Growing Family

Fantastic Adoption Resource

I came upon a fantastic resource this week and I couldn't wait to share it with you.

Empowered to Connect has a website with resources, training opportunities, study guides, and amazing  video resources. I have already watched several of these videos and am so thankful to have found them.

The information they are sharing is so vitally important. If you are considering adoption, please go watch What Every Adoptive Parent Should Know and Counting the Cost. 

Over the years I've gone from being a vocal adoption advocate to always being the one to raise the challenges in adoption in every conversation. I think I probably come across as anti-adoption to many people.

These resources really help articulate what I want people to know. The videos are powerful.

I SO believe in adoption! I love our son (through adoption) with every fiber of my being. I want to encourage other people to adopt if that is what they feel strongly they should do.

I also love truth. I really, really think it does potential damage to a child to let people go into adoption without knowing that parenting a child through adoption is different than parenting a child you have given birth to, and that difference has to be embraced, not ignored.

I am so excited to find a resource like this that lays out the challenges with absolute clarity, AND with absolute hope and confidence that every child can be helped to heal from early challenges, and lead the best life possible. Please go check it out, and watch the videos!

 

Welcome 2012

I love boating. Canoes, kayaks, pontoons, speedboats, ferries, I love them all.

Sometimes when you are on the water you can look down and see everything you're passing over with crystal clarity. Other times, it is just a shadowy blur, and sometimes you can't see anything at all.

Even when you can't see anything, you're still moving. You are still passing markers.

Sometimes in life you have a goal and you are cruising towards it. You can measure the distance and plot a course. You can figure out how long it will take you, given different variables.

Sometimes you drift and end up somewhere unplanned.

January 1st I filled out our request for a NSW Adoption Information Package. January 2nd, the Captain went to the bank for the $40 handling fee you're required to submit with it. January 3rd I took the dog for a walk to the nearest outgoing postbox (a brisk 10 minute walk) to drop it in.

Just like that, we moved the first bit in the direction of adopting again.

If I look over the edge of the boat we are travelling in, I can't see that any progress has been made. Maybe 2-3-4-5 years from now I'll look back and realize "that was the start". 

I definitely feel like I'm crossing over from "can we do it? should we do it?" to "our kids are out there somewhere. They might even be born already and they might be living through some really tough stuff. They need us to get to them."

It seemed like the most important thing to do at the dawn of 2012.

New Mommy Folly

This is my fourth time to become a mother. Each time has been completely different. Adoption is not the same as giving birth "naturally" is not the same as having a c-section is not the same as foster care.

I am not little baby Ant's mother, but he needs me to act like it. I am acting like I am. I am feeding at five a.m. I am cuddling a thousand whimpers as they turn to cries. I am anticipating needs and meeting them. I am praying in the night. 

For so many reasons this mothering experience is markedly different than my previous ones. One way that is really impacting me at the moment is the expectations I am placing on myself. 

With my babies I always gave myself permission to step away from life for those initial intense months. With Small Sun I wrapped us up in a cozy bubble and spent months working on our bond and attachment. It took the highest priority and I was okay saying no to anything that interfered with that effort.

With The Sprout I was forced to only focus on myself and my babies (Small Sun was 18 months when Sprout was born so I did have two babies), because my delivery ended up being traumatic and it was weeks before I was up and about. After I started to heal physically, I could only manage the tiny circle of my two little children. Caring for the two of them took just about all the energy I had.

It wasn't until Finch that I discovered I was nearly anemic and started taking iron supplements. Doing so really did change my life. Now I can start to clearly identify when my iron is low and I need to ramp up my intakes. Then, with Finch's birth via c-section, I was forced to take it easy again until I healed. As with my other children, my mothers (my mother and my mother-in-law), and other relatives came to help. We are so blessed to have family that surrounds us with help when we need it.

But this time? This time I am going solo, and I am going hard.

Don't get me wrong, we have an amazing community that has brought us meals, helped us move, taken our children for play dates, and helped us out in a myriad of ways. Our community is amazing: I'm not writing this about our community because they are everything we could hope for.

