My darling baby is sound asleep in a very rare afternoon nap. It must be the rainy weather, the cold that always seem to be on the verge of breaking out but then recedes after nursing, or just a new, welcomed routine.
I tip toe around the house (which takes some skill living in a studio appartment). But somehow managed to make a cup of tea without waking the baby.
In just a couple of weeks Baby will be 6 months. Time has passed so fast, and yet seems eternal, as it always does when something significant happens.
What did I do before I was a mother? Who was I? What utterly unimportant things did I fill my days with when I didn't have my darling J to snuggle, nurse, feed mango purée, change dipers, watch the rain fall under our dotted umbrella?
Where did my heart live when not held by his tiny hands, soaked by his toothless smiles and comforted by the rythmic movement of his tiny lunges?
A journey nearing it's end. I decided that even if I had to live in my pyjamases, I was going to do what it took to breastfeed, pump and give my baby as much breast milk as possible until he was 6 months old. Then he would have to nurse to the best of his abilites and I would return to semi-normal life, not consisting of nursing and pumping around the clock.
And now all those weeks of darkness, fatigue and bone chilling lack of sleep bordering on insanity is almost over.
And what a contradictory journey it has been.
My darling baby;
The hospital birth was a hellhole where the only thing that reached me through the chemically induced lightning sharp pain was wifey´s voice and the thought of you.
Yet, giving birth to you is the most magnificent victory my body has ever won.
They stood by in awe, all the cold, lifeless, professional people, waiting to cut me with knives and drag you out into this world. And watched us birth as if I was not shaking with cramping muscles, blinded by 3 days without sleep and lost in the realm of my worst nightmare.
The parking lot outside the hospital. Where I sat. Confused and shattered. With you, like a little bean at the bottom of the infant car seat. And I decided that this what not the time to fall apart, but the time to iron clad my panic and hold myself together for you.
Nursing you for hours without end, worrying about your slow weight gain, crying with despaire over having to give you dried cows milk with syntectic nutrients. Failing you, the dearest, most precious gift I have ever recieved. Not being able to give you what I wanted and what you needed. The constant guilt and anxiety.
Still, nursing you has be the closest to heaven I've ever been. Your tiny mouth working on my breast, your tiny hands holding my fingers, clutching my soul. Holding you in my arms as you fall asleep and slowly let go.
