Thoughts on the amazing...

I am a mother of three. But before I was a mother of three, or even two, I was a mother of one.

And if you are a mom, you know how it is when you have your first baby… your starter model. All that training with your Baby Alive doll when you were a kid is no match for the real thing. You believe that no other mother on earth has ever loved their little baby as much as you love your baby. The sun rises and sets in the burps and sneezes of your child, and you secretly know that you will never be able to love another baby as much as you love this one.

Even as you are pregnant with Baby #2, chasing around precious Baby #1, (and accidentally knocking your big belly into doorways because it is actually possible to forget with #2 that you are, indeed, pregnant, as busy as you are with numero uno), you think that all those mothers that say they love all their children equally must have a screw loose, or simply be lying to spare the feelings of the rest of their kids. You have to wonder when you’re the mother of just one how you could possibly love another person as much as you love your firstborn.

At least that was the way I felt. I worried and wondered. And even when I was pregnant with my second, bumping into doorways, picking out names (little Benson Linson?) and painting the nursery blue, I just didn’t see how I’d ever be able to love this kid with the intensity that I loved his sister, my firstborn.

All that changed on July 1st, 2002, when my son made his surprise entrance into the world, three weeks before his due date.

I was convinced that I wasn’t really having contractions at 2 in the morning. I was convinced that if we made the drive to the hospital in the dead of night, I would be sent back home for having so-called ‘Braxton-Hicks’. I even tried to convince Phil that we probably shouldn’t even take the bags I’d packed with us. I mean, really, what was the point? They’d be sending me back home within the hour. Imagine my surprise when the nurse checked me & told me I was dilated 4 centimeters. I should have known then that my life with my son would be full of surprises.

The minute I laid eyes on my boy, I knew that all those other mothers weren’t full of bull. I didn’t worry anymore. I didn’t wonder how it was possible to love another child. It just happens.

So, here’s a happy birthday to my baby boy. My sweet little devil of a son who makes me laugh and drives me crazy most days. That baby that made my heart (along with my hips) just a little bit bigger.

Happy birthday, Davis! I love you very much… truly I do.