I remember walking into my house with our tiny bundle. I remember my
familiar home feeling different. There was an eerie calm. Our daughter
was napping while my sister ordered pizza to welcome us all to our new
normal. The calm that seemed so out of place? It was the calm they talk
about that occurs right before a storm.
The storm was the next few months of our lives as we slowly
adjusted to a family of four rather than the family of three we had
known for the seventeen months prior. Our daughter eventually awoke from
her nap. I sat down to nurse the new baby and she immediately tried to
pull him off my lap while simultaneously throwing a fit herself. My
husband took her to the grocery store. I sat alone with the baby I
barely knew wondering what in the world I had done.
I wish I would have cut myself some slack at that exact moment. I
wish I would have enjoyed nursing my son, shut my eyes and taken a nap!
I wish I wouldn't have had my daughter come to the hospital to meet
her brother. If you’re one of those families who has sweet photos of
your children meeting… skip this next paragraph.
My “sweet” photo from the hospital includes an obvious swipe from my
daughter in the direction of her new brother (while ironically wearing a
shirt that read, "Best Day Ever!"). The truth is, my son deserved that
time with just his parents. Heck, I deserved that time and so did my
husband! I wish we would have realized it was okay to wait a few days to
introduce chaos into our new normal and allowed ourselves quiet bonding
with our son.
I wish I could have suppressed the guilt I felt for sending my daughter to daycare
while I was on maternity leave. I wish I could have seen that routine
was good for her, and that it's easier to get a baby to sleep without a
screaming toddler around.
I wish I would have realized sooner that what I thought was a serious
breach in trust between my daughter and I was nothing of the sort. I
wish I could have seen the future through the clouds of sleep
deprivation and toddler tantrums.
I wish I had known then that the baby boy I barely knew would grow into my daughter’s self-proclaimed “best buddy"!
I wish I would have known that it would take a few months, but
eventually she would stop plugging his nose and start kissing his
cheeks.
Ultimately, I wish I had known that sometime in the future I would awake to giggles
coming from that sweet baby boy’s room. Those giggles would belong to
siblings, and friends, and would be a sign of the forever bond that was
forming.
A version of this post previously appeared on Today Parents.
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