Last Friday was a beautiful day. One of those days that makes me love where I live. Nils and I met up with some moms and babies. We took a long walk in the park. We chatted with various shopkeepers and passersby. The sun shone brightly. It was 75 degrees in the sun.
That evening Oliver and I went out to dinner in the neighborhood, Nils in tow. Nothing big, just a local ramen place. Still, we were out to dinner! With the baby! We've done brunches and lunches before, but dinner felt like a big deal. It was a beautiful night and the entire neighborhood was outside. Everyone had shed a layer or two, and the giddiness was palpable.
"Oh look Olli," I said as we paused at a corner to wait for a walk sign. "The moon looks huge." It was the night before a full, blue moon, and it was enormous. Bright too, and constantly darting out from behind a patchwork of cloud cover. "Let's just stand here for a minute and look at it."
I love being a mom, and the happiness I've felt in recent weeks is so much more than I had hoped for. I love being with Nils, and I feel like Oliver and I have really hit our stride as parents. I am so, so glad we have reached this point because it certainly didn't start out this way.
I woke up early the day we went home from the hospital. It was a cold, clear January day. We had an amazing view of the Manhattan skyline - you could even catch a glimpse of the Chrysler building if you looked out to the left. My beautiful little son lay sleeping in his clear plastic hospital bassinet, and my husband was conked out in one of those terrible, uncomfortable chair-cum-beds. We were going home! I sat up gingerly, swung my feet off the side of the hospital bed, and bawled.
I knew why I was crying. It was the hormones. Every pregnancy book I had read told me to watch out for day 3 - that was when the baby blues might hit. It also didn't help that I hadn't slept more than an hour or two a night since Nils had been born. So I knew all these things, but that didn't make blowing through an entire box of tissue any easier.
The first weeks of motherhood were hard. I've talked to a lot of new mothers since then, and without exception everyone talks about those first weeks as though we're telling war stories. Physical pain, breastfeeding issues, lack of sleep, uncertainty, frequent bouts of weepiness, etc. You've got this little baby who you love so much, but you've also got this strange feeling of dread - in my case it seemed almost like a physical thing, the size of a lemon and located directly in the center of my chest.
I would tiptoe over to look at Nils while he slept, and while an overpowering love sometimes swept over me, an overpowering terror took over the other times. I often felt guilty, but could never figure out what it was that I had done so terribly. I cried multiple times each day, mostly between 4 and 6 pm - my baby blues "witching hour". I wanted to be a joy-filled mother, but I couldn't stop feeling anxious and upset.
But then things started getting better. And once they started getting better, they got really good really quickly. The hormones leveled out, he started sleeping a little longer at night, I became more sure of myself as a mother, he started to smile, etc. Before I knew it I was excited to get up in the morning, and I was that mother in the cafe reassuring the woman with the three week old that "it gets better really soon. Trust me." Nils's and my days became full of smiles and happiness, and the unexplainable, groundless guilt I had often previously felt turned to an easy confidence. I know I'm not a perfect mother, but I know that I love my son. More importantly, I know that he knows I love him. As long as we have that down pat, the rest will work itself out.
It was this peace of mind then, that made me see the moon and marvel at it the way I did. So much to be excited about! I watched the light dim slightly behind a passing cloud, and looked forward to getting Nils excited about things like this. I looked forward to the excuse to see things through his eyes, to having little adventures, just the two of us. I hoped that he would be the kind of kid who sneaks up to the roof just to look at the moon and have a private, secret moment.