I am talking about myself. I have not given myself any permission to take it easy or to let things go. I am busting my tail, and nearly losing it some days, trying to keep everything just like it was before the little Ant arrived. Once in awhile when I am explaining why I forgot my money for playgroup/haven't volunteered at school/attended the second playgroup/run out of bread and milkagain/forgotten to return a phone call/forgotten my own phone number, I say "well, can you call it baby brain if you're just caring for a baby and you're not recovering from childbirth?"

Just caring for a baby.

Like it is a little thing I do on the side.

I am trying to do this like it is a little thing I do on the side.

I am always apologizing to everyone. 

I am always feeling guilty.

I feel like a failure in a million ways. 

(I'm not trying to write a downer post - blame it on the Captain, he's playing melancholy music.)

No, this is not a sob-fest, I am just trying to get it out there. I am trying to reveal the chokehold on my throat that has grown tighter and tighter until I'm fighting for breath.

Why can't I just spread the "no, can't - new baby in the house" excuse blanket out like I have in the past?

Well for one thing, I have a child in school now, and I am more invested and committed in a variety of activities than I have ever been before. There is more to keep up with, period.

Also, I wonder if the fact that this mothering relationship is temporary plays a role in my approach to it? I don't want to clear my life's schedule for something that won't last. I want to do my solid best by this baby, but I don't want to give him my heart completely like I did with my babies, because he won't be staying here.

How do I do it? How do I love him enough that he knows love, and not so much that my heart breaks when he leaves? 

I'm trying to tack him onto our life like a post-it note. I am trying not to let things change for my children, while also trying to let him be the center for some space in the universe, as babies should be. 

I'm trying not to let anyone down, or come up short anywhere. 

Now, more than ever, I am trying to get dressed for me in the morning. I try to be fresh and energetic when I go out into the world. And other than the days when all four of my children end up standing, crying on the uphill walk into school, revealing the fragility of our balancing act, I think I look like I am pulling this off. People call me supermom and admire my cape.

I am mostly honest about how difficult this is. I tell people that it is hard and we sometimes struggle, but I don't know that people believe that when my hair is done, my lip gloss shiny, and my children adorable. 

I'm not sure what I'm writing about in this post (the moody music is pulling me all over the place!). I think what I am trying to say is that I'm pulling this off, mostly, but I feel like a failure a lot of the time. I sometimes suspect that it that lousy Evil whispering lies like a bad song that you hate on the radio until you've heard it so many times you begin to sing along out of familiarity. 

Tomorrow I'm going in nearly an hour before school starts to have a meeting with Small Sun's teacher. Then I'm taking the dog to the vet, then Sprout to catch her carpool to preschool. Next I'll head with the two little boys to a fabric store to get supplies to sew a dress for a friend's birthday gift this weekend. I'll get home in time to prepare the Ant for his contact visit with his mum. She wants to bathe him tomorrow so I'll have to pack all his bath gear. Then I'll clean the house while Finch is sleeping, and bake a cake because we're having friends over for a play date after school. I'll wake Finch up from his nap, run the preschool carpool, get Small Sun from school, pick up the dog from the vet, then rush home to receive the Ant on his return and host the play date. I imagine I'll make something for dinner sometime in there, and there will be the necessary homework and bedtime routine. 

I never would have attempted a day like that in the past. The very thought would push me over the edge. But I know a day like that is just an ordinary day for so many mothers, so I rally. I take my iron, I drink an increasing amount of tea, and I just try to make it happen.

Fostering is challenging my capacity and I can't always tell if I'm growing or cracking.

 

Rusty

I feel like an old cowboy, trying to swing my leg up over the saddle and getting stuck half-way, in an awkward standing splits. After about three years out of the adoption/child welfare conversation, I've got some new things on my mind to work out here.

After adopting Small Sun, I went deep, deep into adoption-blog world, reading all three angles of the triad (First/Birth parent, Adoptee, and Adoptive Parents). I really took in so much from the first parent and adoptee perspectives (which are as varied as the number of people holding them). Ultimately, I gained a much higher appreciation for the first parent-child bond and the need to honor and maintain that whenever possible.

