1 Year Old
Posted on | February 16, 2006 |
My dear beautiful boy,
Last year at this time you and I were not quite separate yet. You were still curled in the dark thrumming space of my belly. I was in labor with you all night, sleeping between contractions, willing you to turn yourself around. But you continued to face upwards, the back of your head pressing against my pelvic bone, and so I walked and walked about the house.
I watched the sun rise, a smudge of red and pink out the bedroom window. And when the day came it was warm, and I walked around the deck holding onto your daddy’s shoulders. The air smelled like spring. Like birth. Thawing mud and the sudden up-springing of sap.
I was exhausted. For the two days before I went into labor, I had been vomiting—fighting the worst stomach flu I’d ever had. I hadn’t eaten in a day and a half and was almost certainly dehydrated. My midwife gave me fluids, and I drank, willing them to stay down. But after fifteen hours of labor, sometimes in the tub that we had set up in the warm cocoon of our bedroom and sometimes on the bed, we decided to go to the hospital. The homebirth I’d wanted for you—for me—was something I was no longer capable of pushing for. I needed fluids.
Your doctor, who knew we were coming and who had supported our decision to try for a home birth, met us at the hospital’s front desk, smiling. I was hooked up to an IV drip, and almost immediately I felt a surge of energy. I started to laugh. But still you didn’t want to leave me, and it took more hours of pushing and finally pitocin to help my exhausted uterus to push you out. The sharp pain of your entrance into the world was immediately replaced by the most intense joy I have ever felt.
There you were. Wet, small, and big-eyed. I pressed you close to my skin, and warm blankets were wrapped around us. I held you by my heart—suddenly outside of me, suddenly your own small self.
And now a year has gone by. The most amazing year, filled with the wonder of watching you grow every month. You are a delight, a rascal, a risk taker, a love. You giggle, you are silly, you make mischief, you love to laugh. Because of you, your daddy and I decided to move north, away from the suburban tangled sprawl of the tri-state area.
Because of you I stopped teaching and stay home with you instead. It is a new kind of job—one that I imagined I might resent, but do not. Great abundance has come into my life this year, as I spend my days with you. I have found my creative self again. I have begun to write and paint and draw.
Your presence in the moment has taught me how to return to the moment. To right now, here where your heart beats next to mine. You are more than I could have possibly dreamed of or imagined or hoped. Happy birthday, my little one.
Love,
Mama
For a photo narrative of Bean’s first year, go here.
Comments
37 Responses to “1 Year Old”
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February 16th, 2006 @ 2:38 pm
What an amazing picture! Reading this entry gave me a surge of excitment for moments to come. Happy Birthday Bean!
February 16th, 2006 @ 2:50 pm
Happy, Happy Birthday Bean!
xoxo
February 16th, 2006 @ 2:51 pm
Happy first birthday, Bean! What a beautiful child. So sweet.
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:22 pm
A beautiful tribute. Happy birthday, Bean!
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:31 pm
Happy Birthday, Bean! Christina, seeing your photos on Flickr earlier today inspired me to have a wander through your blog archives; I must say I’ve been enjoying filling in a bit of back story today.
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:37 pm
Awww, that was a beautiful post and the pictures were amazing. Congrats on the first year!
My favorite pic was the face off with the monkey…too cute, your little guy.
andrea
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:45 pm
What a beautiful photo. Happy birthday, Bean! (Great, great name by the way)
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:51 pm
He has the same eyelash shadows as you. Such a beautiful babe.
February 16th, 2006 @ 3:57 pm
my heart can barely take this much love and beauty!
February 16th, 2006 @ 4:15 pm
That was really beautiful. I love the picture of him with the finger paint. It goes so nicely with what you were saying about how you don’t resent your job staying home with him, and how you’ve found your creative self again.
Warm fuzzies.
February 16th, 2006 @ 4:26 pm
Your writing is so meaningful.
Happy Birthday Bean!
Warm regards,
February 16th, 2006 @ 4:56 pm
happy birthday, Bean! wow, that first year sure is amazing, isn’t it? get ready, the second year is even better! have a blast!
February 16th, 2006 @ 5:06 pm
Happy Birthday little guy! Hope you are feeling better! We hope to see you guys out in CA sometime this year. I know our little brat would love the company and someone littler, that he can grab in his big hug
February 16th, 2006 @ 5:10 pm
Happy birthday!!! I love you so much you and your Mama and Daddy are amazing amazing!!1
February 16th, 2006 @ 5:13 pm
oh me oh my!
I just went through the photo montage, twice!
