Oh pity, little soul
Don't feel left behind
Don't mourn that there are fewer posts
Fewer pictures
There is a lot of more with you too
Okay, more fears...no - maybe different ones
There is more love too, because we know
We know how much we will grow to love you
And there are three to love you
not just two!
Does that make up for it?
I can't help but feel (as a second child who was then an only and then the eldest living in the shadow of the dead) that someday I will be trying to soothe the ego of this second one for having been so neglected. Feelings will be hurt far into the future for the slights of the now...
I'm trying to be present in this experience too, but I have felt so unwell throughout this pregnancy that I haven't exactly been one with the universe of motherhood on this one. I am really becoming aware of the fact that these will be my last few weeks of ever experiencing pregnancy. That my hands rubbing the swell of a belly, feeling the pokings and proddings of my own little alien being are numbering fewer and few. I will never again know this feeling (oof! and a good kick in the ribs to remind me). It's true that with anything, the first time is a bit of a charm. One has only to look back through these posts to see everything, my heart on my sleeve with Nahanni's pregnancy, birth and early times. And though every mother has said it, you can't know til it's true how little time you have to romanticize your second or subsequent pregnancies. And though you will never believe me, my little dos, you were and are loved equally, if not more for the guilt of what I know I have failed you on, here and elsewhere. I know there were not weekly pictures, we are still waiting for the sepia toned art-house photos of you in-utero. But what you don't know is that I consider you your own miracle, because you have fought through and perservered. You have survived the toughest of times in there, times of great sorrow and sadness and fear and helplessness. You have already endured more stress in there than you could possibly have deserved. But you haven't given up - in fact, you are a feisty little thing already, always kicking and bucking and stretching yourself. You have always made yourself known, little one. You are a survivor - this we know already.
And just as before, I long to see your little face. I long to hold you and smell your vanilla-kissed breath. And I know something that I never knew with your sister: I know the depths of the love that I will always have for you. That's worth more than pictures or words, I promise.
