hear it, drag myself out of bed and tiptoe down the hall. Behind me are the sounds of three people breathing slow and steady. I find the dog next to the couch, but even she doesn’t bother to lift her head to greet me.
I take my familiar position, start the breast pump, turn on the television to watch a show to keep myself awake for the next half hour.
I miss sleeping through the night. I miss sleeping more than six hours a night. I miss not having to hook myself up to a pump every three to four hours to make milk for my baby.
This part I won’t miss. This part I already want to end.
I won’t miss his cries at four in the morning, usually five minutes after I tuck myself back into bed. I won’t miss standing in a dark kitchen waiting for his bottle to heat up because he decided at two days old that he didn’t want to breastfeed. I won’t miss cleaning bottles and pump parts and all the little bottles we store the pumped milk in, over and over and over during the course of a day. I won’t miss having to do laundry almost non-stop because there’s spit up on everything we own.
I won’t miss any of that.
But I’m not ready for it to end.
I’m not ready for it to be the last time.
The last time he’s small enough to fit perfectly into my arms as I rock him to sleep. The last time he can fit into his three-month clothes, or his six-month clothes, or his one-year clothes, before I have to pack them up forever. The last time I get to snuggle with him first thing in the morning as I give him his bottle. The last first Thanksgiving. The last first Christmas. The last first birthday.
So many firsts happening and about to happen.
The first time he’ll laugh. The first time he’ll call me Mama. The first time he’ll roll over. The first step he’ll take. The first time he’ll say he loves me.
But there are so many lasts, too.
The last time we’ll be able to sit him on the couch and not worry about him rolling off. The last time he’ll fit into his baby car seat. The last time he’ll fall asleep in his swing or fit into his bassinet.
It was different with our daughter. She was the first, the baby we weren’t sure we’d ever have. Every moment was new and exciting and hard and overwhelming. But with her, we always knew there was a chance at a second. A little embryo frozen away until we were ready to try.
Now, there are no more chances. There will be no more babies. Even if there was a possibility, this is it. Pregnancy with him was hard. The first few weeks with him was harder.
Sometimes I think I just forgot how hard it was the first time around. How long the days are. How the nights are even longer. How every phase — the inconsolable crying, the refusing to sleep, the refusing to stay asleep — seems to last forever.
But in the back of my head I know. For as hard as this is, for as much as I want time to speed up in some respects, every moment of each day — every long, hard, overwhelming, frustrating moment — is the last time.
It feels like forever right now. Each sleepless night turning into another day and into another sleepless night. But it’s already almost been four months. His first birthday will be here before we know it. And then his second, his third, his fifth, his tenth.
I’m not ready. I’m not ready for him to not be this small. I’m not ready for him to not be this innocent. I’m not ready for him to stop looking at me with that wide-eyed expression as he studies me, like he can’t get enough. I’m not ready for him to stop smiling at me when I poke my head over the side of his crib in the morning and he sees me there.
I want some of these moments to last forever. I want to permanently etch them into my mind, into my memories.
Even when I want them to end, I want them to never end. So I hold on to him a little longer after he eats, even when every extra minute is a minute less of sleep. And I snap an extra picture or two, even though I already have hundreds. And I look into his eyes and study his features and try to engrave this moment forever because I know in a few weeks from now, a few months from now, a few years from now, I won’t remember exactly how he looked or how he felt.
He will never again be as small as he is right now, no matter how much I wish I could stop time, and my heart aches at the thought.
He is getting bigger every day. Someday he won’t need his diapers changed. Someday he won’t need me to carry him up the stairs. Someday he won’t need my arms around him to get him to stop crying.
Someday will be here before I know it. Before I want it.
But some somedays are still far, far away. So for today, for this moment, I’m going to hold on to my little boy a little tighter, a little longer, through every long, overwhelming minute. Because I know, as hard as it is, I really am going to miss this.
Non-fiction, of course.
Here's my little man all dressed up for Halloween. He'll be four months old on Wednesday!
Read everyone else's wonderful entries here!
therealljidol this month. No voting. Just writing and reading. This is my entry for the first topic. I hope you all enjoy!It’s three in the morning. I hit the alarm before anyone else can hear it, drag myself out of bed and tiptoe down the hall. Behind me are the sounds of three people breathing slow and steady. I find the dog next to the couch, but even she doesn’t bother to lift her head to greet me.