With that said, all my personal experience is in a positive open adoption that was a voluntary placement. While people have their fears, I can't imagine NOT having Small Sun's mom in our lives, separate though our lives are. She is amazing. I admire her. I like her. If we lived closer, I can imagine us spending so much more time together, and maybe even being friends outside of the bond we have over our son.

Enter our first experience with foster care. 

I am part of a team that works towards restoration first, before moving on to consider other options. I am expected to interact and eventually play a part in mentoring parents who are on the track to having their child restored. This was all very clear in the agency's materials. "Perfect!" I thought. "The agency is as committed to preserving the family as I am. We're a good match."

Hypothetically, I still maintain the sanctity and value of the first parent-child bond. 

Yet, the more hours I spend holding and nurturing this tiny life, the less I can comprehend the reasons he ended up with us. 

When other people say "I could never!" or "Can you even imagine a mother who could..." when discussing placing a child for adoption, abandoning a child, or even neglecting or abusing a child, I've kept it clear in my mind that no, from a position of privilege and resource, those choices don't make sense. From sound mental health and freedom from addiction, they don't make sense. However, most children don't leave one family and end up somewhere else in circumstances that can be described as "stable, wealthy, healthy, sober, full of choices and resource" etc. 

It takes drama and trauma for a parent to surrender their child, or lose their child against their will. 

I can find empathy if I know some context of struggle for the first parent.

At the moment, in this, our first foster care placement, I don't know that contextual information. I know why the baby was removed, and what DOCS is requiring of the parents to consider restoration. I don't know their history. I don't know what compels their choices. I only know the choices themselves, and let's face it, whatever choices that end up with the state taking your child away from you are some rotten choices. 

I'm wondering how I proceed from here? How do I proceed with empathy and respect and a truly helpful attitude? How do I suspend judgement?

Here I am, up all hours of the night, and putting in those lonnnnngggg newborn days. I am feeding, dressing, bathing, burping, changing, and LOVING this baby. I am giving him everything I've got, and I'm supposed to be completely neutral towards the people who were meant to do that and failed. Beyond neutral, I'm meant to be cheerful! supportive! and helpful!

This is a tough thing. If anyone knows of foster parent bloggers, or book recommendations, I need to get through this learning curve if I'm going to be any good at this.

Isn't it amazing how a little reality can throw such a spanner in our belief systems?

 

Cornrows

Today I took Small Sun to have his hair braided. I finally found someone here who was happy to do it. She is a student at Hillsong College, and hails from Barbados. 

He did a great job sitting still, watching shows on the iPad. 

The farther into it she got, the more he pulled and cried. He can tend to have a tender head and certain spots really bothered him. We just made it to the end. Much longer and I think he would have taken off!

I loved watching the process. I was amazed that she did everything the same as when I've tried, but her fingers were just somehow much more dextrous. Where I get tangled and let the hair go and it ends up all lumpy and bumpy, she just flew through the stitches. The Captain asked if after watching I will be able to do it...heh, I think not. I'm trying to do just what she did, it just hasn't resulted in a wonderfully smooth braid like she turned out over and over.

He started off shy, but by the end he felt like a million bucks, and it showed. When we arrived home, Sprout was all adoring and exclaimed "You look JUST like 'kuwati' kid!" She thought he was AMAZING, and chased him around asking to touch his braids.

A couple hours on is another story. He is crying and scratching, saying the braids make him itchy. 

I haven't found a do-rag in Sydney, so I sent him to bed with the old pantyhose trick. I should not have been surprised when The Sprout insisted on having one too. Those two are thicker than thieves and she couldn't bear to be left out. Of course on her glossy hair the cap kept popping right off! She went to bed dedicated to having it on.

The girl who braided it said she hopes he gets two weeks of wear out of them. I'll be surprised if we make it to Christmas, at the rate he is wiggling, and scratching and whining. If he likes them and learns to leave them be, and his hair holds them, then we may go for a more extravagant style next time. I just loved watching "S" braid, and I loved when his hair was half braided, and still brushed out on top. I just imagined all the wild and crazy styles we could do if I could get my braiding down. I'm one of those moms that would say a fast yes to a mohawk, blue stripes, you name it. It's just all so much fun! 

