some mother's day thoughts

we just got back from a wedding in houston this weekend and with all the traveling and what not, when we got home the kids were pooped. we fed them and put them down early. like really early. like 5:45 early. and they were out like lights. except after we got bea into bed, oliver started fussing quite a bit. so i went in to see what it was all about and got him out and rocked him a bit but he was still fussy and worked up and wriggly. so i held him close and put my face close to his ear and started humming to him and he melted into my arms and slowly calmed down and snuggled with me for a good long while. he never holds still enough to snuggle with me. sometimes he'll snuggle with brad, but hardly ever with me. since we first brought him home i've always thought he was closer to brad than with me. he is always so excited when brad comes home, always wants brad to hold him, laughs or smiles more for brad (or at least it seems that way). but the way he melted when i started humming to him was so special. i knew immediately then that he was remembering how my voice sounded when he was still inside my belly, and that it comforted him at once. that is something that only i, as his mother, can do for him. it filled me with so much joy. i'd forgotten that i was his mother from the moment he started growing inside me. i was able to nourish and care him from the very beginning.

since my PPD was so mind-numbingly awful, i often get very emotional and heartbroken when i look back on his early infancy when i was so absent and tortured. i mourn those days more than i'd care to admit. the guilt that i wasn't "there" for him enough haunts me almost daily. but this moment tonight, that long while i spent rocking him as he slowly fell asleep in my arms, i knew i was enough for him. the instant he heard my voice, i knew that he knew he was home and safe. i knew i wasn't failing as a mother. i felt such validation. it was such a spiritual moment for me. for the first time, just for a surging moment, i felt vindicated and free of the guilt i carry with me so heavily. that moment was such a gift from my heavenly father through oliver tonight, right on time on mother's day. i am so grateful for the reminder of the preciousness of my motherhood. i hope i can carry it with me always.