Dear Juliet and Simon

Dear Little Christmas Angels,

A few things I don't want you (or me, mostly) to forget about this wonderful Christmas.

Juliet, it's so easy to start listing them-- you singing Jingle Bells, you loving the "bubbles" on the tree, your red frock, your face when you saw the kitchen Santa brought. The way you say "dorry" and look everywhere for the doll you got (who is incidentally called Juliet, too, or so says the box, but I think Dorry is better.) christmas coincided with a language explosion for you this time, and every day has brought more magic. Mummy is now firmly in your lexicon, and I couldn't be happier. Little sentences are starting to appear, too, and No is your favourite word. You are challenging in the way an almost-two-year-old should be, and rewarding beyond my ability to express. Your little triumphs make me so proud and are the best gifts all year long. I didn't need to open a thing on Saturday morning, only to see you so happy, and so beautiful and so smart.

And Simon, well, baby boy, you challenge me, too, in ways I never expected. I get frustrated with the feeding and reflux situation. It brings me to tears sometimes, including on Boxing Day, but always know that it's because I can't make it better for you, even though I desperately want to. It's because I want things to be smooth and all giggles and joy, but it's far from your fault that it's not. I love seeing you change, too, seeing you grow and perhaps because of the hardships, hearing you laugh is that much sweeter, that much more of a treasure. I loved sitting with you in the dark on Christmas eve, watching the tree and listening to you drink and breathe and I felt relaxed and so, so, so thankful. So full. You were the gift this year I didn't know I wanted, but sometimes those are the very best kind (definitely so when it comes to you). You don't understand the presents, the decorations and gathering of people we love. You just know cuddles and puke and milk at the moment, I think. But you were loved. You made everyone proud, made everyone want a cuddle, and your smiles lit up the room more than any fairy lights could have.

There is a time in my past that was so dark, when I never dreamed I could feel this happy, this complete, this level of joy, but my heart nearly burst this last week, many times, with love and pride and utter elation. You two are better than anything Santa's ever put under my tree. And every day is like opening some new surprise, some new discoveries.

Already, I can't wait for next Christmas.

I love you both to the top of the wise men's star and back again,
Mummy

Dear Simon

Dear Little Man,
Sometimes I think having a reflux baby is God's way of telling me I'm not in control of everything and I don't know everything.

One day you're inconsolable, gassy, unhappy and barely sleep, the next you take a 2-hour nap and smile all day. I get disheartened about the medicine, then gain confidence in it again. I wonder if it's something else, then decide it's not.

In short, I feel helpless sometimes. I want to make it better. I want a decent night's sleep. I want the experience of having Juliet as a baby to count for something, to make me know what on earth to do.

But life's like that sometimes, unfortunately. You'll learn that soon enough. Your sister's learning it now. Things don't always go how we want them to, but we adapt, and survive and try to laugh a little along the way. I blame myself incessantly, too, but that's a whole other letter, I'm afraid.

Anyway, I hope we get you on the right track soon, because I love yuo so much and if I could, I'd take that pain and discomfort and have it myself.

I love you lots,
Your (Very tired) Mummy

Dear Juliet and Simon

My Darling Juliet and Si-Si,
Mummy is poorly. I know you know this because I can't get through a story without losing my voice completely, and I've lost count of the times I've woken you up, Simon, from a snooze in my arms with the cough that would give any smoker a run for their money.

Oh, I had loads of lovely things I've been thinking about and wanting to write to you about with Christmas around the corner. So many things that have popped into my head and promptly been blown out into a tissue, apparently.

I think the sleeplessness and the fact I can't take anything, lest it get passed along to you, little man, makes it harder to cope. but, for 99% of the day and night, I'm OK, and even happy. Mummies don't get sick days. Mummies buck up and muddle through. And I'm really proud of myself for doing just that. My new mantra is "It's just a cold." Hearing you two cough or snuffle is 100000 times worse than any physical discomfort I'm experiencing.

Yes, I feel guilty that we haven't been out sledging in the snow, or taking walks at dusk to look at the lights, and the bathroom's nastiness has been niggling at my overdeveloped sense of guilt for a while, but we're going to survive and Christmas is going to come in a few days and I know it's going to be magical and perfect no matter what. 

More to come, hopefully, soon, but for now, forgive me for being in self-preservation mode and know that healthier days aren't far off.

Love you both,
Mummy

Dear Simon

Dear Simon,
I just wanted to tell you, in case you read all of these references to the journey we had to have your sister-- you're not an oops baby. Don't ever let anyone call you that.

