i want to be a mom when i grow up

dear asher baby,

when was it that i knew i was your mother. i know i have always wanted to be a mother... like when i saw my own mother hold my baby sister so tight, or when my grade two teacher asked what i wanted to be when i grew up, and i confidently exclaimed, "a mom!"

but when did i know i was yours. that infamous moment my mommy friends and country songs all talk about where the heavens open and the angels proclaim, "you are this baby's mother, and he is your son!"

was it a couple nights ago, at 3am, when you would not fall asleep because you had a very lovely (yet terribly long…) story to tell of all the things you had forgotten to tell me of heaven?

or was it that moment a few weeks ago where i first opened my eyes in the morning and your baby bright blues were looking at me from your bassinet and suddenly you broke out into a full body grin, as if to say, "oh beautiful mommy! you're awake! i was waiting for you!"

or was it last month when we had tried everything everyone had suggested, even books and the internet failed us, and all i could do was gently bounce you while you screamed for all to hear how terribly upset you were, and i knew to whisper in your ear, "you're safe and loved."

maybe it was after you ate, milk dripping off your chin, with half-shut eyes and a drunken grin, as if to say, "Heavenly Father said the food was gonna be good, but i had no idea it would be THAT good…"

it may have been during those few short recovery weeks when i just didn't want to put you down. ever. and when everyone suggested i take a nap, i knew i would miss you too much to sleep…and we'd rock back and forth and at dawn listen to the owls hooting outside our window.

or maybe when the doctors told me to go home and sleep and they'll take care of you, and a fire deep inside burned so hot the nurses cheered when they saw it in my eyes, and i said, "i will not leave this baby! i am taking him home!"

or perhaps that first time you latched, as i've heard so many moms say before, when you were just a few minutes new, and it felt so perfectly right.

or even right before you first learned to nurse, when you looked right up at me without looking away, and you knew me.

but i knew i was your mother before you were born. before i first saw you with tears in my eyes. before that fateful night at Suessical the Musical. before all those doctor appointments and blood tests, alarms and finger pokes. and even before i first saw you as a blue smudge on an ultrasound.

it was that moment, before i saw the two lines appear on a pregnancy test. and i knew that everything was about to change. that you would be the hardest thing i'd ever have to work for. and i knew it would be the greatest, most challenging, most terrible and rewarding experience of my life. and that you were already there, waiting for me. and that you were perfect.

that's when i knew i was your mother. and i always will be.

love,
mom

{photos taken by my sister, chloe}