Watch her sleep

I'm scared to let myself enjoy Anonybabe. She was freaking delightful yesterday. Babbling and talking. Thanking me for stuff. Pooping in the mother effing potty for Christ's sake.


I think back to those first nights in that first year...they were nightmarish. I really felt like I was going to die or she was going to die. Stop breathing in the night. Like I wasn't going to be diligent enough. Of course I didn't really think that she was going to be suffocated under a pillow or by her own CO2, but...if I was awake, and I often was, at least every hour on the hour - I'd think, might as well check, just to see that she's okay, just to make sure this isn't the one time I assumed things were okay and they weren't, just to do everything within my power to make sure she is safe and happy, because god knows most things are outside of my control. I was just...so scared and unhappy. And lonely.


This morning as I climbed out of bed and into my clothes while Anonybabe and Anonyhub were still sleeping, I went back to say a little silent blessing and goodbye over each of them before I left. I always go to Anonybabe first. I thought about this as I leaned over her to watch her breath, as I thought out my declarations of love and wishes that she have an exciting, fulfilling, captivating day. I looked over at Anonyhub, head thrown back, mouth open. He used to get the benefit of my laserbeam focus before Anonybabe came along. When she did, I kind of dropped him like a hot potato. She needed me, but it kind of boiled/boils down to the fact that I want her. I choose to be consumed by her. It's so easy to fall into. The dopamine riverbeds were all dredged out so that when that first flood of the mother obsession hormone hit, it flowed easily in her direction.


Can I really live this and observe it at the same time? Motherhood, I mean? In my mind's eye, I'm always holding up all of the failed and broken and tepid and twisted parent/child relationships I know - and they are legion. Why in the world would I think my relationship with my daughter would be any different? Everybody loves their kids. Everybody does what they have the resources to do. And yet everybody suffers. But I think I'm trying to jump ahead to the suffering part, the alienation, the stifling anger, the lifelong damage. I'm trying to head it off at the pass. And I don't really think I can. Rather, the only way I could would be to bypass all of the good parts of being a mother: the intimacy, the miracles of growth and development happening right before my eyes, the depth of affection. I think they are all part and parcel. And I know that to embrace the good is to necessarily open myself wide to the bad. To feel even more keenly than Anonybabe does the pain she'll inflict on herself while she's trying to figure herself out.


The process of pregnancy and childbirth wasn't as bad as I feared. In fact, it was pretty awesome. Maybe the same thing will happen as Anonybabe grows up and becomes a human in every sense of the word. Maybe watching her grow up won't be as painful as growing up myself.



I'm ready for her to become sinful, in some ways. I'm ready to be com padres.