I had a dream the other night that our little Emma was
walking.
That’s right walking. At the ripe old age of 6 months.
It seems our smarty-pants skipped crawling all together and
moved right on up to strutting.
I had a dream the other night that our little Emma was walking.
That’s right walking. At the ripe old age of 6 months.
It seems our smarty-pants skipped crawling all together and moved right on up to strutting.
In my dream, I was shocked but then proud. I called to my husband, Chris, to come take a look at our miracle baby.
The next morning, I woke up, amused then relieved that it was just a dream. In reality, I’m not ready for walking. Heck, I’m not ready for what our little munchkin can do now.
I’m not one of those Moms who studies the baby developmental books and waits anxiously for her baby to tackle the next challenge. Just the opposite. I’m downright stunned when Emma shows off her newest trick.
Like two weeks ago, when my sister, Katie informed me that Emma had just rolled over.
“Are you sure?” I asked running out to the family room. “She’s never done that before.”
Indeed, Emma was on her belly, her whole face smiling up at me. One moment earlier she was lying on her back crazily wielding her rattle.
I looked at her amazed. I knew intellectually she must have rolled over. But my heart wasn’t buying it.
Then last week, Emma sat up by herself for longer than eight seconds.
“She’s figured out she could hold herself up with her hands,” my Mom said, beaming down at Emma.
How can this be? I wondered to myself. One day, Emma topples over like a Weeble Wobble, and the next, she’s holding herself up with all the steadiness and skill of a stilt walker.
How did she figure that out? What clicked in her little mind? And does she have any awareness that just the day before she couldn’t do the very thing she’s doing now?
Everything is happening too fast. Everything every mom has told me is coming true. They do grow up too fast. You do wish you could hold them a little longer.
I’ll admit that I was a doubter. When Emma was four or five weeks old, I smiled when I heard these comments from well-meaning parents.
“Just you wait,” they told me. “You won’t believe how quickly they grow up.”
Well, all of you were right. Listen to me, my baby’s only 6 months old and I’m mourning this fact. Just wait until she turns 1 or 2.
I know I have to come to grips with it soon. In restaurants, I will have to start accepting the waiter’s offer of a high chair and, one day, a booster chair.
Of course, I am excited by the prospect of the little person our little one is becoming. A huge part of me can’t wait to hear her first word, and then her first sentence. I imagine the silly games we’ll play, the first day of school, the recitals, the ball games, the sleep-overs, the moments we’ll share.
But another part of me – the part of me that remembers like it was yesterday watching her move in my belly and later cradling her for the first time – wants her to stay my little baby.
I now understand why my own Mom cried when she and my Dad left me in the care of my college dorm 13 years ago. I sympathize with those tears and can almost guess at the depth of the ache she must have felt in her heart.
Tonight, when Emma awoke crying from a deep sleep as she is prone to do, I rocked her back to sleep. When she had stopped crying, and her face settled back into its lax, peaceful state, I held her a little extra longer.
I studied her 6-month-old face, memorizing each eye lash, line and curve. I saw in my mind’s eye her 6-year-old self, and later down the road, her 16-year-old self. God help me.
I knew one day soon she will walk away from me. And that time it won’t be just a dream.