To You, Daughter, When You Became Four

Darling Sproutje,

It was on the trip to Currarong that I saw you, contrasted against your friend, and the lines and colors of your person-hood were so clear that I laughed. You, always in a dress, always deep in make-believe, always looking for beauty, and finding it.

You might not remember, but I think I always will, the day we collected shells on the beach.

From one end of the beach to the other - from cliff to jetty there were millions and billions of tiny shells. The whole beach was shells. When our happy party broke from the bush line, out of the trees, and onto the beach, in expectant search of a shipwreck, you plopped down and focused on all those minuscule delights. We tried to persuade you to come see the shipwreck, to explore, to continue, but you were too deep into the world of sea shells. You learned the word "iridescent" and have used it appropriately and passionately ever since. You filled up a large bucket, one by one, and were later beside yourself with grief when they were upset into the dirt path and you wailed "It will be so hard to wash all of them!"

You are so fierce, and I have it recorded in numerous pictures - you yelling straight into the camera with all the savagery and braveness of a ruler. While I protect you, I do not fear for you in the world, or your place in it. I have seen you, often enough, wade into a crowd of boys and girls heads taller than you, to make a place for yourself.

Like at Small Sun's Grandparents' Day concert, where I couldn't find you anywhere, and realized you must be up front, singing with your brother, despite the fact that you are not a student at the preschool and do not know the songs. A tiny shimmer of golden hair next to your brother's shoulder confirmed my suspicions.

And you are also kind. Really, very, wonderfully kind in a way that makes my heart sing. 

Sometimes your brother asks you for things he shouldn't. Sometimes I want to draw a line for you to say "you don't need to give him that," but I see how big your heart is to offer him what is yours, with no consideration at all. I see how you respond to him when he is hurting, how you offer a hug and a pat and kind words. You are only small, but you are a very big person.

 Today we were meant to go to the beach. We had a wonderful party planned. When it rained all week, and was still raining this morning, we changed plans and had a beach party inside instead. 

We had our morning tea boxes on beach towels in the living room, instead of the sand. 

We feasted on beachy cupcakes, and you were thrilled with the whole event, even though the beach party you had been anticipating for weeks, was rained out. You're that kind of girl.

At the end of the day, while I was filling the washer with laundry, you were wandering around the garden saying "I miss my friends. I wish they could all be here forever!" And, on the way home from eating Mexican food for dinner, your voice rang out from the backseat "can I go to school tomorrow? I want to go to school!"

You see, you're the first thing that stayed in my womb and grew and grew and grew until at four in the morning, after 28 hours of travel, you emerged smooth, and white, with the rosiest lips. In my mind's eye everything is dark except your white, white skin, and that pinkest mouth. 

And now, you're such a big girl, as big as the three story dollhouse I painted and wallpapered and sewed for, only to position it at the end of your bed while you were sleeping so that you would wake up to it on your birthday morning. When you did, you hugged me and said "I dreamed two dreams last night. One was a dollhouse, and one was a horse and it kissed me!"

You are a dreamer, and you are perfect. You are four, and I love you.

Mommy

 

Saturday Evening Post

Our life is new and improved in many ways. First of all, there's Finch, OBVIOUSLY. While he looks a lot like the Sprout did as a baby, this new baby experience couldn't be more different from my last, or from my experience bringing Small Sun home.

Finch is over two weeks old and I am not sleep deprived. He sleeps stretches of at least four hours at night, and one night even did seven. So if I go to bed early, we are doing 2 or 3 feedings a night and I am getting a total amount of decent sleep. He's nursing like a champion. Really, he's nursing at two weeks like The Sprout was at six weeks. Other than the discomfort of my milk coming in and a few days of him learning to latch correctly, creating a nursing bond with him has been totally easy. Again, completely different from last time.

Even though Finch is tiny tiny and already has a cold, I am completely stress free. At the risk of sounding redundant, so different from the first two times!