*sigh*
he’s a love, a rascal– all you describe so eloquently.
blessed be.
Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEAN!
February 16th, 2006 @ 5:17 pm
And here I thought all my reproductive urges had been squashed for good. Happy Birthday to the darling bean
February 16th, 2006 @ 5:50 pm
I love hearing stories of babies coming into the world. I love the photo essay to go along. Happy Birthday to your beautiful baby boy!
February 16th, 2006 @ 6:14 pm
Happy Birthday to the most amazing little Bean! Lots of smooches on his sweet head!
February 16th, 2006 @ 6:25 pm
What a precious photo and your words, so heartfelt I can feel it–so powerful. He’s a lucky Bean.
February 16th, 2006 @ 6:28 pm
Happiest of happy first birthdays to the Bean! I love the little baby pictures, he looks so much like his older self. What a treat, all these sweet baby pictures. And the birth story - soooo good. I eat up birth stories with a spoon. And you, Christina, are the prettiest mama indeed. You look radiant in every picture.
February 16th, 2006 @ 6:39 pm
Happy Birthday Bean! And Congrats CR & DH on bringing such a joy to this world. (in the picture on this post he looks so much like DH!). I loved seeing pregnant pics of you, Christina…thank you for sharing such a sweet narrative with us.
PS. glad you finally went pro on flickr…i eat up these pics of yours!
and oh my, the daffodil shot! the 6 month old pic–you guys are so sporty.
PPS. I can see the laundry basket was a fixed thing from the start!
February 16th, 2006 @ 6:55 pm
*sniff, sniff*
Happy Birthday Bean! That was beautiful.
February 16th, 2006 @ 7:29 pm
beautiful and moving…
touching and sweet….
wow
February 16th, 2006 @ 7:31 pm
Happy Birthday to Bean and to you, Christina. He is clearly worth the work it took to bring him into this world. Reading this makes me miss the baby my son was almost 24 years ago! It seems like just a short time ago I was lumbering around with his kicking body inside me… Enjoy your marvelous, beautiful son:>
February 17th, 2006 @ 12:55 am
Bean! Happy Birthday!
You are soooo lucky she stays home with you!
And the fun is just about to begin…woohoo!
The story was so beautiful, Christina. Thank you for sharing it!
February 17th, 2006 @ 4:19 am
Happy Birthday Bean and Bean’s mother!
The photo is absolutely wonderful.
And I am so glad your sister is ok. I’ve been on internet withdrawal all week and only now read it. Best wishes to all of you!
February 17th, 2006 @ 6:09 am
I’ve just met you both, but it’s an honour to meet you on such a special day, to wish Bean a happy day and a great second year, and to say to Mama - you are doing the most wonderful thing, and that letter alone is such a gift of love. Bean is a lucky boy indeed.
February 17th, 2006 @ 9:32 am
beautifully written…i can’t believe i’m taking my own little baby to her 18 month checkup today! CRAZY how fast time flies!! happy birthday to the little one!
love~jill
February 17th, 2006 @ 10:07 am
I have always felt that birth days should be a day to celebrate Mama … So Happy Birth Day to you.
February 17th, 2006 @ 11:23 am
Happy birthday to your little man! I enjoyed reading your birth story and seeing the photos of Bean as a littler one.
February 17th, 2006 @ 1:45 pm
My heart is exploding with love. Such a beautiful boy, such a beautiful mama. I feel so fortunate to read this. Thank you for sharing your wonderful life and insightful words with us, every day.
February 17th, 2006 @ 2:34 pm
Those photos were wonderful! What a year!
February 18th, 2006 @ 2:52 pm
Belated birthday wishes to your beautiful Bean. Beautiful post.
February 18th, 2006 @ 10:42 pm
What a beautiful boy you have.
I really relate to your post.
My son Trey will be a year old March 4th and I am a high school biology teacher on leave for the year. I too have found my creative self again since I have been staying home with Trey.
I never knew it would be so wonderful.
Will you be going back in the fall to teaching?
February 26th, 2006 @ 10:13 pm
oh happy happy first birthday, bean!
I love how our birth stories are all so much the same yet worlds of difference all at once. we are bound together by pain and the miraculousness yet fantastic tiny details make each story completely unique.
so glad you shared this with us, friend. bean is one lucky little guy.
March 15th, 2006 @ 10:36 pm
Oh my goodness. I came across this because I was looking for ideas for a party for my sweet boy who will be 1 on April 25, and boy did this make me cry. Thank you for making me remember how lucky I am.
December 23rd, 2006 @ 4:13 am
what a beautiful little boy!!