On the Eve Of You

My dear boy,

We are just weeks- or maybe days- away from meeting you and I have so much to tell you before you get here.

More than anything, I want you to know how excited we are to see your sweet face and hold you and lock eyes with you.  Each night we crawl into bed and talk about you and what it will be like to have you home with us.  I always say that I can’t wait to hold you and your daddy, well he is so silly, because he talks about wanting to poke at you and take you to Starbucks in the baby carrier to get a gold card.

We just want you here with us and still can’t quite comprehend how real you are.

These last couple of months, you have been truly celebrated.  Friends and neighbors held celebrations in your honor and we have been overwhelmed by all of the love and excitement they have shown in awaiting your arrival.  People we do not know have sent you gifts or sent us messages congratulating us.  They heard our story and know what a miracle you are and they just want to be a part of our joy.  

It’s almost as if you are everyone’s baby, but how blessed we are that you are ours.

Lately, you and I have been meeting in my dreams.  I hold you and we go for walks and there is always a lot of kissing and cooing.  I love those dreams and our time together in them.  

Could a mother love her son anymore than I love you?  I just don’t see how it’s possible.

I keep thinking about how this time last year I was resigned to the idea that we would never have a baby and although it was not what I wanted, I was beginning to settle in with that.  But your daddy always had hope and he- along with the hopes and prayers of so many others- believed it was not yet the end for us.  

That kind of hope comes from GOD and it is because of HIM you are here, my sweet baby.  

These last nine months have been so redemptive for me physically.  I have spent the last three years mourning (and sometimes hating) my body and what it would not do and now I get to revel in all the ways it has changed because of you.

And I cannot help but think of the babies we have lost.  They are your brothers and sisters and you will never meet them, but we will talk about them.  They will be important for you to know about because their lives- and their deaths- changed me in ways that have shaped the woman I am now; the mother I will become; and the follower of CHRIST I am called to be.

Grief changes a person- it has to- and the choice I had to make was if I was going to let it make me bitter or softer.  I never wanted bitterness to be my legacy and that is not something I will pass on to you.

And so, on the eve of you, I want you to know that you are treasured beyond riches and wanted beyond desires.  You are our miracle and an embodiment of GOD’s promise to make all things new.  

I love you so much, dear boy.