Becoming a mother for the first time was challenging and I can remember a lot of panicky, stressed, nervous, fearful feelings mingled in with the pure delight. Then, The Sprout's delivery ended up being quite traumatic and the first weeks of her life are cloaked in a kind of grey stupor of weeping and pain (I kid you not). There are some beautiful moments, but really, I mostly remember the pain.

I am challenged in other ways this time - helping two very bouncy kids adjust their attitudes, while nursing, is not easy - but I am not overwhelmed. We're just kind of coasting along. TV is my friend. Very short to do lists are my friend. Keeping low expectations of what we can do is my friend. Saying "I need help with that" a million times a day is my friend.

I'm breaking my baby rule with this baby. Before I stayed in for a minimum of a couple weeks, or at least avoided crowds and germs fests, to give my babies a chance to build up their immune systems. I told all my friends that I wouldn't be seeing them for awhile because I'd be in baby quarantine...but I didn't do it after all. A few days after we got out of hospital I went to a street festival, then church, lunch at a cafe, family grocery shopping, a trip to the mall, then home group, and today another lunch out. That's how I ended up changing Finch's diaper at the park today. It ended with him doing the extra poo all over the diaper, then switching to the rocket pee as I tried to clean the poo up. And you know what dressing a newborn on your lap is like, right? All floppy head and flailing limbs? Well, doing it on a winter's day, outside, with a baby working up an appetite expressed through a scream...well, not so fun. But the point is, I haven't been able to keep us inside. I want to see people and get out! I think letting myself break that rule is doing a lot to keep the blues at bay.

I can imagine this is an incredibly boring post, but it's one for the record. We had a lovely Saturday taking new family photos with friends. All the kids are still sleeping off the adventure. The Captain is sitting in our new comfy leather chair, reading Dutch magazines. The living room is warm and cozy because of our new super-heater. In fact, this is my second Sydney winter, but I have only felt warm since we bought this heater. Dusk is settling, the fridge is full of yummy leftovers we can call dinner, I just woke up from a two hour nap and ate a yummy muffin, and life is good.

Another Adoption Head-Spin

In facing the challenges I've had this week with Small Sun, I emailed my old playgroup friends in the States. We have a yahoo group that has acted as the forum for many a lively discussion, from breastfeeding to schooling decisions. I love that group of women and often turn to them for encouragement and ideas when I'm facing a parenting challenge.

The responses I received were helpful. Some new ideas emerged, and some things I'm already doing were reinforced. Also I felt surrounded by community as I focus on parenting in this particular season. One thing that several people said that got me thinking, however, was the sentiment along the lines of "God put Small Sun into your family, so you can trust that God will help you to be the parents he needs."

I just want to unpack that statement a little bit and share how I feel about it, purely from the angle of how I react to it, not from examining the accuracy of the statement itself.

I put a lot of trust in the sovereignty of God in our lives, and find comfort in His omniscience. So on one hand, this statement could be incredibly comforting to me. It would be if it was made about my daughter. I discovered her there in my womb, and it felt nothing short of miraculous that God chose to knit her there, in me. I can believe that God meant for me to parent her because He put her right there in my body. Kind of hard to miss His intentions on that one.

But with Small Sun, well he was planted somewhere else. He was nurtured and carried and cared for in the womb of another mother. I think in most voluntary placement adoptions it's like apples to oranges if you try to line up the pros and cons of the first family and the adoptive family to figure out who was "more fit" or where the child would be "better off". I think it's a futile exercise and pointless to do. Things are lost and gained on either side. Some things are more easily measured, like financial stability, private school education, etc. But it's the things that are harder to measure where I feel the child loses and gains more: it is in belonging to a genetic heritage, matching with your family, and having your gifts, and personality make sense within the framework of your family that really end up meaning something in the end.

