a story about skin to skin

I got to share some words over at Lisa-Jo Baker's space yesterday- words about mothering, words about what I had expected from my first pregnancy and how everything and nothing changed when Jack made his grand entrance into the world. It's a day late to be posting but of course, the real work of mothering involves convincing a 14-month-old that it really is raining outside (getting into coats and boots and going outside, then crying, then coming inside...).It's a story about the wondrous hard work of mothering. It's a story that you have all helped me write, as you ponder with me this walk into being someone's mom. It's a story you've taught me to see, in all your comments and prayers and well wishes. I know it's been quiet around these parts, but the semester is ending and there is new space carved into my week to write and reflect.I can't wait to walk through it with you.--I spent a year and 20 days grieving an empty five minutes. They were the first minutes of my son’s life, minutes of quick, quiet NICU intervention hidden from me where I lay, bleeding profusely onto the delivery room floor, the doctor remembering three stitches in that she hadn’t in fact given me an anesthetic before starting to sew me back together. They were the five minutes I had once imagined as the moments of transformation, the moments I thought I would become a mother, the moments when I would begin, if there is such a thing as beginning after nine months of pregnancy...Keep reading over at Lisa-Jo's?love,hilary