Wrote this a couple weeks ago but didn't get it posted till now...
7/6/14
Dear Little One,
We are just shy of 16 weeks into this 40-ish week journey together, and I'm starting to sense you more and more. I feel your tiny movements now and enjoy getting to know you in the little ways I can. I know that you like hanging out on the left side of my body and that although the nurse at the OB's said I'm carrying high, you seem to prefer to be low.
It's strange to be coming into motherhood again, this time as your mom. In some ways, the experience is familiar. Nausea, exhaustion, excitement, anxiety, learning that you are healthy at each step, learning that you are a boy... The list goes on. But in so many ways it's so very clear to me that this experience is completely new, and many of those differences are much harder to express in words.
I don't have the wide-eyed innocence I had when I was pregnant before. I have known babies who've died and babies with all sorts of diseases and we've faced Autism in our own family. I know what studies project as the statistical likelihood of us facing it again and I know the uselessness and damage perpetrated by knowledge of these numbers. So, I won't lie. I have some fears, and although I'm usually pretty centered about those fears, I'm doing some things differently this time in the hopes of creating for you the healthiest prenatal environment that I can, and I'm grateful that our life circumstances and the resources available to us are radically different than they were in our first journey into parenthood.
Paradoxically, I'm in many ways far less anxious, opinionated, and inclined toward dogmatism than I was in my first pregnancy. I've come to believe that parents should parent the child they have, and not the child they read about in books. I do have some firm opinions about how to parent well, but I also have a lot of faith in God and the resilience God gives to us when we are formed, and thus, I have enormous faith in you.
Because I believe so much that parenting is about relationship and giving what is needed or most life affirming, I'm incredibly eager to know you. To be honest, I'm not patient enough about this. I know that every person born is unique and that I must prepare to be your mother in a brand new way; still myself, but also yours.
I hope I'm the mom you deserve. I know I will hit some home runs, that sometimes I'll completely blow it, and that most times won't be that dramatic; but on balance, I hope I'm a good mom. I'm certainly going to do my best.
I hope you're doing well in there and I hope you can already feel how much I love you.
Mom
