what I wanted

Today I was lying down for a few minutes, just taking a little rest.  I worked from home today, and Geoff was cleaning up the kitchen, and Katie was in her room playing with some toys, after having just woken up from her nap.  The monitor was on the bed next to me, and I could hear her singing songs to herself and playing the tambourine my dad & stepmom brought her last weekend.

Most of the recent writing I've done about Katie has been about how hard it is to be a parent.  I'm thinking specifically of this and this, although there have been others, too.  And it is hard, everyone knows that. 

But I was thinking today, as I lay there on my bed, about how long and how much I yearned for a child.  I wanted a child so much that I was afraid that I would never get it, as if wanting it too much was bad luck - as if there is some system that works in a similar fashion to the way you're supposed to knock on wood after you mention something bad that hasn't yet happened.  "I really want a baby, with every little bit of my heart," you'd say, and then realize what you'd said.  "Oops, I mean, yeah, a baby would be ok with me.  If I had a baby, that wouldn't suck." 

I wanted a baby not for any particular reason.  I mean, there were lots of particular reasons, I guess, but none of them was really the essence of my yearning.  I wanted somebody to love; I wanted somebody to feed and hold and take care of; I wanted somebody to share our home with us; I wanted somebody that Geoff and I would both love more than we had even maybe known we could love; I wanted to help somebody figure out the world; I wanted to see the world through a child's eyes; I wanted to have an excuse to watch Sesame Street, and Bass & Rankin Christmas shows, and to play with toys, and to fingerpaint and make cookies; I wanted to share holidays and traditions.  I don't know if any of those are really important, at least not by themselves - and for each one that is important, you could certainly argue that in order to fulfill those goals, you wouldn't have to have a child.  There are lots of people you can love and support and share things with, and you don't really have to have an excuse to watch Sesame Street or make cookies. 

So I wanted a baby, and I couldn't have explained exactly why, if you'd asked me.  I just did. 

When I was pregnant, people would tell me that I couldn't really know what I was getting myself in for.  They would tell me that my life would change in ways that I could never anticipate, and that I was giving up freedom, and that I would suffer.  And I guess they were right, as far as that goes.

But what I was thinking today is that maybe I haven't written down the real thing you should know - the very bottom line.  And I want to make sure you know; I want to make sure Katie knows: I got what I wanted.  Katie is everything that I was yearning for.  I have no regrets, and in fact, if I were to travel back in time to before Katie was born, I would yearn for her presence with even more intensity than I did the first time, because I would know what I was getting into. 

It's not like I'm done with this parenting thing, I know.  Katie is 2.5 today, after all.  I know that there will be phases and issues and difficulties related to being her parent that I do not expect.  But sometimes it's nice to take stock, to sit back and realize that there was something that I wanted more than anything, for years and years and years, and that there came a time when I got it.  Maybe that won't happen very many times in my life, but it happened this time. 

I got what I wanted.  Hallelujah.

Comments

[Betsy Morrison]

ain't it wonderful?

[Eliza]

Hello. This made me cry.

[Meg]

That's awesome, Jessamyn! I'm so happy for you! Your entries make me feel less afraid to have kids and less strange for the moments in which I yearn for a baby. Thanks for that.

[Emma]

I'm so happy for you :) I've been reading your journal/blog/whatever you want to call it for a long time, and I know how much you yearned for a child, and I'm so glad that you got it and are this happy. You have a very powerful way of writing that touches the reader and I've found myself either crying or with a tear in my eye after reading you several times. I hope you never stop writing.

[TB]

Maybe you never wrote it down in this exact way before, but it has always been crystal clear that you got what you wanted and more. It's such a joy to read how happy motherhood has made you.

[Wendy May]

Jess, that is the most amazing picture. Your pictures are always good- but that one. It totally astounded me. Something about how the light and the water worked together... I can't explain it- but it's just about perfect.

You really should write for Oprah magazine. You're an amazing writer!