by Patti
After S was born, although I was so sleep-deprived I actually wondered if one could die from lack of sleep, I was pleasantly surprised at what an easy baby she was, and how naturally I fell into caring for her while still managing to do things around the house. Hard? This wasn't hard!
When she was only a few weeks old, the cookie-bakin' spirit hit me, and I decided to whip up a batch. As usual, S made it easy for me. She slept quietly in her little bouncy chair, and I Martha'd away in the kitchen, humming and smugly thinking to myself, "Hard? This isn't hard!" I popped in the first batch, and just as the timer alerted me that it was done, S started to stir. Being the perfect multi-tasker, I sweetly scooped up my baby, and then headed to the oven to take out the cookie sheet. Look at me! Holding a newborn AND baking! Such finesse, such control, such ability! I opened the oven door, holding S in one arm, and with the other, swiftly removed the pan.
Suddenly, S wailed out in pain. I dropped the cookie sheet, realizing I had just burned my baby. Ohmygod I had totally just BURNED MY BABY. I ran to the bedroom and laid S on the bed, and inspected her tender little body. Everything looked good. Intact. Unscathed. But she continued to cry, clearly in discomfort, and I frantically tried to recall how I had been holding her. I concluded it had been her thigh that the cookie sheet had grazed, and I called the pediatrician, crying into the phone that I had just burned my baby, I had just burned my BAAAAABBBBBYYYY! The nurse reassured me, telling me that as long as the skin looked normal, I could just smooth some ointment on the area and she should be fine. I hung up, shaking, and rummaged the linen closet for some ointment. I squeezed some onto her thigh, whispering apologies over and over again to her as I gingerly rubbed in the cream. Then I held her to me, willing her to be okay.
But she kept crying. And crying. AND CRYING. I pulled her away from me, her little legs kicking angrily. That is when I saw it: her foot was red and beginning to swell. I had rubbed the ointment into the wrong place! I was trying to heal her, and I was doing it all wrong. I started to cry right along with her, rubbed in the ointment into the right place, and then called back the doctor, and the nurse once again reassured me she would be alright.
And she was. Thank God.
That day was the first of an embarrassing string of awful parenting moments, but, through tearful confessions to friends, I soon learned that I was not alone. If we peel back the layer of the perfection we all strive for, we learn that we all make mistakes with our kids, from the shameful accidents to the less-than-stellar parental freak-outs that twist themselves into possessed yelling.
But, as a new mother, I learned an even more important lesson that day. Sure, this "having a baby" stuff wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be. It was harder. I realized it's not the lack of sleep or the ability or inability to make dinner, take a shower, or throw dinner parties while tending to your baby's needs that makes it hard. No, what makes it hard is how much you care; how suddenly you are more vulnerable, more raw, more in love, than you've ever been. And as that baby grows and becomes a person with opinions and interests and demands and a defined personality, it only gets harder.
And you know what? I'm up for the challenge.
