Who let this happen?

Jack is going to be 5 tomorrow.  FIVE.  That's years old, not months old.  Where has the time gone?  I have phantom uterine incision pains remembering the joy and terror of his early arrival.  Honestly, it feels like it was only 5 minutes ago that Dr. Man Hands strolled in the room and told me that I'd be having "that baby" by dinnertime b/c my liver was failing and "livers don't come back."  I wasn't ready -- we hadn't painted or decorated his room, washed the tiny clothes that would be too big for him if he came so soon anyway, taken birthing classes.  All we had was his name picked out and our hopes that he would be born healthy and strong.

For a planner like me, having a baby two months ahead of schedule was my worst nightmare come true.  I couldn't face all the what-if's that could damage a baby born too soon so I fixated on the little things.  I worried about the fact that he didn't have a crib to sleep in b/c I couldn't think about how long it would be before we could bring him home with us.  I cried about how I never had a baby shower while trying not to wonder if I would need special equipment beyond the scope of Babies R Us gear to care for my special baby.  Surprisingly, though, I never once thought that he wouldn't make it which is pretty amazing considering that I've had maybe 6 optimistic moments in my entire life.  Our bond was strong from the moment I saw the second line on the pregnancy test stick and I felt his strength within me through that long night of counting the hours between steroid shots, hoping that they would be everything that his lungs needed for his birth the next day.

I didn't see him for over 24 hours after he was born because he was in the critical section of the NICU and I was hooked up to magnesium sulfate to prevent seizures as my blood pressure slowly returned to normal.  When Tom finally wheeled me up to his incubator and I put my hand into the port hole to touch my tiny bird of a son, it was like a piece of my heart that I didn't know was missing was returned to me.  

That first month was the hardest of my maternal career.  Leaving the hospital without him, there are no words for how awful that felt.  I pumped breastmilk like a maniac, scrubbed my hands raw to make sure I didn't bring outside germs to him and spent every moment I could next to his isolette, trying to feel like his mother and not another name on his sanctioned visitors list.  I worried that he wouldn't know me and that he would feel closer to the nurses than to me.  How silly I was because never has anyone loved me like Jack does.  Not the worried love of my mother, not the obsessive love of my precious Natalie,  just pure love because of, or maybe in spite of, who I am.  Jack showed me that it was okay to be happy again. He finished the lesson that his father started by teaching me that it's while it may not be safe, it is oh-so-worth-it to love someone without fear or reservations.

So here is to my boy -- so funny, so smart, so sensitive, such a wise old soul and a mind-boggling combination of his worrywart mother and easy-going father -- on the eve of his fifth birthday.  Many, many more happy and healthy ones for you, my love.