Motherhood, Respectful Parenting

A canvas for watching darkness and light.

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Oh man, I’m totally nerding out right now. With O, I try my best to practice something called mindful parenting (more commonly known as RIE). I discovered it in school and putting it to use now makes so much wonderful, heart-happy sense to me. Anyways, I follow a FB parent group of parents who share a similar interest in RIE and people often post to it sharing their observations, struggles and/or triumphs. Yesterday, I posted this to it’s wall and a lot of people loved it… but not only that, one of the main ‘flag bearers’ of RIE these days, Janet Lansbury, liked it and asked if she could share. UM, YES! Our little guy is now famous, lol! Or my whimsical shenanigans are. One of the two.

Observe, wait, trust, and enjoy! A lovely example of the power of nature… indoors!

Sarah shared her success:

“Thank you, RIE! Five minutes before taking this photo I was thinking to myself that I needed to find something to fill this space in my LO’s room. I then noticed him looking at it too, however, and realized he was intently watching the shadows dance across the wall from the swaying trees outside the window. Before, I might have thought him bored, but for forty five minutes he kept coming back to the sight, becoming very still as he watched the moving shapes and silhouettes bounce across the wall. Eventually, the sun moved on and as did his interest… but it seems this space already has exactly what it needs: a canvas for watching darkness and light.”

Here’s a link for those on Facebook.

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Motherhood

I. Need. Him.

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Speaking of needs, I came across a realization of sweetness the other day.

While on bed rest with that hurt foot (one which has now thankfully mended — mostly!), D stayed home from work so he could look after O. Like most babies his age, O likes to move and be up to see the world, no matter how much we try to encourage his independent back play (many, many, maaaany times a day). I wasn’t really able to give him all that he needed with not being able to walk, so D had to take over.

As D was thrust head first into the experience that is my everyday life with O (something which he admitted made him feel entirely overwhelmed — welcome to my life, hubs!), I re-experienced some of what my existence was like before O. Laying around for hours, perusing social media like it was going out of style, watching Netflix uninterrupted — the whole nine yards. However, if and when O wouldn’t calm for him, D would seek me holding him as a reprieve.

And, after one time of having not done everything and anything for my son for a few hours (a very rare occurrence), he was given to me to help settle and soothe.

Once in my arms, something clicked.

Something fell into place.

A part I didn’t know was missing was now there.

My heart became sappy happy and got this strange full feeling.

My god, I realized. It’s not just that this kid needs me. I need him.

I. Need. Him.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve adored O since he crawled out of my womb. But need him? I don’t recall when that came to be or grew into my being.

And so, he was hugged a bit tighter, squished a bit longer and nuzzled a bit closer before demanding his desires of movement and exploration be met yet again.

Dad, and son, to my rescue.

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Mental Health, Milestones & Genetics, Motherhood

How can we ever really know?

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O was born with a couple of things that make him different than the typical baby boy. Some of these things will require surgery in a years time and one is something that cannot be seen by the human eye.

This unseen part about him is chromosomal. To be more specific, he has a large deletion in his 3rd chromosome. This deletion may be the reason for some of the other, differing, things about him — or it may not be. It’s hard to say. All that is known right now is the unknown, as his deletion is considered rare to the geneticists at BC Children’s and it hasn’t been seen enough to know what it could imply health wise, now or later, if anything at all.

In an attempt to understand how this came to be, be it from D and I or how our DNA combined, blood work was done on us. As of a few days ago, I now know that I too have this large deletion in my 3rd chromosome and that I passed it on to O in the womb.

I’m writing this here, in this space, because I need to better understand what this means to me. I need to voice it, to put it in text, to make sense of it. Selfishly, I need to be told it will be okay (even if the irrational side of me disagrees), again and again, on top of how many times I’ve already been told as much. I’m in the midst of scheduling a follow up with the geneticists to be told the same. Everyone is hinging on the fact that I seem to be okay, same with my other family members who may or may not have it, and so O should be okay too.

But how can we ever really know that? Am I okay? What about later on? Have I missed something my entire life? Was there something I should have questioned but never did? Is my son going to suffer because I didn’t? These are huge, unknowable, worrisome questions — I know. But how does one continue on as normal when they find out that something is missing in the base of their DNA? In the base of what makes them human? And that they’ve passed it on to their son, with repercussions entirely unknown?

Nothing I can do can change this, I get that, and I know that I need to be positive. I have to be. Not just for me, but for O and D. But how?

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