How it goes

(Thank you so much for all the love and blessing.  We are not ever alone, even far away.)

What wonderful creatures newborns are. The grunty squeaks, the rooting, the little frantic passes at your nose and lips. And then a wonderful stillness, almost a listening, before their digestive systems overtake them and overwhelm them and an explosive poop echoes into the peace of your bed.

Mmmmm.

Kid A has this absolute horror of the baby's spit up (still deciding on a nickname). He loves to hold him, he is the sweetest older brother, but he just gags if his baby brother spits up while he is holding him. It makes me laugh.

We all love him. I am taking every single second that I can, just to stare at him.

Chinua and I trip out on how much he looks like the others. He looks almost exactly like Leafy did, with YaYa's complexion, but from some angles I am overwhelmingly reminded of Kid A as a newborn. And then it's YaYa. And then I am telling Chinua that I need to nurse Leafy, and he's all, you need to nurse who? It seems that there is a certain way that we make babies, and they don't stray far from the mold.

I'm a wonderful milky mess, with curves for approximately the fourth time in my life, curves that I show off to Renee and Chinua whenever I get the chance. Check me out, I say. My belly is gone and it has moved upward.

I'm weepy. "Do you hate me?" I asked Chinua this morning, tears pitifully flowing down my cheeks. "Do you think I'm a failure?" He lay beside me for awhile and reminded me of these hormone things that happen. It's the third day. Now is the time for tears, and milk, and then the baby pees on me and we are all just soaking. And there is so much love, everywhere.

I love to eat. Kind people bring me food. Normally I make breakfast every morning, and lunch as well, but Jaya has been watching me and she brings me the very breakfast I would have made... fruit and muesli and yogurt and honey, even though I haven't asked her to. I don't feel nauseous anymore in the morning, I don't have to eat bite by bite, slowly, so that I don't throw up. I can chug back a glass of water if I want to, first thing in the morning, without throwing up. Renee made me lunch and I had no heartburn, no little tiny stomach that doesn't want to take in food. I swear it was the best thing I had ever tasted in my whole entire life.

I am weak. Sometimes I feel like I will faint when I stand up. I walk around like an old lady, still exhausted from the birth. I am processing all that happened. I am writing it out slowly. I am recovering.

The kids sit on my bed and watch me nurse, they watch me change the baby, they hold him, they kiss him. I have three boys. I can't believe I have three boys. Leafy seems a little disturbed, although I think it is more from my absence than from the new baby, whom he loves. He sits on my lap and holds him on his lap, with that proud shy look he gets when he thinks he's doing something pretty cool. I'm so glad that Leafy fits on my lap again.

I stare at the baby, I smell him, I kiss him relentlessly. This is how it goes.