It was worth it

Today my oldest child is 3 years old (or will be at 11:53 or whatever it was ... I was flat out on a surgical table, the recipient of an emergency c-section).

How the heck did this happen? I remember when he was a fat, big-headed blob of a baby who swayed when he sat alone. I remember nights and nights of sitting on the edge of the bed rocking a crying Boy because I had not yet discovered the simple miracle of simethicone. (If you are expecting a child GO BUY SOME RIGHT NOW!)

I remember being so dissappointed that I couldn't use the like-new Snugli that I'd found for $1 at the thrift store because he was so freakin big that it, combined with my huge boobs, hurt my back. (He weighed 10 1/2lbs at birth, and I've not been able to use it for either of his sisters who came home right at 9lbs each. *sigh*)

What? When? Where?

I tell you it's been a very very cool ride that's only been augmented by the aformentioned two sisters. I even find myself eager to fast forward ahead a few years, when we've completed our family (we'll try for 5), and get to see all of them interact and learn and grow.

They're exasperating, delightful, frustrating and sometimes so amusing that you have to stop and wipe the tears of laughter out of your eyes. Then sometimes they're so maddening you just have to clench teeth and ball up fists and leave the room.

But you know what I remember most? Every time I look at him? I remember those dark years, those pre-Boy years, before I met Darling Hubby - when I was still married to White Trash Dickhead, when I tried and tried and couldn't get pregnant. How I'd go a few months with no period, then *POW* it would come like a clotted flood. How I'd stand in the shower with blood running down my legs and cry and wish I was dead.

I often think that what I went through before was my pre-payment for this. Could that be possible? I really do think that everything evens out in the end and that people get what's coming to them. I think things are cyclical. But all that suffering? Those nights with Jack Daniels and an empty house considering the most sure way of ending it all?

Well, whatever it is, I'll take it. A 'take the money and run' approach to life. Fuck it. I try very hard to be a good person and do what's right (part of my 'everything evens out' philosophy) and if I have to tip-toe around the Fates, so be it.

You have NO idea what's going to happen in the future. I say live your life and be prepared for what might happen. A lot of people say that I am overly lucky. Perhaps. But they don't know what I've been through. I'm 40 years old and have paid a LOT of dues. A whole lot.

And if these three (and a half) creatures are my payment then I'll take it. The suffering was worth it. Every. Single. Bloody. Tear-stained. Second.