Dear daughter

Dear little one,

My sweet girl, my first child, the one to make me a mother and the one to have to go through the roughest of our parental learning curve: you are my everything. You will never know what it is like to love your own first child until you do it yourself; I myself am still left breathless sometimes when I realize the love my own mother had to have had for me when I was born as her oldest, and as her only daughter. 

It doesn't matter how much you keep me up in the dark of night, how often I feel completely frustrated at not knowing what you need, or how many outfits I have to change you out of as you spit up, you are the best thing I can think of filling my time with. I can't possibly imagine how much time I have spent staring at your perfect smooth face, your perfect lips and eyes and nose and cheeks and fingers and toes and stomach and back and bum and legs and arms, or how many times I have called every part of you perfect. I can't imagine life without you, though I vaguely remember it being a lot more boring. 

You are barely over one month old now and the scariest feeling I have to constantly push out of my mind now is the fact that every day, every minute, every second you are growing older and will one day be old enough to not need me. Its absolutely terrifying, and completely explains why my mom spent so much time crying in her closet the months before I left for college. I now know why television and movies and even my own life are full of anecdotes of parents going crazy as they have to learn to let their children go, because I've only had you in my arms for 4 weeks and can't imagine even having to let go of the option of holding you in my arms at all, let alone you leaving my nest entirely.

And that is why I have chosen to live in these moments as MUCH AS I POSSIBLY CAN. I have chosen to work my hardest to keep the dread at bay and to love every time you cry for me in the night, every time you need to be fed and I have to put everything else down, every time I need to change your diaper, every time you cry and cry because your tummy hurts and all I can do is rock you and whisper that it's going to be okay.  I try to soak up and live in every one of your smiles you've started to so freely give and to live in the moments of you snoozing next to me on the pillow in the light of dawn. I am working on living through every cry, sob, whine, sneeze, hiccup, and coo. I don't want to ever forget when you look at me with wonder, or sadness, or confusion, or crossed eyes, or glee, or devotion. I am making sure to soak up the looks you give your dad when he holds you, or the sweet stares you give our friends and that you gave your grandparents when you first got to meet and get to know them. I am living for now so that as you grow, I have no regrets and so I appreciate each change and improvement you make to become a beautiful, self-aware, happy, ambitious and capable person.

I want to never ever forget what it was like to hold your tiny new body in my arms, knowing you needed me more than anything else. You are my everything right now, and that won't ever change. And I want you to know it.

I love you more than anything, my sweet Adalaide. You are my world.

Love, your mama