Eleanor,
For reasons you will understand when you are older, this Mother's Day was hard. My heart hurt and at the same time I was filled with such joy at you today. The opposites of those feelings made me feel torn in two directions.
I always assumed I would be a young mother. And then it took years of praying and tears, only to have you surprise us when we least expected it. I spent that entire pregnancy just so happy, looking back on photos of those months nearly requires sunglasses. Then you came and my world was flipped for the better.
For the so much I could never have imagined it better.
I had spent time worrying how to be a mother. How would I make sure you knew you were loved, even when I needed to teach you, discipline you? How would I keep my sanity and not snap, to view the world from your angle and try to see you weren't purposefully (usually) trying to be a pain?
It was easy. I love you. And the ease made my heart hurt because I had thought it would be hard.
You made me a mother, the greatest gift I have ever been given. My beautiful, spunky, strong-willed, joyful first. You are beyond easy to love, even in the hard moments.
I love you,
Mama
