My third child is the best last baby I could have asked for. But probably not in the way you are imagining.
You see, somewhere along the line I got the impression that third babies are laid back, chill babies. They handle the chaos with grace and sleep through anything because they have to. They are born into a busy bustling family dynamic that is already firmly in place, so they don’t come along expecting to change anything. They just find their place in it.
So naturally, I expected a chill baby who slept through the night and smiled all the time and never fussed about anything. This misinformation probably contributed to my hesitation to officially call her our “last baby”. Deep down, the idea of having more than three made me gulp, for a variety of reasons. But when I felt her little kicks in my belly and imagined holding my sweet sleeping darling I couldn’t imagine closing the door on the stage of life.
Then she arrived.
And she is just as sweet and precious as I imagined she would be.
Aaaaand from day one she shattered my idea of what a third baby would be like. She didn’t slide quietly into our family dynamic. She marched in and dramatically planted her flag so that no one could possibly overlook her arrival.
And even though it was a shock to adjust my naive expectations to the new reality, as I sit here cradling her sleeping body on the six month anniversary of her birth, I can now see that she is the perfect last baby.
Because she has made it very clear to me that she is our last baby.
After two smooth pregnancies, hers came with complications, reminding me how nerve wracking growing a human can be.
After a night in the NICU for jaundice, she reminded me how heartbreakingly hard parenting can be when you have to watch your kids go through something difficult.
After six months of still not sleeping through the night she reminded me of the limitations of my own sanity.
After months of fussing every time I set her down she reminded me that my other children don’t stop needing me when a new one comes along.
After months of remembering how hard nursing is, after weeks of trying to convince her to eat baby food to no avail, after realizing she is going to start crawling soon in the midst of our lego-and-shopkins-and-Barbie-shoe infected living room, she reminded me that this parenting gig takes guts. Guts and heart and laundry detergent and wine.
After all this and more, I know in my gut that she is my last.
Sure, some of it has to do with finding my own personal limit to the number of children I can adequately parent. But actually, it’s more than that.
It’s about appreciating what I have.
She reminded me that pregnancy is hard, but she also reminded me that modern medicine is miraculous and that my own body is miraculous and that because of a combination of those miraculous things I have three beautiful healthy daughters.
She reminded me that parenting is sometimes so painfully hard that you can only survive it one hour at a time while you wait for the sun to come up after the longest night of your life. But she also reminded me what a blessing it is to love another human so much that it changes you.
She reminded me how much I need sleep to be a decent human but she also reminded me how beautiful the quiet night is.
She reminded me that children aren’t always what you expect them to be and that there’s a chance for me to grow from the things I can’t control.
She reminded me how hard the first few months of a new life can be. And she made sure that I slowed down and snuggled her long enough to see the beauty hidden in the struggle.
She is the perfect last baby because she reminded me why it is time for us to be done with this stage of life and she also reminded me of the beauty in being done with this stage of life.
Six months ago this tiny little five pound human showed up, planted her flag in my heart and woke me up in ways I didn’t even know I needed.
She’s been waking me up ever since.
(Literally. 😉 )