ONE YEAR OF MOTHERHOOD

It’s a tradition that we have been following, the letter writing. At least one letter on every special occasion. Ofcourse I will tell my baby stories about his childhood when he grows up, but this feeling of unimaginable, heart exploding love I feel for him is worth documenting from time to time. So here goes, a late first birthday letter to my little man, the best baby in the whole universe, the most perfect son, the one who makes me count my blessings….

Hey Abu Baby..

Yes, that’s what I’m calling you these days.

I can’t believe you are already a year old. You are so much bigger now than the little new-born we were waiting to meet at the hospital. I used to fear holding the tiny you back then. Scared that I will mess you up. You were so little and so fragile. Now you are my big big boy who laughs or at least smiles every time I look at him.

Your eight perfect teeth. The squint of your joyous eyes. The way your cheeks rise. God!! I love it when you smile. I have never seen a more perfect human being in my entire life. I have never loved anyone even close to half of how much I love you.

You know these days you are just learning to walk. Thursday, 19^th of September 2019. It was around 18:43 and the power was out. You were all hot and exhausted. You so desperately wanted to come to me. Your aunt Ruba helped you stand, and you couldn’t find a way to crawl. That’s when you took your first steps. We couldn’t believe our eyes. Our jaws dropped. You walked like a pro. Like you had been doing it your entire life.

There are times when you wake up in the middle of the night, crawl up on my arm and go right back to sleep. I just love it so so so much. And those nights if I try to put your head down on the bed, you instantly wake up and crawl right back on me.

You are the most important person to me. More important than my life. Its like you are my heart, and you walk outside my body. Protecting you is my only job, one that is going to be one rollercoaster of a ride. I love you.

Your mom

Like everything else, motherhood was extremely challenging at first. But unlike everything else, it didn’t get easier with time, it just got more beautiful. The tiny new-born who was so fragile, I was scared to hold started to become the source of all my joy as time passed by.

A teeny tiny person who taught me how much love I am capable of also showed me that the greatest joy of life can sometimes be found in the middle of the night, after a long tiring day when my baby crawls up to my arm and falls back asleep. And that joy doubles when he wakes up every time I try to put him away.

Have you ever been so much in love with a person, that every time you look at them, you feel perfection is flowing out of them? Be it their tiny hands and feet or the birthmark on the arm. Be it their tiny little perfect teeth or the imperfectly perfect dimple on their right cheek.

Only a mother can fall in love with the smallest things. The first smile, the first time they point at something, the first step they take, the first words out of their mouth. A mother falls in love with her baby over and over again. At every smile, every action, every step, every word. At every time her baby looks at her and every time he doesn’t. At every little step he takes after his first and every time he holds himself when he is about to fall.