My sweet angel,
You have been waking in the middle of the night the past week. You cry out for "Mommy". I go to your room and you instinctively climb/crawl into my arms, where you then collapse your small body into mine and rest your head on my shoulder. I reassure you, tell you that Mommy is right here with you and that everything is okay...your breathing deepens and your body relaxes. You gradually slip deeper into an innocent sleep that your Mommy has long ago forgotten...
As I feel your chest rise and fall in perfect cadence and I inhale the sweet lavender scent of your baby wash, it hits me: this is a fleeting moment. While tonight, you needed me, so desperately...you would have sobbed until I came to your door, there would have been nothing else to comfort you like your Mommy sweeping in the room and rocking you gently back to your peaceful sleep...It hits me like a cold, winter wind at an open door that I don't have many of these opportunities left. Not in the big scheme of things. Yes, you are only 2 years old (almost 3, as I so constantly remind myself), but those two years went by in two blinks of an eye. These ever so valuable years where you actually need me to rescue you are vanishing so quickly..."slipping through my fingers all the time, I try to capture every minute, the feeling in it...slipping through my fingers all the time"...ABBA has obviously penned a perfect song that will repeat in my mind constantly as these years pass. It is a frenzied feeling...like trying so desperately to keep a handful of sand from sifting through your fingers...the harder you try to grasp it, the more quickly it falls and washes back into the ocean current.
From the second you were born, Braxton, I knew that I had never known true love like the completely encompassing love that enveloped my body and soul for you. The first time your eyes met mine, I was forever changed. I was completely and wholly selfish before I met you. I had no regard for anyone but myself and I was miserable. With you, though, everything suddenly made sense. I knew, all at once, almost, why I had been put on this earth. It's a feeling that you can't describe until you look into the eyes of your own child. I could have never read any text that would have prepared me for the overwhelming peace and love that I felt when your little heart beat thumped through your chest into my arms for the first time. Even your first cry was like a chorus of angels, for I knew that you were okay. I know that sounds ridiculously melodramatic, but it's true. If anyone ever needed a saving grace, I needed you.
As you grow older, I will explain to you that when you were just 2 months old my mom (your Gram-Gram) had a stroke that left the entire left side of her brain dead. A big, black mass on a cat scan. When that part of her brain died, so did her ability to talk, or write, or really communicate much of anything. Also, she was left paralyzed on the right side (her dominant side) of her body. She could no longer walk. At first, she couldn't even move at will or blink her eyes to show that she was even communicative at all. YOU, Braxton, held me together through all of that. I most surely would have fallen apart. I would have given up. I would have turned to drugs or alcohol or anything to escape the reality of the fact that I had lost the mother that I had known for the past 20 years of my life. I know myself, and as shameful as it is, I could not have dealt with it any other way. You kept me going. You kept me straight, and you kept me alive. I held my brothers together during that time, and I was the rock of our group. I didn't crack because of you. I could never do that to you. You are my angel. You are my saving grace. I have a lot to tell you about how much your Gram Gram loves you, how she came and stayed with us the week after your were born, how you put a fire in her heart that I had not seen EVER, and how after her stroke, you aided tremendously in her recovery.
I also owe to you, my sweet boy, my most valuable relationship with my father. Your Granddad.
I have never seen a man look at a little boy the way your Granddad looks at you. Sometimes, for a fraction of second, I envy it. But then, I cannot blame him, and my sheer gratitude takes over any feelings of jealousy I could ever have. You are the sun and Moon to your Granddad. You bring light to his eyes that rival every star that has ever shone in the sky. It really amazes me how one little boy can make one man so sublimely happy...and that makes me sublimely happy. For once, I feel I have made your Granddad proud. I know he always expected a lot from me, and I know that I was capable of a lot that I fell short of...but you, my dear son...You exceeded every expectation that had ever been had of me. You make every failure worth it...you are the reason that sometimes I didn't succeed. If any move had been made any differently by me, you would not exist here with us now as we know you....So I'll gladly take every disappointment and heartache ten times over...just to keep you here with me. You are so worth ever pang of hurt I've ever felt. You make it all make sense.
You are my one, true joy in life. I could write for hours about all of the things that you do throughout the day that make me proud and gleeful. Perhaps, though, I should save that for another blog post. Not trying to make this Guinness Book of World Records, here.
Thank you, my dear child. If ever you read this (as I expect you to, because I'm printing it out and putting it in your baby book) I want you to know that no one has ever loved you as much as I do right now, at this very moment...no one will love you more in 5 minutes, no one will love you more tomorrow...no one will ever love you as much as I do. I carried you for 9 months and felt your arms try to reach through my belly...I endured labor and didn't scream not once...because YOU are all I have ever wanted. You are all I have ever needed. I'm sure that one day I will give you a brother or sister, but it will not be because I am lacking at all for love for you...I just know how cool it is to have siblings. Just ask your uncles :)
I love you, baby angel. You truly are my angel.
You are the first love of my life.
Even when you don't need me anymore, I will always be your mommy. Please don't forget about me...You are the only thing in life that I ever did right...Just as much as you needed Mommy to save you from the scary monsters in your room, someday I will need you. You will always be my baby.
"I love you Braxton,
Oh yes, I do
I don't love anyone
As much as You
When you're not near me
I'm sad and blue...
Oh, Braxton
I love you"
---Mommy
xoxoxoxoxox
March 7, 2014
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