I take my familiar position, start the breast pump, turn on the television to watch a show to keep myself awake for the next half hour.
I miss sleeping through the night. I miss sleeping more than six hours a night. I miss not having to hook myself up to a pump every three to four hours to make milk for my baby.
This part I won’t miss. This part I already want to end.
I won’t miss his cries at four in the morning, usually five minutes after I tuck myself back into bed. I won’t miss standing in a dark kitchen waiting for his bottle to heat up because he decided at two days old that he didn’t want to breastfeed. I won’t miss cleaning bottles and pump parts and all the little bottles we store the pumped milk in, over and over and over during the course of a day. I won’t miss having to do laundry almost non-stop because there’s spit up on everything we own.
I won’t miss any of that.
But I’m not ready for it to end.
I’m not ready for it to be the last time.
The last time he’s small enough to fit perfectly into my arms as I rock him to sleep. The last time he can fit into his three-month clothes, or his six-month clothes, or his one-year clothes, before I have to pack them up forever. The last time I get to snuggle with him first thing in the morning as I give him his bottle. The last first Thanksgiving. The last first Christmas. The last first birthday.
So many firsts happening and about to happen.
The first time he’ll laugh. The first time he’ll call me Mama. The first time he’ll roll over. The first step he’ll take. The first time he’ll say he loves me.
But there are so many lasts, too.
The last time we’ll be able to sit him on the couch and not worry about him rolling off. The last time he’ll fit into his baby car seat. The last time he’ll fall asleep in his swing or fit into his bassinet.
It was different with our daughter. She was the first, the baby we weren’t sure we’d ever have. Every moment was new and exciting and hard and overwhelming. But with her, we always knew there was a chance at a second. A little embryo frozen away until we were ready to try.
Now, there are no more chances. There will be no more babies. Even if there was a possibility, this is it. Pregnancy with him was hard. The first few weeks with him was harder.
Sometimes I think I just forgot how hard it was the first time around. How long the days are. How the nights are even longer. How every phase — the inconsolable crying, the refusing to sleep, the refusing to stay asleep — seems to last forever.
But in the back of my head I know. For as hard as this is, for as much as I want time to speed up in some respects, every moment of each day — every long, hard, overwhelming, frustrating moment — is the last time.
It feels like forever right now. Each sleepless night turning into another day and into another sleepless night. But it’s already almost been four months. His first birthday will be here before we know it. And then his second, his third, his fifth, his tenth.
I’m not ready. I’m not ready for him to not be this small. I’m not ready for him to not be this innocent. I’m not ready for him to stop looking at me with that wide-eyed expression as he studies me, like he can’t get enough. I’m not ready for him to stop smiling at me when I poke my head over the side of his crib in the morning and he sees me there.
I want some of these moments to last forever. I want to permanently etch them into my mind, into my memories.
Even when I want them to end, I want them to never end. So I hold on to him a little longer after he eats, even when every extra minute is a minute less of sleep. And I snap an extra picture or two, even though I already have hundreds. And I look into his eyes and study his features and try to engrave this moment forever because I know in a few weeks from now, a few months from now, a few years from now, I won’t remember exactly how he looked or how he felt.
He will never again be as small as he is right now, no matter how much I wish I could stop time, and my heart aches at the thought.
He is getting bigger every day. Someday he won’t need his diapers changed. Someday he won’t need me to carry him up the stairs. Someday he won’t need my arms around him to get him to stop crying.
Someday will be here before I know it. Before I want it.
But some somedays are still far, far away. So for today, for this moment, I’m going to hold on to my little boy a little tighter, a little longer, through every long, overwhelming minute. Because I know, as hard as it is, I really am going to miss this.
Non-fiction, of course.
Here's my little man all dressed up for Halloween. He'll be four months old on Wednesday!
Read everyone else's wonderful entries here!
no subject
Date: 2021-11-09 10:46 pm (UTC)Oh, he's so fluffy and healthy, and that's so wonderful after all the fears during parts of your pregnancy. He's just perfect!
I know all of those feelings so well. Once the colic started, we knew our second would be our last, and we were already mourning the end of so many baby needs and moments even before they'd begun. And because ours were close together like yours (2 years apart), it felt like it went by even faster, like we hadn't had enough time to
wallowdwell on so many of those moments. Because the first child still needs so much time and attention that there's more "triage" than the first time around, and that makes it harder to reflect.But it's all worth it, and congratulations on your beautiful boy!