Dear Jacob XXII

by youngmarriedmom Posted on February 4, 2013

Dear Jacob,

 

This letter has been weeks in the making. Life is busy with you and baby Henry. I think about your growth and progress all the time. I thank God for you over and over each day. I’ve even taken notes as to not forget what I’ve been thinking about you. Now, finally, I’m putting it all together in a way that makes sense. (I hope!)

 

No one had any doubt that you would be a great big brother. There are times when you want my attention, namely in the form of help with things you are totally capable of doing on your own. For the most part, though, you love Henry and seem to be happy he’s here. You even took care of him while I was pregnant, making sure I ate enough, especially the things you felt Henry liked, like chips and salsa.

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You give him hugs and kisses and want to hold him. You help introduce him to people and showed one of your friends, who has a sibling on the way, how to hold and kiss a baby. You play with Henry in the “jungle” and get upset if I don’t let you buckle him in to the “fishies” seat. You are gentler than I expect you to be with him.

 

You don’t always tell the truth about what Henry’s doing—he’s sleeping in my arms and you walk up, look at him, and say, “He’s not sleepin’”—but you do care a great deal. You’ve started to tell me, “He’s tryin’ to talk” when Henry cries, and you are getting better at telling me what he wants. You love to get the burp cloth to wipe Henry’s mouth, like I do (I remind you that cloths don’t go near his face unless I’m nearby). You help burp Henry, and the little guy burps almost every time. You like to hold him on your chest, like I do, even if he does take up most of your belly.

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Henry’s growing like crazy, but one of the biggest changes we’ve seen these last six weeks has been in you. You just grew up, big time. You are talking in longer sentences with a much broader vocabulary. You can put on your coat, hat, and boots all by yourself. A few weeks ago, you surprised me by walking eleven blocks to library, holding my hand. You can put together puzzles, take a clean snack cup off the counter and put it away, put your dishes in the kitchen at the end of a meal (though I admit that last one makes me nervous when there’s still food on the plate). You’d been getting “me” and “you” confused—“I sit next to me,” “Mommy read to you!”—but that’s getting straightened out. You’ve been singing “Who Loves You” with the words I put to it:

 
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Who loves you, Baby Jacob?
Who’s always there to make it right?

 

but you prefer to put “Baby Henry” in there when he’s upset.

 

You amaze me all the time. You are sweet, loving, friendly, smart. I think my pregnancy was tough for you, because I was crankier, more tired, able to do less with you. You are more affectionate with me now that Henry is in our arms, and I am grateful for that. I love the moments when the three of us—my two little boys and me—end up on the couch together in a snuggle, midday. These are the moments when I know for sure not only that I am where God needs me to be, but also that I am happy being where God wants me to be.

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I expect you will have times in life when you are doing God’s will, but you don’t really like it. Not that I don’t like being your mom; that’s not it at all. But parenting is challenging, as much in terms of giving you what you need as in figuring out what the title of “mother” means for my identity, my faith, the way I love and live my life. Your smile, your hugs, your jokes, the little things you say that sound silly but that you take so seriously: these things are my greatest joys.

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I went to buy you new church clothes last weekend. You are moving out of the toddler section and into the little boy section. You are growing up, and I am grateful to see every single day of it. You are my star, my special little guy. No matter how many more kids we add to our family, no matter how big you get, you will always be my baby, Jacob. I love you to infinity and beyond.

 

All my heart,
Mom

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Rebuilding Season

by youngmarriedmom Posted on January 29, 2013

Though newborn Henry is different from newborn Jacob, there are some things that are simply part of life with a newborn. The most challenging, for me, is reminding myself that being a mom is enough. I had a trouble with this for a long time with Jacob—I was about to leave my job and launch a freelance business—and I struggled with it again with Henry, especially at about three weeks in. I always want to do more, accomplish more, have something else to show for myself, whether it’s work, cooking something, or writing something. I don’t expect this of any other woman who’s recently given birth, but, I think like many others, I set a different standard for myself.

 

I have better perspective on this situation this time around, and realize I need to see at least the first three months postpartum as a rebuilding season. This is a unique and blessed season of life, and one in which I must set different expectations for myself.

 

At that three-week point, I found myself thinking: Why am I not back to wearing pre-pregnancy clothes? Why am I not interested in blogging or getting back to freelance work, when I used to love those things? Why am I so tired, but trying to do more and more, like Jessie on Saved by the Bell, when she takes caffeine pills?

