Today Is Her Birthday
Eighteen years ago today, I finally understood the real meaning of unconditional love……a love that envelopes your very being…….a love that really cannot be put into words. Eighteen years ago today, as I held my sweet baby in my arms for the first time, I felt it rush over my body like an ocean wave as tears of ultimate joy ran down my face. I had loved people in my life….my parents, my siblings, my extended family….a few boyfriends and at the time, my ex-husband. I loved my baby girl as she kicked and squirmed inside of me all those long months, but when I actually held her in my arms, it was magic. There are mothers out there who know of what I speak…….it is a language no other person who has not walked this path can understand….much like I will never understand the feeling of jumping out of an airplane and trust me, I will NEVER know that feeling ~ not while I’m breathing anyway! 🙂
Sweet baby Alanna came into my life the evening of August 1st. I was two weeks overdue so labor was induced, however things didn’t progress as they should have so the doctor came in after a very long day and announced we would have to try again tomorrow. Again, only women who have experienced labor can understand where my reaction came from when I informed him there would be no waiting until tomorrow, I was having that baby NOW! He tried to play on my sympathy’s by telling me he had already performed six C-sections that day…..I told him he was going for a record seven. 🙂 My life changed for the better at 9:55 p.m. that day.
Blond hair and blue eyes………typically baby’s born with blond hair have a little more than peach fuzz for the first year of their life. Alanna was born with the fullest head of hair I have ever seen (she had to have a haircut at 4 months). She was the talk of the maternity ward…….nurses, and some visitors, from all over the hospital came to see the “baby with all the blond hair” in the nursery. Of course, that also brought unwanted attention too…..a woman came to my room asking if I was the mother of the baby with all the blond hair. I told her I was (this was getting to be pretty routine), she wanted to know where the baby was. I had sent Alanna back to the nursery that morning so I could rest a little and get cleaned up. When I told her this, she thanked me and went away. A few minutes later, she was back to let me know they wouldn’t let her take the baby out of the nursery………my response to her was she didn’t need to. The woman wandered off as I began to panic……..what if she found a nurse that did let her take the baby…..what if , what if, what if??? I found my floor nurse and relayed the story to her. On our way to the nursery to be sure Alanna was safe, I saw this same woman in a room, talking to another mother who did have her baby with her. Long story short……security was alerted and this woman was taken away. I should have known then that life with Alanna would be anything but dull. 🙂
She was a good baby and a good kid…….she went through her teen years as we all have…….a hormonal time bomb waiting to explode………but we made it through those tumultuous years and have a wonderful relationship today.
Happy 18th Birthday my sweet baby girl………I love you still with all my heart!
