plus one

The night before I was to be induced (yes, it was totally planned, gotcha), as I put Annabelle to bed, I completely lost it. I could barely hold it together enough to sing her bedtime songs. She noticed and asked, "Mommy sad?" When I walked out of her room, I sunk in a heap of tears. I sobbed. It was hard to explain, but suddenly the reality of losing the time with just Annabelle hit me with full force. Suddenly I realized that things would be different. Things were going to change. The predictable life of love and routine that we had so carefully shaped for the last two years would change. It's a strange paradigm to be in - wanting my new baby so very much, but fearing the change that would occur as that new baby changed everything and grew us to a family four.

My induction was a dream (besides the small issue of being sent to a different out-of-network hospital). The pitocin did its magic. I "suffered" through contractions for a few hours before I wimped out and got that blessed epidural, we waited a few hours (read: I totally snoozed), I pushed through five contractions literally without breaking a sweat (a sharp contrast to my labor with Annabelle, during which I sweated enough to fill a small lake), and our big baby girl was there.

Annabelle was waiting in the hall with her aunties and before the gender had been revealed, was outside the door requesting, "Go inside and see my sister?!"

She walked in to the room tentatively. And who wouldn't. Hospitals are weird. And Mommy was in a weird dress with cords and wires hanging out of her arms. She wanted her aunties to stick close to her, to keep her safe. But she also wanted to see Lydia. She wanted to touch her and hold her and give her loves. The next morning at home, as Daddy got ready to go, she followed behind, and in classic toddler style repeated over and over, "Go see Lydia? Go see my sister? Go see Lydia? Go see my sister?"

And when they arrived that morning and she gave her baby sister some more loves without reservation or jealousy in her sweet understanding toddler heart, I realized that everything would be okay, that sometimes change is good and beautiful and comes in eight pound twelve ounce packages. And how wonderfully perfect those packages can be.