The Beat of My Heart...

Every Monday afternoon, I have to get ready for work.  Most days it takes awhile if KK is awake because she is now into everything.  She pulls clothes off the hangers, gets into the trash, wants into the shower, puts bottles into her mouth and opens the cabinets and pulls out everything.  I usually bank extra time to make it out the door.  Today she was sleepy so I tried laying her down.  She got this cute stuff sheep with a few noise machine noises on it.  The other day I took it out, so I let her take it to bed with her for nap time today and she loved it.  She gets to pick the sound and within a minute she's fallen asleep without a peep. 

But my heart melted a little when I turned up the monitor today.  There peacefully asleep was my little lady, butt up in the air listening to the sound of a heart beat.  While in my office I find this sound to particularly drive me nuts, a few of my clients love it.  It always felts like a kid banging on a drum. I guess it's because for her, she spent 9 months listening to it.  Nine months in my belly being loved on and it feels like home.   I love this kid so much, because for nine months I felt her.  I felt her pretty early on in pregnancy, and I loved her from the start.  So to hear her soothed by a heart beat today melted my heart. 


I am not a big proponent of co-sleeping for our family because I am a light sleeper as is KK.  I figured from night one, no one would sleep well if we added a baby who might suffocate, so she's always been in a crib or bassinet.  She's always slept well.  She has always fallen asleep without assistance.  She's always been quite independent.  While it's a blessing to have such an easy baby, with her going to daycare, I feel less and less needed by her.  If she has her blankie, a cup of something, and her paci she is the ultimate self-soother.  Sometimes I just feel like I could be replaced by any childcare person.  But today, as I listen to her listen to the heart beat and I see how relaxed she is, that once annoying rhythm reminds me that she loves me, needs me, and misses me when I am away.

I hate leaving her most of the time.  We really are so close now.  I see why parents who lose a child to death or become estranged can fall apart.  I know I would now that I know this kind of love.  The heart beat has been playing as I write this.  My heart beats along with it.  KK has changed my heart so much.  It's so much easier to close the door to "the things of this world" and all of the brokeness in it.  Love is truly the one thing that matters in this world.  It's the only thing that changes us.  It's the only truly holy thing that I have experienced from above and here on earth that sustains my soul. 

Earlier today I was having one of those theological thoughts about "the point of life"...  It was meaningless for a moment.  It was depressed for a moment.  And then I heard the heart beat.  I was reminded.  Reminded just how much this life is worth every ounce of struggle and pain... To experience this kind of love, I'd do it all over again...