Hadley,
Today you are six months, 2 weeks and 2 days. For the last 198 days, you have been the crux of our every everything. I spent thirteen weeks with you and day by day you learned your basic needs. I watched you take in the world around you, become more alert, learn to recognize people and other objects. I watched you transform from a newborn to an infant. I saw your smiles, heard your first giggle, listened as you found your voice, and discovered different textures. I watched as you began to focus your gaze on our faces, rather than look beyond them. I held you as you cried, and soothed you to become calm. When it was time for me to return to work, your Daddy took over and he stayed home to take care of his sweet baby girl - the first person in his office to take advantage of this new benefit that I am so thankful he is given.
He has heard those little giggles turn into belly laughs. He's taught you how to enjoy tummy time and roll over, how to jump in your jumparoo, to sit on your own like a big girl, and turn the pages of a book. Your little voice has changed and you call out now, you sing to us, you babble on and on. He has watched you become this precocious, energetic, happy baby girl. Every day he took you on walks and swung with you on the porch swing. In his last week of leave with you, you started stretching out your arms big and wide, he would do the same and lift you to him for the game he calls Big Hugs. You've started reaching for our faces, touching our cheeks, and giving us kisses.
I treasure every minute of every day I was home with you, and more so, I treasure the special time your Daddy got to have home with you. I hope when you grow up and if you become a Mommy someday, you will have plenty of time home with your babies without having to compromise your income, job responsibilities, or career aspirations. I hope you can have it all with cessation. I hope that all working mommies won't have to have a choice between spending those needed months (yes, it is months) with their baby, or being able to financially contribute to the household to provide what is needed for their families. I wish that a true maternity leave would be available for working moms, one that is representative of the beauty and importance of bringing a new life into the world, while indicative of what it entails to ensure the proper health and connectivity needed for a mother and a child. I hope that all Daddies will have the ability to take paternity leave and bond with their babies, taking care of them, being part of this very important time of growth and development as well, further solidifying a true partnership with their spouse in this joint venture called parenthood. I was fortunate to have 13 weeks with you, then when my time ended, your Daddy was able to spend 15 weeks with you - but this is not necessarily the norm and that's a shame.
Today is a new step for us as a family. Today I do the hardest thing I've had to do during your 198 days. Today I hand you over to someone we've never met, in a place you don't know, and trust them with your care. I wish I could explain it to you in a way you'd understand, and reassure you that everything will be okay, that we will be back for you. You've become used to Mommy being gone but you were in your own house with Daddy responding to your needs. Now everything is changing for you. My heart aches and it hurts that you are now going to be out of our daily care. That I won't be able to come home at lunch to see you and nurse you. That Daddy won't be there to make things better when you cry. It was a painful, long road to get you into this world - it is hard to put that trust in someone else to take care of you as well as we would. Will you find the comfort that you need when you cry? Will you know they love and care for you too? I'll miss those pictures and videos of what you are doing that get me through the day. I'm afraid to miss more of your firsts, for someone else to get those.
But can I tell you something? I'm also really excited for you.
These six months we've watched all these wonderful things take place with you. We've also watched as you've interacted with others. How you light up and have intrigue, especially with other little ones. You are going to love being around others your age and your teachers, learning from them, taking the world in. This is going to be so wonderful for you and honestly, it will be better developmentally than what we could do with you at home. You are going to thrive and it's important for us to let you. We want to give you this experience.
I want you to know that there is no greater job that either your Daddy or I have than being your parents. That's why, as your parents, we go to work every day - that is what is best for our family. The truth of the matter is, I love what I do, the job I have, the career I've built - I personally need that time to contribute to society and to our family. Even more so, I love what I get to come home to when that day at the office is done and be your Daddy's wife, and your Mommy. We work hard for you, to provide for you, to set an example for you. Every day, we aim to better ourselves as professionals in the careers we've worked hard to have in order to lay that foundation for you, so that you may blaze your own trail someday. You are going to have friends whose mommies or daddies don't go into an office every day and that is just as wonderful. That is what works best for their family, that is how they show their love to their littles. It doesn't mean we love you any less, or that they love theirs any less. We are all doing what is best for our own families, because each family is different with no two the same. You are going to do great things baby girl, you can do whatever you want to do. You can be a stay at home mom, you can be a work from home mom, you can be a go to the office mom, you can work part-time, you can work full-time. You can have a career, be a wife, be a mom - do them separately or all at the same time. You can take the world by storm and we are your biggest cheerleaders.
Whenever we pack you up in the car and we drop you off at daycare, know that during those nine hours we are away, it is because we love you as much as we do. You are our motivation, our inspiration, and we know you are thriving where you are. Although I cried today leaving you, handing you over to people we didn't know, it's not something I would change given the choice right now. They were so comforting, told us we could call whenever we needed, come by whenever we wanted. In my heart I feel like I should have already done this, the first day at daycare thing, with your brother. If he were here, Hudson would have been in the classroom across the hall. I think that made more tears flow and the experience that much harder. As I met other parents at pick up time, I wondered if our paths would have crossed already, if we would have been doing life together as parents but instead we meet now for the first time? While he's not next door to be there if you need him, he is always with you. When we picked you up for the day, before you realized we were there, we saw that you were happy - you were so happy - and that made us happy.
We love you Hadley Jane. We want to make you proud, and for you to know that you always make us proud. Everything we do is out of love for you.
Nosies,
Mommy
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