TO MY GIRLS

Sure your stories look different, but the dream of each of you grew in my heart, in secret, in the waiting for you both.

When I became your mother, Nova, it wasn’t in a hospital room with a midwife and doctor. I hadn’t labored physically for you, but it was as though my heart and spirit had.

That day my heart was racing. It was as though I was being freed from all the pain I had carried in it while waiting to become a mother. I loved you before I met you, but I fell in love with you that cold June day when I first held you and looked into those big brown eyes.

I feel that same way every day that I look at you in the same way, it’s just that I know you now, and what a privilege it is!

When I became your mother, Vida, you had me bearing down, using all the strength I had. I felt both weak and strong at the same time. Pushing with every bit of life I had in me so that you could begin yours. I was so ready to meet you. Your life is a testimony of faith and healing!

When I first held you on that hot January morning, and looked into your beautiful blue eyes, I sensed that we somehow knew each other already. I guess that’s what happens when you’ve been tucked away inside me for so long. You have the same hands as I do, your dimple is in the same place as mine.

Both of your stories and your lives were equally longed for, prayed for, hoped for and Are equally beautiful.

When I look at each of you, I see myself. I see my children.

Strange how two very different stories can have the exact same outcome: A heart filled to overflow, my hands holding tiny perfect hands, and the honor of being called mother by both my girls.

Pain is a strange thing: We think it signifies something bad, but not in the moments when you become a mother; whether through the miracle of adoption or the miracle of birth. The pain seems insignificant when you know the physical or emotional pain will only be an echo in the time to come, but what it produces will sing on into eternity.

I love so much that God knew you would be sisters, and he knew I would be your mother. He knew our story before we could even comprehend the beauty of it.

I’m so thankful.

Xx

Mommy