So to stumble back around to statements like "Small Sun belongs in your family", "You are the best parents for Small Sun", and "God put Small Sun into your family for a reason", well, they just make me squirm. I can't flat out disbelieve them because I CAN see so much Providence in the joining of The Captain and I with Small Sun's first mother. Yet I certainly can't believe them because to say that Small Sun belongs with us, is to say that he did not/does not belong with his first family, and I don't believe that to be true. To say we are the best parents for Small Sun is to say that his first mother wasn't the best mother for him and I don't believe that either. And while I do believe that God had purpose in bringing us into Small Sun's life, I don't believe that it was God's hand that severed the mother-child relationship he had with his first mother.

Perhaps some of this is tied up in open adoption longing? If we had a more open adoption, perhaps I could believe those statements to a greater extent, because my mothering wouldn't feel so much an exclusion to Small Sun's other mother. I don't want to be the only mother present in his life, but I am.

So when I receive this intended encouragement, I actually feel myself grit my teeth and batten down the hatches a little bit. I feel like I've got to do this adoptive parenting thing the best that I can, but I can't be deluding myself with any platitudes about Small Sun's supposed belonging in our family. I can't indulge in making my experience in the relationship more comfortable, at the risk of further alienating Small Sun from his first family. I can't rest easy on the belief that he is "supposed to be with us". 

Flip that coin around though, to a situation where someone is questioning Small Sun's belonging in our family, and I will fight with claws and teeth to defend him. In the space of a breath I will be nose to nose with the offender, declaring myself definitively and permanently his MOTHER. That is different though. That is a matter of defending him in our family and making sure that he is protected and that he belongs.

Belongs...there it is again. Tricky thing, belonging. I guess it is when belonging in one place means not belonging in another that I begin to squirm. I think that there are seemingly opposing truths that can exist simultaneously but I don't feel like I've matured enough as an adoptive parent to be there yet.

Instead of helping me sort out my thoughts, this blog entry feels like multiple muddy footprint trails all over a nice white rug. Rather than finding the head and the tail of the animal I think I'm wrestling, I am groping blind finding a foot here, a wing there, all muddled and confused. Sorry, but that's the way adoptive parenting is a lot of the time.

Stuck on Adoption Losses

We're in our second week of school holidays and the whole schedule is off kilter. If I know anything about my son, it's that he NEEDS to have a schedule, and know what's happening next, and how it will go down. Besides the holidays he knows that it is his birthday "soon", and baby is going to be born "soon". I try to explain that those things are happening next month, but he keeps asking "is it my birthday tomorrow?"

We are dealing with some really hairy behavior here at the moment. Hairier and scarier than any previous toddler carryings-on. Aggression. Defiance. Physical hostility (okay, violence).

The behaviors Small Sun is displaying freak me out. That is usually my response when our children start pressing a boundary they haven't tested before; I feel overwhelmed until I've got my Plan in place. Once I've got The Plan, I just keep plugging away at it until the tide turns.

Here's the thing, though - my concern over the impact of adoption losses on my son clouds my vision.

We have got a clear vision of how we are parenting. We've got our ideals and approach solidly in place. We may tweak the approach from time to time as needed, but we are unified and decided on how we are raising our kids. Within that framework, I know what needs to be done in light of this new behavior. Consistency, maintaining the boundaries even when they are being pushed to the limit, and keeping a calm and even tempered demeanor while having a backbone of steel.

But when I look at the situation through the lens of adoption, primarily adoption loss and primal wound perspectives, my resolve comes all undone. I see the disrupted schedule, the uncertainty of the future from the perspective of a (nearly) four year old, the looming impact of a new sibling (a boy who "matches"), and all the questions and emotions surrounding these things. I am filled with empathy and I understand the wildly ranging emotions and the difficult behavior.

That's where the gears stick for me: stalling at empathy and failing to deliver the consequences that will help my son learn self control and self assurance. It's like I can either stick to the plan and disengage from an empathetic response, or I can engage my empathy and have trouble maintaining the boundaries. I really struggle to do both simultaneously.

Here's the thing: it really doesn't help my son if I feel like I understand him, but I don't help him along in making good choices in life. And at the same time, I would be neglecting his emotional needs if I was consistent with setting boundaries for him, but didn't engage his heart. I need to do both. Some days that is just so hard.

