I held my breath this December as the new year hovered. I’ve no issues with resolutions or the holidays, my trepidation is in the echoes of change, these passages I am coming to know as a mom. I did not want, was not ready, am not ready, for this door to close. I know (though a part of me even as I type this thinks, “If his vasectomy somehow failed, if something slipped through, somehow, someway, it would be ok.”) that Finley is my last.
She fully embraces her role as baby, alternately angelic or demanding as her whim demands. It is miraculous to watch the unapologetic and irresistible machinations of “the baby.” I think, and this may change in years to come, we all admire her temerity. “Do it, Fin. Claim it!” She is, after all, doing exactly as we each would do were we not encumbered by the I shouldn’ts and I couldn’t possiblies. Declaring what she wants and clearing the way, literally and figuratively, to get it. God, if I could give them all one gift it would be that. Save them a lifetime of door-matting.
The new year came and went and my baby still nursed. She no longer turns to me like she used to, there aren’t so many cuddles throughout the day, but at night she claims me. First there comes a mew and then another. Sometimes I leap from the bed, but other times I hold myself back, I wait to make sure it isn’t one more case of shifting in her sleep rather than a true call for me. I know they twist and turn, make noises and rustles, but when it isn’t that, I go or rouse Sean and ask him to bring her to me. This time will be something we both lose, after all. While the midnight and predawn feedings may have felt to be mine alone, he has marked the hours I’ve spent away, the minutes rocking in moonlight, the hours shushing softly and stroking her brow as I held her in the guest room, each touch we had was a hollow he felt.
“Is she ok?” he’d ask as I settled back in the covers. The confirmation that he marked these times with me was something I could never describe, a euphoria and relief to know that the chronicling was not mine alone, that one day two voices, two hearts would retell these unremembered times.
Nearly a month has passed and still she nurses. We are on borrowed time, I know. I am readying as is she. It kills me to say that. I have loved these years like no other time in my life. The too tall, too this, too that, not nearly enough such and such has become a perfect fit. I have grown three babies, nurtured them in my body and then sustained them on nothing but my milk for months. They’ve nursed to health and nursed to sleep. They’ve done it as I’ve worked and done it as we’ve traveled.
Now, 5+ years after I nursed my first, I hear the softest murmurs of protest. I am ready to sleep through the night, ready to accept that it is past comfortable to nurse her in public and that most of the time she uses it as a ploy. I know that a cuddle or simply undiluted attention will do, and yet, I am loathe to initiate the end.
Tonight another milestone snuck up on me. So preoccupied with nursing, I forgot the crib. She has been turning to her sister’s beds for months, but last night she asked to sleep there. “Finny, in’a here. Sleep. Now. Me, Finny in’a Bwi-Bwi’s a’bed? Puh-weese?” As I type this she is in the toddler bed Sean brought over from the house this afternoon. It had been bound for Goodwill, our plan being to let her transition to the new house by staying in her crib.
“No, thanks,” she projected, “I do it, I do it.” We know her well enough to comply, even to the literally unspoken.
I feel sheepish, but grateful. Little miss “I-know-their-cues-and-can-predict-their-milestones-blah-blah-blah” got it wrong. My last baby slept her last night in her crib and I missed it. I only hope she’ll give me one more night of nursing before she slips the final moments of tiny babies in my life away until these beauties become mommies to their own babies.
i decided when mir stopped nursing – and i still remember – it was the night before her third birthday. she liked it, i liked it, it was mostly comfort at night, and, oh, it makes me sentimentally teary to think about. my baby.
It happened so fast. I can’t believe she’s upstairs in that bed.
I LOVE the Wink! The looks — and, as aver, the words!! Too beautiful!
Our 2 will be our only 2. I have moments of… maybe just 1 more? But then I think again. We’ve still done no “permanant fix”… but we’re done. Still… I find myself thinking if it happened accidentally I wouldn’t be all that upset.
Ah – I remember fondly those days. Grab hold of them and hold them tightly. All to soon it will be Kindergarten and 5th grade graduations. Double digits and first dates.