No, we weren't planning to have another baby so soon (or at all if you'd have asked me), but I honestly believe that God has these plans for us that we can't know about, but that bring us to where we're meant to be, and one of the things I'm meant to be is your mummy. After years ot trying to have Juliet, of being told we had less than a 5% chance of having a baby on our own without help, I was content with one child. I was thankful for her.

But long before any of that, daddy and I used to talk about the family we wanted and we said we wanted two children. I think God heard us.

When I found out I was pregnant with you, I was in shock. And I'll never forget what your dad said: "We're not that lucky-- it can't be true." It was, and we are and as soon as the shock wore off, something in me shifted and I suddenly knew that our family just wasn't complete before-- that you'd been missing, and I knew that you were meant to be. People said Juliet was our miracle baby, and she was, but so were you. How else can I explain the 95% odds against you happening?

And truthfully, I'm so glad you did. You were meant to be my son, meant to come into our family exactly when you did. That's about as far from an accident or oops as you can get.

All my love,
Mummy

Dear Juliet

Dear Juliet,
I think it's really, really funny at the moment that you think everyone's (and everything's) nose goes honk honk when you pinch it.
I just didn't want to forget that because it's freaking cute.
Love you,
Mum

Dear Juliet and Simon

Dear Sweet Little Snowbunnies,

I think sometimes that parenthood is a chance for adults to do-over childhood. I want to do everything I think my parents should have done, and everything they did that I loved. I want to play with toys and sing and dance like a fool in the living room.

So when we woke up to 8+ inches of snow this morning, I was stoked. "Let's go play outside in the snow!" I sometimes feel a pang of sadness, growing up so far from my own childhood home, that you two won't have the joys of snow days and two hour delays and sledges and snow boots. I loved that gorwing up. Sure it's a pain sometimes (I remember my second grade Christmas play being cancelled for snow-- how sad I was), but generally, it's pure magic and I want you to have as much magic as possible in your lives.

Simon, you're way too small to play outside, tiny and vulnerable to germs, so you had to make due with looking out the window from the safety of Auntie Jill's arms at the falling flakes while mummy and Juliet played and threw snowballs at the window.

Juliet, you weren't keen at first. "Ewwww, no, wet," was your reply to my suggestion we go play outside, but you got all bundled in layers and wellies and gloves that are way too big for your little hands. And we played. Threw snowballs and caught snowflakes on our tongues. It was fun-- childlike, being cold and excited all at once, rosy-cheeked, and so warm and comfy when we came back indoors and got dry.

I hope you have more days like this, as you grow. I hope we go sledding. I hope you learn to make a really good snowball and that you have better aim than I do with them! Partly because I want you to have that magic, and partly because I want it for myself.

Either way, be snug in your warm little beds now, my angels and dream of dancing snowflkaes.

Snuggly love,
Mummy

Dear Juliet

Dearest Juliet,
I think the sibling rivalry/jealousy I have been so fearful of (and so hopeful about avoiding) has set in.

I watch you these days, crying, wanting to be held across my lap and fed your milk from a sippy cup like your little brother. You're still too small to want to be a big girl. You're still, really, a baby yourself.

And no matter how many moments I try to make in each day where it's just you and me, where you're the centre of the world, I know it's never enough. You had me to yourself until 9 weeks ago when it all changed. You were my baby and now I have to look after Simon. I see your eyes follow me when I go to get him out of his cot, hear you whimper and then full-on cry when I get up with him in the early hours of the morning. It kills me, kiddo.

I want to make you see how special you are to me, how badly I wanted you and how you made years of hoping and waiting and disappointment and doctors and tears all worth it in the instant I held you in that hospital room. That every day we shared, just us girls, will always be precious to me. How much I love seeing you grow-- it's never been as bitter as sweet for me. I'm so proud of you, so in awe of you, so in love with you, and even when I'm sitting there, helpless to solve the sadness that's making you cry because I'm feeding your (very needy) brother, I'm watching you and loving you and soaking up every second of seeing you grow and learn and show off just how incredibly smart and beautiful you are.


Sometimes, these days, I feel enormous guilt-- the night I took the pregnancy test for Simon, I looked at you sleeping in your cot and cried-- I felt I was cheating you of time with me, time to be our baby. I know that, before long, you two will be glad to have each other, and that you have someone to love for your whole life, but right now, it's hard for me, too.

So just know that you're still my very special girl, and even though I always thought it was super hokey and cheesy, it's true; a parent's heart expands to hold more love with subsequent children. The love isn't divided, it's multiplied.

Please be gentle with me, darling girl.

Love and kisses,
Your Mummy