There are so many things I wish I had written down before now.  But as with so many other things in life that are so monumental, when we are going through them, we rarely appreciate their beauty.

There are so many things I have thought to tell you in the last few days.  I know there are tons of hormones in my system and I am exhausted and this whole thing has been utterly overwhelming but I also know that what I am feeling is very real and that you should know just how you have impacted my life.

We should start, however, at the ugly beginning.  And the ugly beginning is that I had you pictured in my mind as this thing that would happen to Tim and I and it would be awesome and life altering but I didn't love you as anything more than a hypothetical.  And to be honest, as the pregnancy progressed I even resented some things about it.  I hated the ugly red tiger scratches on my belly and the way doing anything more than elliptical at the gym seemed outlandish and nuts.  I hated the stage where I felt chubby instead of pregnant and I could tell people did a double take as they weren't sure, either.  I hated when my face filled out and my stomach extended beyond the point of being able to see my toes.  I hated not being able to bend over and I hated the way none of my clothes fit any longer.

But that whole thing, that prior paragraph, doesn't do much besides tell you that I was very concerned about superficial things.  Things that don't truly matter.  And does it redeem me, at all, to say that I am very much not concerned about those things now?  Does it make it any better if I tell you I look at my pregnant self and laugh because the bottom line is I missed the whole point.  The whole point. Which is that you have utterly and irrevocably changed everything for me from here on out.  That I sit and I cry (not out of sheer exhaustion, I promise) but out of sadness that you are not in my tummy any longer and that every night we go to bed is another day I won't get with you again.

But I move too quickly.  Because the first thing we have to talk about is labor and what a ridiculous and insane experience that is.

You were late.  12 days late to be precise.  I waited and waited and waited and worried that my body was broken.  That maybe I was genetically unable to go into labor on my own. And so I passed the time, bloated and edematous, largely on the couch.  I still got out to the dog park every day but beyond that was so exhausted and ready to meet you that most days passed in a blur.  A blur of Home and Garden TV and sleeping until 9 or 10 (uninterrupted, I might add) and going to movies and restaurants with Tim at our every whim (which, honestly, was less than it should have been because making people is a lot of work).

I felt you rumble around in my belly and now that I know you I know how magical that really was. But before I met you, I didn't quite get it (and for that I am very, very sorry).  It was you in there. YOU. Every knock and tumble was a message, a reminder that we are inextricably linked. Every kick that I felt or spurt of hiccups wasn't some imaginary thing that would just disappear on its own.  What it was all leading up to was us meeting.  And I feel like maybe you knew that all along. You floated along in there, memorized my heart beat, ate what I ate, and experienced what I did.  I remember one day, in particular, that I was quite upset and you kicked and kicked and kicked the living daylights out of me.  We were sharing one space, one body system and somehow I didn't even have you pictured as a real thing, a real (and amazing) human I would meet shortly.

And now that I've met you, I wish I could rewind and record and write every single detail of every single kick and punch and hiccup because I realize that we will never have those days again. I loved the way you would sometimes wake me up in the morning with a huge rumble and somersault and the way certain foods made you crazy. I loved laying in the bath and watching your hands or feet distort my stomach. Being with you during that time (however uncomfortable) was just truly special. There can be no closer bond, I would imagine. I am so grateful to have spent those months with you, whale-like and insecure or not.

I had to have my membranes stripped twice in order to get you to come.  By the time they did that, I couldn't walk without my relaxed pelvis grinding against itself and I couldn't roll in bed without the use of serious inertia and dedication.  I was ready.  But again, now that I'm sitting on this side, I realize I had no idea what ready was.

But it's late and you're hungry and I'm tired so I will get back here tomorrow.  I will tell you more. Because the parts of this story that come next are the most important parts.  The parts where I got to meet you, where we both were so very, very sick, and the part where you changed everything.  In my life there are lots of before and afters.  The one with you, though, it matters the absolute most.

But that, I fear, is a story for another night.