"It Goes So Fast"

"It goes by so fast."  I can't count the number of times someone told me that.  And I knew it was true.  But everything that was happening seemed SO important at the time.  Even though I knew things would change, it was completely impossible for me to fathom that at some point I wouldn't need to have burp cloths strewn everywhere around the house just to ensure one would be in arms reach.  Eventually, I wouldn't be counting the minutes until the next time I was "allowed" to feed them, or counting the milliliters they're drinking.

And then two weeks ago, my friend Colleen had her baby, Gavin (who, by the way, is totally adorable).  During the four days she was in the hospital, we texted back and forth, and I was flooded with memories of my half week.  Did they give me morphine after the C-section? I don't remember.  How long was it before they finally got me a breast pump? It seemed like such a big deal at the time, and now it's just an anecdote.  When Gavin was a week old, I went over to visit.  Colleen looked tired and her skin was still that sort of waxy post-surgery color, and yet she was totally gorgeous as she looked at her teeny, tiny little son.  (We compared photos from recovery, and I definitely won the "hide that picture from small children" award.)  And he is teeny tiny - even though he was 8 pounds, 1 oz when he was born - nearly 3 and a half pounds bigger than Max!  Colleen's husband, Brad, was bouncing around showing things off and talking a mile a minute.  He radiated pride in his son and reminded me so much of Joe that it made me laugh.  I looked around her living room - everything focused on the bouncy chair in the middle of the room - and I realized how long it had been since I spent hours just sitting with a baby on my chest, sleeping.

Today, I went back to drop off a couple of little things I'd found that they could use.  They'd had a rough night - Gavin cried from midnight to two-thirty, straight.  And I thought how lucky I was that the Teenies never did that.  Colleen asked me why nobody had told her about the terrible nights and the incredible exhaustion, and all of a sudden, it hit me.  You forget.  I'd heard it before, but about the pain of childbirth. But it's true about all the hard stuff.  I remember the nights when Joe and I would wake up and feed them serially while we watched the MLB Network through bleary eyes.  But when I do, I remember how cute Caroline was balanced on the Boppy on top of the bed, not how tired I was.  It's true - you remember the good stuff and sort of gloss over the struggle.  I don't know if that's good news to Colleen or not, right now, or if she's even awake enough with a two-week old to think about it, but it does.

And I won't condescend and tell her to soak up every minute of it because "it goes by so fast".  Talk about guilt!  There are times that I've caught myself feeling BAD for checking my email or talking to someone on the phone because I should be "enjoying" every minute of my kids - even though they're TOTALLY happy in the other room playing in their little kitchen.  Sometimes, when I catch myself feeling guilty, I wonder how my parents feel.  A long time ago, people were telling them to appreciate every moment of me as a baby - and my mother has already told me I was nowhere near as much fun as the Teenies.  I wonder if they ever sit around and think about what it was like when I was little?  I'm pretty sure they don't remember the exhaustion.

Now, the teenage years, on the other hand...