5th September 2023 my son’s first day at school. As a mother, he is my first child, and so
this was my first experience of my baby starting a school, leaving a nursery where he started as a baby, and filling those big boy shoes as he walked to school.
I knew in my heart for a long time, that he was so ready to start school. Even though he is a younger one, being born in May, he had largely outgrown the dynamic of the nursery and was ready for more routine, more structure and focused learning. He had even begun saying to me “I will learn that when I go to school”.
What I hadn’t realised was how I felt throughout this process, I knew this was going to be tougher on me emotionally, even though he was the one going through this change. All of a sudden I wondered where the last four years had gone?
Where my tiny little 6lb 5oz baby had gone?
One of the biggest things I have noticed a mother is how much quicker time passes, than it ever has.
Naturally, our lives getting busier looking after little ones and it is so much more focussed on their needs.
Before you know it, Christmas rolls around again, holidays, birthdays and they’re a year older, then another year.
This feeling makes me want to hold onto him tighter and tighter every year, every milestone.
& so instead of doing that, at those particular points in time, I do it every day.
But not in the sense that, he cant leave my loving grasp. But that I consciously take time each day, to just be present in the moment with him.
I make a conscious choice, to just soak him up, stare at his gorgeous little face and take in all features, close my eyes while we have a cuddle in the morning before getting up for the day and just revel in that moment. I really just LIVE in that moment, smile to myself and absorb that moment for exactly what it is.
Especially at the age he is at, we often have moments, afternoons, days of backchat, attitude and pure patience testing. I have even learnt, to be able to smile in some of those moments, because his funny little voice as he repeats back to me what I have said, will change one day, and I want to just enjoy it. The way he drops his r’s sometimes, I am sure he will grow out of one day, but I am sure as anything I don’t want to feel like I missed it, or wished it away.
So here we are, in the thick of the moments, standing tall and saying I am here, I see you, you have 100% of me right now and I am soaking up 100% of you.
Some days, parenting is so tough, and other days are so beautiful, but have you ever wondered how truly present we are in it all? When are minds are whirring thinking about the next thing, and then the next again after that, so we aren’t truly present and living in that solid moment, experiencing it.
A list of my favourite times, and the times I find the easiest to just stop and be present in the moment;
1. Playing in the bath
2. Cuddles in bed in the morning before we get up for the day
3. That cuddle before he goes off to school
4. Playing at the park
5. Watching his swimming lesson
6. Sharing food together
7. When he tells me all about his day
Are just a few, but find some time, any time, once a day, even if its just a few seconds, to soak them up and give them 100%, see them exactly as they are, in that moment. For they can change in the next.
I honestly think this is why I also found him going to school so emotional. I was some conscious, of each step of his getting ready, which item of clothing went first, not getting any dog hair on the black items, doing his jumper before doing his hair, that when he was ready, it was such a moment, he looked so different, so big, I was 100% in those moment focussed on him and this process with him.
When I stop and think about my son, and how much I love him, it makes me emotional. I am so beyond eternally grateful for him.
Do you ever sit and realise, understand, how grateful you are to be blessed with your babies?
Get present, live in the moments with them, fall into their world, bring out your inner child, with your child, connect, play.
You’re their best friend. & as they grow, you will have grown with them, by their side.
Comments