At Last

It's become cold here in Chicago.

So cold that my fellow mommies and I are discussing who has the best deals on Winter coats.

So cold that I broke out the comforter last night.

So cold that in lieu of our morning trip to the park, I decided to take Amira out during the slightly warmer afternoon instead.

This time last year, an Autumn walk meant no more than dressing my daughter in layers and avoiding the lakefront at all costs. But even if worse came to worse and she caught a minor cold, it wouldn't be that big of a deal for us.

Things are slightly different now.

Today, if my daughter were to catch a cold I'd have to immediately put her on her nebulizer.

I'd have to fill the bathroom with steam and rub her down with Vicks and wait for her breathing to become regular enough for her to get a good night's sleep.

Because at long last the inevitable has finally occured.

After 2.5 years, I've finally weaned my daughter.

I will never again nurse her through an illness.

I will never again nurse her when she falls and hurts herself.

I will never again put her to my breast and know that she'll be sleeping sweetly within 15 minutes...no matter HOW wired she'd previously been.

My baby's not a baby anymore.

And as much as I've longed for this moment over the past 6 months (when nursing began to feel more like a burden than a blessing)

I'd be lying if I said it wasn't bittersweet.

...And Found

I've lived in Chicago for 3 years now and every summer Lorenzo and I take the baby home to Boston to visit my family.

There was not much different about this vacation. I saw my family, my friends, and my old co-workers but because, upon our arrival, my best friend Maggie hadn't returned to Boston from her vacation yet, I was able to spend some time alone with her youngest daughter, Cat.

I am so grateful for that occasion.

Cat, who had just completed her freshman year of college, came to my mom's house to visit us as soon as she learned we were in town. Having not seen each other in a year we had a lot of catching up to do.

"Tell me all about college," I began.

And after filling me in on the classes she'd taken, her major, and her new friends, Cat gave me the details of her break up with her high school boyfriend. As much as it had hurt her at the time, she was doing much better now and knew it had been for the best.

Like Cat, I too had gone away to college with my high school boyfriend and like Cat, we also broke up before the end of the first year.

But...

I didn't handle things as well as she had.

I probably came as close to a nervous breakdown as one can get without needing psychiatric care. (THAT nervous breakdown would come years later...another post, another time)

Growing up, I never had any self-esteem. I have no idea why because I was surrounded by the most supportive, the most loving friends, family and teachers that anyone could ask for but...

Somehow I veered off track.

The books that had been a constant for me, the writing that had once sustained me were suddenly replaced with phone calls and love letters from boys.

The journaling that I had done, the poems and short stories I used to write...gone.

Instead, what mattered most was how pretty I was, how popular, how well-liked.

Somewhere along the line I lost myself.

Luckily, after many, many years I regained my sense of self-worth. And now, at 36, I enter a new phase of my life. My goal is no longer to be the sexy singleton. Today, I am a mother, a partner, and a role model to my little girl.

And I'm a writer, or at least, I plan on becoming one again.

To paraphrase something Toni Morrison once said there are two things I now know I have to do: I HAVE to be able to parent my child and I have to write. There are no longer any ifs, ands, or buts about it for me.

I have to write.

And that's exactly what I intend to do from here on out.