Birthday bittersweetness
I warned you that I’d be MIA for a few weeks back in mid-September. Â And sure enough I have been. Â I’ve been recovering from minor surgery. Â I’m still not at my best but I am better than I was, so I call that progress. Â I have spent many hours with my heating pad. Â It’s a new one, so we are becoming quite acquainted. Â I’ve been working through all sorts of physical and emotional things for a variety of reasons that still feel a bit too raw to discuss openly just yet. Â But the other thing that’s happened in the midst of all of this is my baby girl turning 5. Â 5! Â No other birthday since her first has struck me quite this way.
When her first birthday rolled around, I knew that I was losing my baby. Â In fact the weekly e-mails I got about parenting switched immediately from referring to “your baby” to “your toddler.” Â I cried some more. Â I wasn’t ready to let go of my baby being a baby. Â Looking back on that now, I smile. Â And when my son turned 1, I didn’t shed a tear, because I knew the secret: toddlers are way more fun than babies. Â You still get the baby snuggliness and cuteness but you also get to see their personality come through even more. Â You get to hear more of their thoughts as they start verbalizing things. Â You get to really play with them. Â It gets good. Â Don’t get me wrong. Â I don’t think toddlerhood is bliss. Â I’d say it’s about 60 percent fun and 40 percent frustration, but the fun is FUN. Â The good is so very good. Â I didn’t know all of that, though, when my daughter turned 1. Â I didn’t know how good it was going to get. Â Something happens between the first and second birthday that your child really becomes his or her own person and it’s awesome.
But, 5 has caught me off guard. Â It signifies that kindergarten is soon on its way (almost a year away, but I know it’s coming!). Â After this year, she will no longer be able to hold up fingers on only one hand to show her age. Â My little girl is growing into a big girl. She’s getting more mature. Â She’s getting more independent and I don’t know if I am ready for that. Â While she spends three hours, four days a week in PreK now, I know that next year she’ll start school and I’ll lose my days with her. Â Never again will we be consistently, happily home together most of the time she’s awake. Â And that makes me sad. Â That makes me sad even on days when I’d give my left arm to remember what it feels like to do something just for me and get a break. Â I am not ready for my little girl to grow up.
At the same time, I cannot stop it. Â I’m sure I have lamented about this before on my blog. Â It’s not new information and it most certainly isn’t unique to me. Generations of moms before me have dealt with the same feelings. Â I almost feel like I need to apologize to my own parents for growing up, but at the same time if I hadn’t grown up, they wouldn’t have had these beautiful grandbabies. Â It’s how life is meant to be lived. Â It’s the cycle that has been continuing from the very beginning of time.
Maybe in 3-1/2 years when my son turns 5, I won’t feel it quite as keenly. Â Maybe I’ll approach his 5th birthday as I did his 1st, knowing that what is to come is so very good. Â For now, my daughter has a week out of school on fall break. Â I won’t say that every waking moment I’ll be by her side, playing and having fun. Â In fact, as I type this I’m in another room from her while she’s watching a show on Netflix as her baby brother naps in his room. Â But, I will have fun with her. Â I will laugh with her. Â I will enjoy her for who she is today as a 5-year-old because I have a very good feeling that before I know it, she’ll be a 15-year-old and I’ll be yet again asking myself where the time has gone.
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