In Love

This may seem to some to be about 15 1/2 months too late to say this. I know that many moms say this when they see that little pink plus sign. Even more moms say this when they hold their new warm pink bundles to their bare chest. For whatever reason -- hormones, my history, our mutually difficult personalities -- I have not said this until now. I am in love with my little girl.

Please don't judge me for saying this so late in the game. I have always loved Kate. I've protected her, nurtured her, and cared for her. But I now know that feeling that some of my mom friends gush about. Kate, in all her toddler rampaging glory, looks to my eyes as the most intelligent, wickedly humorous, inquiring little soul I have ever seen. When I think of her, I know what the buddists mean by opening your heart and feeling a sense of expansiveness. Everything she does is brilliant and bright. Even her tantrums have taken a new twist and feel less overwhelming and terrible. (My pediatrician's advice for toddlerhood: "try to find the tantrums amusing". Ha. Oh, you who has boys in college and does not remember, or perhaps never lived through, being at home with a toddler.)

Her tantrums used to slice me raw. My nerves seemed exposed. I felt as though I myself was at risk when she thrashed and cried inconsolably (which she did from only two months old). This week I have nurtured my daughter sick with a cold: rocked her to sleep on my shoulder, driven her through dark streets singing "Los Elephantes" over and over, laid next to her on the floor as she settled into calm, and cuddled and pet her as she struggled to get some breath into her little body. Moms are supposed to do this, you are thinking. That's what we do. But the feeling I carried with me in this was different than before. I was a calmer, more centered mom. I felt more open. Less vulnerable to absorbing her pain.

Granted, last night when she was screaming in a dissociative-like state, seemingly unaware of her surroundings, I was glad to have Daddy P to pass her off to so I could go and calm myself before returning. But I returned. Whereas months ago I would not have. I would have gone to cry on the floor. I always feared doing so just taught her that her emotions were too dangerous and overwhelming for even her mother to feel. Now, as I grow and heal myself, as I bathe her in the love I have for her, I feel more able to hold her pain and teach her she can feel this misery and still be safe. This is the one lesson I want to give to her: that she can feel every emotion, in all its gut-wrenching terror, and not feel alone, but feel safe and held in this world.

So yes. I am in love with my daughter. Joyful in love.