Monday, June 27, 2011

Discovery

I’ve discovered or re-discovered a few things in the past weeks.

1. The first or second night home with Liam, I was up feeding him in the middle of the night. I could not believe how much I love this kid and how I would do anything for him for the rest of my life. But then I thought about my own mom. How she was sitting up in the middle of the night thirty years ago thinking the same thing. It dawned on me that my mom feels the same way about me. She shows me her love every day, but it was really clear to me when I was sitting there, staring at Liam. There is a special bond between a mom and her children.

2. Liam is usually great in the car, either happily looking around or snoozing. But the other day, he was so tired and just cried and cried on the way home from a friend’s house. He had never done that in the car before and I was beyond stressed out by my poor little guy being so tired and sad. Liam loves my singing (the only person in the world who does!), so I started singing “Jesus Loves Me” to him. I just kept singing it over and over and suddenly the mood in the car shifted. I listened to the words of the song. I had been singing it to Liam- letting him know that Jesus loves him. But I realized that Jesus loves me too. I had forgotten. Liam was still crying, nothing had changed, but everything had changed in a moment.

3. I can’t do this alone. Kyle and I are a team and we work so much better as a team. Its very hard for me to ask for help. Not just the “will you bring me my water” kind of help, but the “I need you” kind of help. Being home with Liam has been wonderful and I have cherished my time with him. But some days, after spending all night and all day with him, I really look forward to Kyle coming home so I can talk to an adult and just sit next to him. I need him to help with Liam and give me a break, but I also just need him to be near. And for some reason, that is really hard to say.

There are other things I wish I had learned during this time. “Don’t sweat the small stuff” is top of that list. I think I’ve gotten better at it in some ways. It doesn’t bother me when I get sprayed with pee or if Liam poops in his diaper 1.7 seconds after I change it. But there are other things I wish I could just roll with (like the whole eating every three hours thing from yesterday’s post. Incidentally, he’s been eating every three hours today- ha!). I want to be one of those moms that doesn’t get ruffled and I feel like I fail at that half the time. I know I’m new at this and Liam is new at this, so there is room to grow. I’ve never been very laidback to begin with, so this is a goal to strive toward. I’m not looking to turn into a wavy haired surfer that says things like “right on” and just seems to wander wherever she is. But I want to be able to take a step back and determine if something is really worth the time I spend stewing over it.


These two pictures are from last Sunday when Liam got baptized!

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