 

Oh right, because I had given birth three weeks prior. Of course I wasn’t in the place I used to be. I felt like I should be because we continued to be on Jacob’s toddler schedule, and that felt like normal. When John was home for the two weeks after Henry was born, he had to remind himself of the same thing. We kept forgetting how young Henry was and how little time had passed since the delivery. Of course I couldn’t walk the fifteen minutes to the doctor’s. Of course I didn’t want to sit at the kitchen table for dinner. I was still recovering, still finding my balance. That’s okay. That’s how it should be.

 
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I’ve found the peace that comes with accepting that, and six weeks in, life with my little guys feels right. When people ask how I’m doing, I can tell them honestly that as long as I don’t try to do much other than keep them alive, happy, fed, and well rested, we’re doing just fine. It’s when I try to sneak something else in that it crumbles.

 

Life these days often feels like a run-on sentence: I have a toddler who asks for help, then tells me I’m doing it wrong, because he’s trying to learn and I’m trying to get things done—in large part because I have a baby who wants to eat when he wants to eat, wants his diaper changed when it’s dirty, no matter what else is going on.

 

The days pass so quickly, are so busy, that I need to remind myself to reflect and realize where I am. Really, I like that this time is busy. I love looking at our family. I love that I am blessed with a lifestyle where I am married to a wonderful guy, have awesome kids, and get to do work and hobbies I love. There’s so much to be grateful for. I’m not doing everything I was six months ago. I’m not entirely the same person I was six months ago. But that’s okay. That’s good. This is rebuilding; this is how we get to the next place.

 

Like Ferris Bueller says, “Life moves pretty fast; if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it!”

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Dear Henry IX

by youngmarriedmom Posted on January 28, 2013

Dear Henry,

 

This last weekend we took you to New Jersey to be baptized. You were baptized in your grandparents’ living room by the priest from the church where your dad and I met, got married, and had Jacob baptized. It was a wonderful ceremony, welcoming you into the Church. I was worried you would be loud and perhaps messy, but the twenty minutes or so it took to give you the Sacrament seemed to me to be some of your most peaceful yet. At the end, you smiled through the final blessings. I hope you take that joy in being Catholic wherever you go. I hope when it’s time for you to chose this Faith for yourself, you do it with your whole heart. It is the greatest gift your father and I could give you, and despite all the running around we did preparing for and hosting the party that immediately followed, we found a couple of moments here and there to stand still and realize what a beautiful thing happened that day. It was a special day for us and for you!

 

This weekend was also your first time meeting one set of grandparents and a bunch of extended family members. Needless to say, everyone loves you. They were all happily surprised at how big you are. There was a lot of conversation about the color of your eyes (still a mystery—I think they’re brown inside and blue at the rims of the irises) and about the fact that you don’t really look like anyone in the family right now, not even Jacob. We talked about your grunting, about what I’ve started to think of as your “spunk,” about the fact that you are already very much your own person.

 

For a couple of hours, you were passed around from one family member to the next, peacefully sleeping the whole time. You love being held. We all love holding you (even if our arms do get tired). Even after your bath Sunday night, you still smell like chrism, or, as your godmother says, “like salvation.” You’re lucky—Aunt Helen is faithful and funny.

 

I love that you were baptized during the Church’s Year of Faith. This year is a special time for Catholics to learn more about their faith; deepen their prayer lives; and share their love, centered on Christ, with others. I hope those initiatives find their way into your life by your father and my example, even after this particular year is over.
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Sometimes I wonder whether you and Jacob will remain faithful to the Church later in your lives. I wonder if you will choose something else, and think that your dad and my sharing our faith with you was a waste of time. Then I remember that for us, faith is not a matter of opinion or emotion; it’s a call we’ve chosen to respond to. It’s what we owe our marriage, our family, our lives to. With that perspective, I don’t think we have a choice when it comes to passing that on to you. It’s our way of life, and as your parents, our job is to teach you how to navigate this world, how to navigate yourself. I guarantee it won’t be easy. But that’s not the goal. The goal is that you “run with endurance the race that is set before [you]” (Heb 12:1). We believe the Catholic faith is the best way to do that.

 

I’ll stop preaching to you now, little boy. Know that we really believe in this Faith we’re teaching you. We choose it every day, out of love. We hope you will learn to do the same.

 

We love you, our new little Catholic. We are grateful for you, proud of you, and want all good things for you.

 

With love,
Mom

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