First Birthday, WOAH!
Noah is one years old, today, and wow I cannot even believe it. There are a zillion thoughts, emotions and feelings I am experiencing when I sit and reflect on his first year of life.
My husband and I woke up before the alarm, as Noah was babbling in his crib this morning. He will play and babble until we get him up for the day. We were discussing the day I went into labor, our excitement and our fears, the unknown and pure joy when Noah Thomas entered the world.
As a blind Mom, I think that I experience events differently, both good and bad. It’s tough, not being able to look at pictures of Noah from when he was tiny as a newborn. I am not able to compare pictures, facial/body features, or toothless smiles, to those same things now. I cannot look in the monitor and see him peacefully sleeping on his tummy or standing up in his crib like a goofball. I am unable to see him shovel his food into his mouth during meal or snack times. I can’t look over at him on his play mat, playing with toys and flipping through his favorite books. I can’t see his expression when I pick him up from daycare. The list goes on on and but the most important thing is that, he will always be my little boy and I will always love him unconditionally.
What I can and I do appreciate is, feeling an old onesie or sleeper from when he was a newborn. It is crazy to think that he really was that little at one point and not too long ago. I am always feeling his body and tickling his toes and cheeks to see how he grows. I ask my husband to describe how Noah sleeps sometimes so that I can imagine looking at him myself. When holding him, I nuzzle my nose to his head and feel his hair getting longer and thicker. I sometimes will feel what he is playing with so that I can talk about it to him since I cannot see it from across the room. I read him braille books and he follows along with his fingers too. I rub his back while he is in his crib and he pops up and sits and I continue to rub his back as we play “throw the lovey” across the crib. I can hear his excitement when I knock on the door of his daycare room to pick him up at the end of the day.
Noah and I have a special bond, as most Mom’s do with their son’s. We have a cute gesture that we both do and giggle while doing it. I nuzzle my nose on Noah’s cheek when I hold him in my arms, he does the same thing back to me and we kind of eskimo kiss. It is my way of “seeing” him, and it is simply adorable.
Sometimes, Noah will grab my hand, probably unintentionally, but it melts my heart. He pulls up on my pant leg to have me pick him up, or usually, to grab my hands so that he can walk around the house with assistance.
In the bathtub, I play with Noah and we make up silly games and songs. We also make funny noises and faces in the mirror. When I use the washcloth to clean his body, it allows me to “see” how big he is. I put lotion on before putting on his jammies and this gives me the opportunity to feel how long his arms have gotten and how big his feet are now.
I know that memories fade over time, as they do for all of us, but I am going to try to hold on to these memories as long as I can, because for me, that is all that I have, until there comes the day where a cure for sight loss is found and I can stare at pictures and videos that we have of our little love bug.
I am very grateful for our special bond and for creating memories each and every day!