I spend all day thinking about you.
I have never thought about a person I hadn’t met so much, not even your dad. I mean I thought about how I might one day meet someone I would partner with in life but I didn’t dwell on it for long. I would wonder… then I would move on.
But you, I think about you every second of every day. Even when I am not thinking of you, I am thinking of you. I think about all the normal things like what you will look like or if you’ll be chill and let me sleep through the night ever again - but that’s just about ten percent of the time.
Mostly I think about us.
I think about what kind of relationship we’re going to have, if you’ll be anything like me or like your dad. If you will like the world we have created and brought you into. If the ways we believe in raising you will draw you close to us or push you away.
I have spent so much time saying I don’t have expectations for you. I know you’ll be your own person, completely dependent on us for a while, but ultimately independent with who you choose to be as a human being. and I do… I know this.
I think most of my expectations are on myself. I have spent so much time in the last decade of my life figuring out and becoming who I know I am meant to be, the most authentic and healed version of me. For myself, for my friends, and for your father - the undoubtable love of my life. I am so happy and so proud of who I am now. There was a time in my life when I didn’t know if I would be able to say that and mean it, but I do.
Now I am sitting here and I can feel you moving inside me and it stirs up this feeling of uncertainty that it might still not be enough. That I might still fall short in too many categories and not be what you need from me as your mother.
I am terrified of failing you.
But the honest truth is, I probably will. Not catastrophically (I hope) but I am new at this and some mistakes will be made before I have a chance to learn from them. That’s on me to accept and deal with. I never want you to feel like any of it is on you.
Of course, I want you to like me. I want to be your person but ultimately and above all else I want you to know that I like you. Not just in the way mothers biologically love their children - but I like you. Whatever you choose to be, whoever you choose to love, however you choose to live. I want you to know that you will always be more than enough.
You are everything.
Life is so incredibly fragile, but tough. Beautiful, while ugly. Generous, yet so unfair. You are going to feel so many different things and I want to protect you from everything that might hurt you and share in everything that is beautiful. However, as a woman myself, I know that I can’t. That scares me more than you will ever know. It almost stopped me from getting to experience the joy of ever meeting you in the first place. But I also know how much I love my life, how much color your father poured into my world and that he will color yours the same. I know that as much as this world will take from you it can give you so much more.
I picked a way to live and it suits me. I find comfort in where I am and what I have done but baby girl - I don’t want you to think you can’t stray to something different than the example I have set. There are one million ways to be happy and I’ll keep your world spinning until you pick the one you love. Above all else, I want you to see more beauty in your days than I ever have.
I want you to squeeze every ounce of life from your days and I want to see you laugh more than I ever see you cry. I want to hear happiness in your voice when you’re grown and call me up. I want you to live the life you want and never feel like you have to hide any of it from me.
My sweet Vienna, my love for you is bottomless and unconditional. From these days forward, you will never be alone in spirit, body, or mind. My child, my daughter, my piece of heaven on earth… you have your own life just as I have mine but I will live everyday to do right by you so that they stay forever intertwined.
xoxo,
mom
