Just 10 years, 2 SUV's, 2 pediatricians, 3 specialists and countless black sharpie markers into this :-)
It may sound cliche but there should be a Mother's Toolkit. Something they hand you with the generic, black vinyl diaper bag when you go home from the hospital. After just 48, or 36 or even 24 supermom hours later, you leave with this tiny, completely dependent life that came from literally inside of you. You leave the hospital still wearing your maternity clothes with this mushy strange belly that just a couple of days earlier was tight with the impending birth. And as you click the infant seat into your car, the realization sinks in that this divine being is yours, completely yours.
With all the privileges and responsiblities therein :-)
But wouldn't it be great if there was this "Essentials Mommy Toolkit" given to you; not prepared by baby registries or vogue motherhood magazines, but rather by the countless moms who have gone before you and will give you truthful items of necessity to not only survive as a mom, but to joyfully equip you for the journey? I would love that! Now, I know we would all have our own lists of supplies but so far this is what I would include...:-)
1. Special Vision Glasses that would illuminate all the items in Babies-R-Us that you really need, instead of registering for 10 organic, non-latex, mouth-contouring pacifiers at $10 a pop.
2. Earplugs that will edit out all the horrible labor stories you hear just days before you go into labor yourself.
3. An internal amplifier in your husband's ear that would heighten the baby's cry at 2 a.m. that would make it impossible for him to pretend he is still alseep and doesn't hear :-)
4. Black sharpie markers that not only label everything with your child's name, but will mark them indeliably with your name so that anyone who ever tried to hurt or take your child would suffer the consequences of your mama bear strength.
5. Duct tape to put over the mouths of people, many of whom never had kids or forgot what it can be like at times, who make unnecessary comments about how you should be handling your toddler's temper tantrum in the store.
6. An extra 25th hour in the day to do nothing but stand in a steamy hot shower... all alone!
7. Something that will hold your heart together which breaks now so easily when you see another child missing or being mistreated.
8. A coupon that gives full permission to put nothing else on the dinner table than mac and cheese some nights. :-)
9. Real permission to share not only your child's outward successes but their real struggles, remembering that it is their life and not some kind of justification of how well or poorly we are doing as moms.
10. A parenting book that says on every page nothing except, "Yes, it IS as hard as it is. You're doing fine." :-)
When I got pregnant for the first time, so many people said to me, "It will change your life forever." Those words have never proved to be more truthful. I almost don't know or remember the woman I was before my kids blessed my life. At times I see her and miss her, but most days I don't and I don't look back.
Even this morning as I was breaking up a fight over how close you can stand to the Wii sensor remote, my son came to me with tears in his eyes asking me to play a quick game of Phase 10 before we left for school.
Is there any greater invitation than that? :-)
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