From 2 to 3

Only six weeks and two days until we become a family of five. Time seems to be simultaneously hurtling forward, and dragging by. I am so eager to meet the new baby, and it seems like it is taking forever! But then each week I blink and the week is gone, eaten up in playgroup and play-dates and preschool and church meetings and errands and birthday parties and girl's nights and book clubs.

We bought a car seat on Saturday. The plan was to go peruse the options and then look for the favored model second hand, but after trying the only four "narrow" seats in the back of our wagon, and having only one fit where we can still close the door, we went ahead and bought it. Having a car seat sitting there, ready to go, well that feels like a big deal to me.

I thought that I would be more nervous about transitioning from two kids to three kids, but strangely, I am feeling completely calm. Now that we've got the birth plan (I'll lie still while the OB cuts the baby out), and the childcare (blessed in-laws coming to stay) worked out, I am significantly less stressed. Having three kids under four isn't worrying me at all.

Perhaps it is perspective? I know the first six months or so are likely to be VERY challenging, and I expect to feel like I'm going back to ground zero with productivity/freedom/etc. If I can keep my children fed, clothed, hugged, and get Small Sun to preschool, I will have accomplished my six month goals for our family. If that means ordering over-priced groceries online to be delivered to my door, letting the kids wear goofy outfits, snuggling on the couch while they watch too much tv and movies, and being the "bad parent" who doesn't volunteer to help with anything, anywhere, so be it.

I worry about not being able to pick up and snuggle Small Sun and the Sprout. I worry about it raining a lot this fall and us being stuck inside, snarling at each other. But really, I don't worry much.

New Baby will come. We'll all be ecstatic. We'll take it easy and rely on the help of friends and family (three rounds of reinforcements spending a total of 8 weeks with us over a four month period), we won't look too closely at the baseboards or the ceilings or under the claw-foot tub. We'll spend lots of time cuddling and eating take out.

I have a really good friend here who has three kids. Her baby is five months old, and her son is four. I don't know how she's survived the last six months, truly. But she didn't slow down. She didn't say "no". She just kept up the same pace. I don't think I can do that and stay sane. To me, having a new baby means we hunker down in the family bunker, we hang a permanent "NO" sign to the rest of the world, at least until we're ready to rejoin society.

With Easter coming up, The Captain and I were talking about how our church here has so many Easter services and attending holiday services is a big part of the church culture we're in. For both of us growing up, holidays were a time when we attended church very little, even foregoing Sunday services, as our families believed that the sharing of faith is most salient within the walls of our home, with our families. We would close the doors to huddle together to read the scriptures, to share the outworking of our faith in our lives, to eat together, savoring the blessing of family, which is the gift of God. I don't think it is selfish or indulgent to turn inward (bringing others into our family circle, at times) instead of participating in outward activities, during momentous occasions.

So, maybe I'm being naive. Maybe it will be harder than I think. I really don't know. I just expect it to be hard and beautiful as it was when Small Sun came home, and when The Sprout was born.

I am finding that I am more excited about the arrival of this baby than I was with the first two. With Small Sun I felt so much hesitation, trying to identify when he was really "mine" and I could give him my whole heart without encroaching on his mother's time. With The Sprout I had mothered a newborn, but I hadn't experienced the resulting baby after giving birth. Being pregnant was to carry mystery inside me. Now I know the before and after: the kicks inside that take my breath away, that very soon will become little feet tucked against my ribs as I nurse.

I am surprised to find that my two children are very grown up these days. At almost 2.5, The Sprout is potty trained, sleeping in a toddler bed, and can put on her own clothes. At nearly 4, Small Sun is able to help in SO many ways. This is completely different than when Small Sun was 1.5 and I had a new baby. I know their ages may present different challenges, but they are not babies that need me to do everything for them. At the same time, they were babies so recently, that I am not too far out of the habit of diapers and night feedings. I think the fact that they seem so "big" and capable is helping me not feel too concerned.

I'd love to hear feedback from other mothers about the transition from two to three, and about recovering from a c-section. This isn't a beautiful post, but it is a record of how I'm feeling, on the cusp of three!