I sometimes tend to be a delayed reactor when it comes to emotions. The things that affect me the most, I tend to not respond to in the moment. I set my feelings aside and just keep moving on with life. But even though the feelings have been set aside, they don't just fade away, and later they always find a way of seeping out.
Recently, I have been experiencing those seeping emotions. The last few weeks I have been feeling all the emotions of Ben being in the hospital after he was born. It's been eight months, but I am only just now really feeling it. Not so much the hardship of being in the hospital, but the joy of returning home.
Lately, I have been holding him a little closer, and thanking God for him a little more often. I find myself feeding him or holding him and thinking, "Look at him! He's doing so well! He's okay. He's here. He's mine."
When he was still at the hospital, even though I was with him, I felt the separation. First, with the bili-lights, when I literally wasn't even allowed to hold him unless absolutely necessary. Then with all the cords and tubes and IVs when we were at Children's. He was mine, but I couldn't have him fully. I couldn't hold him anytime I wanted. I couldn't nurse him--he would only take a bottle. If he was awake at night I couldn't snuggle him in bed like I would my other kids. He was stuck in that hospital, and I was stuck feeling like an outsider instead of a mother.
When we finally came home, it was back to normal life. Then again, it wasn't, because instead of four children, I now had five. It was busy! I didn't have time to deal with my own emotions-- I had to take care of an infant, as well as four other children who were having lots of feelings of their own!
It's funny how sometimes other big events can bring out feelings from the past. We have recently moved, and I think that the stress and craziness of that process has begun to bring out those hidden emotions from last Spring that had been so carefully put away.
The emotions I wasn't ready to feel and didn't have time for a few months ago are now coming out in sweet and strange ways. They make me treasure the moments I have with my little guy a little more. They make me tear up at random moments when there is really nothing to cry about. They make me appreciate how sweet he is, and how little and cute.
I think what I feel the most, is thankful. I am so very thankful that I have my sweet boy with me. That he really is doing great. That he really is okay. That what put him in the hospital was not something more serious.
It is so good to have him home with all of us-- not cared for by nurses (as wonderful as they were with him), but loved by his family.
It is so good to know that he's mine :)
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