18 years

I searched all over the house until I finally found the journal I kept at the time my daughter, Helena, was born.  I have always kept a journal my entire life.  At least my entire life since I was 8 years old.  This blog took over as my 'journal' in 2009 and I have not written in a formal paper bound book since.  But I still have my old journals.  In this case, I wanted to look up what I wrote when Helena was born.

I was hoping I had written some inspiring words of the love a new mom feels for her first born.

No such luck.  Just a blow by blow of the labor and delivery.  I'll spare you.

Phooey.

Looking back on those entries from her first months of life makes me realize just how YOUNG and inexperienced we were!  We were just kids ourselves!

I remember a feeling of panic when I realized that the doctors and nurses at the hospital were just going to send this fragile little whiff of life home with me.  ME!  That I was suddenly responsible for the life of another human being.

I was terrified.  To put it mildly.

Mom came to stay for a week.  I remember her telling me I shouldn't be so quiet around the baby, or she would startle awake at the smallest sound.  She needed to be used to a noisy environment.  But, my life was a quiet one.  I wasn't 'being quiet' for the baby... I was always quiet naturally.  So, I went out of my way to make the house noisier for little Helena.

Did you know that, at first, Helena had a nickname?

We tried to call her "Hailey" for a couple of weeks.  That's as long as it lasted.  The name didn't stick.  Weird as it sounds, she simply wasn't anything other than elegant and graceful "Helena".  I can't explain it any better than that.

Here we are, 18 years later.  Life's roller coaster has had many ups and downs since then.  Helena was our guinea pig while we learned what it was to be parents.  We are still learning.  She is still the guinea pig.  Sorry, sweetie.

But, I'll tell you one thing.  I didn't know what it was to truly love another person until Helena was born.

Let me rephrase that.  I didn't know what it was to love someone else MORE than life itself.  To love so much that it is painful.  To have a part of your own heart walking around outside of yourself, residing in the body of another.

I think the love of a mother for her child is the closest any mortal gets to understanding the divine love of God.

Such an exquisite agony.

And now, she is 18 years old and taking her first steps into the realms of adulthood.  Thinking she is ready,  feeling oh-so-grown up.  But she is still my little girl, the one I would die for rather than see her suffer.

And I love her more than she will ever know...

... at least, until she becomes a mother.

Happy Birthday, my sweet Helena.