I recently was given a book called “Let Me Hold You Longer”
by Karen Kingsbury. If you haven’t read it, and you are a mother or father… or
have a mother or father… or just need a good cry, read it. I read it maybe once
or twice a week to Nico, and I bawl the whole way through it.
Let me give you a brief synopsis in my own words: Our babies
grow, and they grow too fast. We will never know when each little snuggle, each
little nap will be their last. That we will fall asleep one night thinking of
all the things we have to do the next day, and wake up the next morning with a
teenager that no longer wants to snuggle, or nap. We will be too busy to just
stop and stare at that beautiful baby, too busy to have one more tea party, not
knowing that tomorrow she will be too big for that silly little girl stuff. We
live for their “firsts”, we snap pictures and clap and cheer when they roll
over, or giggle, or get their first tooth. Their “lasts” are what we miss,
those are the things that sail by without us even noticing.
My son Nico is 13 weeks old. 13 weeks have gone by in the
flash of a second. He has doubled in size, he rolls over, he holds up his head
like a pro, and he is babbling and giggling every morning when he wakes up
smiling. It’s going by too fast. So fast, in fact, that I feel like Nico is
bigger, and stronger, and has infinitely more development every time I blink.
So fast, that it scares me every single day that I will miss something. That
one night I will be too tired to enjoy and savor waking up at 4am to feed him,
and drift through that feeding, and back to sleep without ever thinking twice
about it. The next night not hearing those little coos, those little fusses,
and feeling a pain in my heart, missing it. Missing him needing his mama to
soothe him, to nourish him at 4am. I fear I will miss one of his “lasts” every
day, every night.
We don’t have many lasts yet, thank goodness. Not that I
know of anyways… He still snuggles up on my chest. He still wakes up for his
4am feeding. He naps, and holds onto my fingers, and needs his mama. Of course
there are a couple of things I miss already, like the way he used to loved to
be rocked to sleep in the cradle of my arm. Now, he is a bog boy and ONLY wants
to be held looking out at the world, and put to sleep wide awake. I am not sure
when the last time I held him like a tiny baby was, cradled in the crook of my
arm, but I missed it. It came and went without me thinking twice, and now it’s
gone, just like that.
So, when your mother tells you that you hold your baby too
much, as if the safety of your arms is spoiling him, just smile and nod. They
aren’t this little for very long, and I personally want to breathe in every
second of it. I don’t want to miss a single first, or last.