No more babies here. Unless you count the new puppy that won’t stop her whining tonight!
Ohhhh…. Weaning is so hard. And knowing this is your last…. I feel for you. Lovely post.
We are coming to an end with this stage as well and I am having a hard time with it. Knowing that she will be my last one and having her want to nurse less and less is killing me. I am not ready, she obviously is. I needed this today…Beautiful post!
i can’t wait to meet your girls someday. i hope.
No. More. Crib. Ugh.
This is exactly why I cannot admit to myself that Charlotte is my last baby. I have given away the bouncy chair, my glider chair and the baby swing. But I hold on to the clothes, the baby car seat and the bath tub. I am in a pull of “do not mess with the perfect thing we have” vs. “I cannot imagine not having another baby in my body.” So, I push it out of my mind and only give the milestones the honor of belong to Charlotte and not to the “last baby.”
But deep down, I know when she grows out of the crib, it will move to the basement and probably not be put together again.
{{{hugs mama}}}
oof. Fin will forever be the belle of the ball in my eyes. The little babylegs wearing cherub, and simultaneously, the boss.
As I prepare for what logically I must assume is my last baby, I almost can’t help but dream about doing it just one more time would be like.
Enjoy these moments. You’re uniquely qualified and blessed to mark the milestones joyfully.
I picked up Lil today and cradled her after a papercut. She actually turned her head and pretended to nurse with this sly smile on her face. At 4 1/2, she still remembers our routine of 3 years ago.
I’d tell you to hold onto that nursing. It’s such a blessing. But I know you know that!
(BTW, love this new place!)
You have lots of time before your babies become mommies themselves. It’s wonderful to hear how much you cherish every moment, even the tough ones.
Amanda, I was just sharing with my MIL this morning that I thought Reece was trying to wean herself. Sigh. And cry. I will miss it so much. And she is my last, so that makes it even harder. Thanks for sharing, as always.
*sigh* I was an extended nurser, and my younger daughter didn’t wean till she was about 3. I remember finally realizing that it was habit with her — if I got her out of her crib in the morning wearing my nightgown, she wanted to nurse, but if I was dressed she didn’t. So I got dressed every morning before I fetched her out of her crib, and she was weaned. (Though she still remembered nursing for quite a while afterward.) But at least our transition to the “big-girl bed” went just as planned. It’s so hard giving these things up. My elder daughter’s 10 now, and she talks my ear off sometimes, and I have to remind myself that in another couple years or so, she won’t want to tell me anything, so I need to enjoy it now. You seem to have the knack of enjoying the now. Love your “Mama Sap.”
I’m writing this because you commented over on Xbox’s site congratulating him and E for their baby.
I’m putting this on this post because it’s a little bit down the page and I don’t want him to see it 🙂
A while ago, before Martin’s (xbox4nappyrash) wife got pregnant I promised I would post a youtube video of me singing “Yes” by Mcalomont & Butler whilst accompanying myself on the ukulele to celebrate the birth of their child.
This will not be a pretty sight as I can neither sing, nor really play the ukulele (this isn’t false modesty – I really can’t).
However what I thought might make it really cool would be instead of just a straight video I put together a montage of videos shot by readers of his blog and fellow walkers all celebrating – i.e. dancing, sticking thumbs up, cheering, holding up signs, that sort of thing. It would have to be something that would work without sound as I would put my (awful) soundtrack over the top of it.
It would be great if you could participate. If you send me a short 5-15 second video clip (or at a push a photo, but a video would be much better) along with your name and blog then I’ll put it together with other submissions and get something ready for the end of the week. I think it would be a really nice thing to do for martin to show him and E how pleased we are for him. and Martin has been incredibly supportive of me and my various projects in the past.
However I realise this isn’t the sort of thing a lot of people are comfortable with and so would understand completely if you don’t want to do it.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. You can email me at [email protected]
Dan.
You mark these milestones with such respect, even in missing one. My third is also my last. And as she works every day to keep up with her older siblings, I have to fight the instinct to hold her back. She is almost through nursing, and I’m saddened and delighted all at the same time. Mothering is so full of these contradictions.