Happy One Month Birthday Baby Boy

I've spent a lot of time lately wondering about the future. I mean, it's crazy how Motherhood immediately turns one into a life pondering person. I worry a lot more. I wax and wane through fear and intense gratification. I would describe it as so thankful that I fear it will be taken away.  That at some point the greatness has to end. I'm not negative, just cautious.  Some would say we've had a lot happen to us this year and that we've paid our dues.  I realize that you just never know.  In my eyes, we had a tough year, but our son is home with us weighing twenty pounds with no feeding tube, trying to crawl, splish splashing in the pool like any other 9 month old.  SO many HLHS babies don't make it. So many are on feeding tubes for years. So many have additional health related complications.  Paxton is the "poster child" HLHS baby. It's what we've been told. He is exactly how HLHS would play out if doctors could plan this defect.  How FREAKING lucky are we.
I was wading in the pool with him today reveling in the gloriousness that having my son in my arms on this beautiful summer day really is!

 It is glorious.

I. never. want. it. to. end.

Yet every single time I walk into his room I immediately check for breathing because I am so afraid this will all be taken away from me.  I am so afraid it's been so good that it's time to pay the piper. When in reality our son has half a heart and man that really sucks. But then it doesn't.  Do you know what his half a heart has taught every single person in this family...What he has taught so many more that are not blood related...
Oh' this gorgeous cherub has changed the world in my eyes and I don't think he is done yet.
Thinking back to the days full of the greatest fear I have ever known a year ago this time to see how far we have come astounds me.  I realize that life is what you make it. I have been blessed, as oh' so many Mothers are, with this innate ability to do what I have to do.  Whatever we have to do for our little bugs, we somehow muster up the strength to do it come hell or high water.
I thought I was a good Mom before Paxton, but now, now I know the absolute fragility of each moment given to us, and that's with any child. We don't know our fate. We don't know how it's all gonna go down and I am a constant work in progress as I find the control freak in me is not in fact, in control.  That no matter what I do, how many times I check my boys breathing, his destiny is not up to me.
Nor are my other two boys.
I love my babies with every fiber of my being. It's so hard to let go. To allow life to play out however it's going to.
So I do my best to take it one day at a time. To relish the small things.

The moments where Paxton looks at me with pure joy.

 When Austin looks at me with his angel face and says " I wuv you Mommy."

(obviously old pic of course)

Or Mason saying "Hold me Mommy, sweep wit me" (Sleep with me) and I do.

Oh' the power they have over my heart. It's absolutely indescribable.
I spend my days praying that their Dad and I are able to be here on this Earth for them until they are old enough to navigate it on their own.
I pray that my children's health remains intact. That they never have to suffer. I know the suffering that happens, my youngest has endured it and I have seen far, far more worse with my own eyes.

I pray that my children become good stewards on this journey..

There is so much that takes over our hearts when we make the decision to have children. The moment you find out you are with child, you are different and when that baby makes his or her way into your arms you are never, ever the same.
I will never be able to go back to the freedom my heart knew b.c. (before children). My heart is theirs and while it will always be full of worry, fear and nervous anticipation; it will also be full of gratitude, hope and a love I will never really be able to put into words.
While I am changed beyond anything my mind could have ever imagined, I know that no matter how heavy my heart feels at times, there is nothing in this world that can compare to being a Mommy. To feeling them kick inside my belly. That first time I laid eyes on 1, 2, 3 of them as they entered this universe wailing at the top of their lungs.

The pride I feel each time they accomplish something, say a new word, show kindness to each other and use their manners. It really is priceless and worth the sleepless, sometimes heart wrenching moments that come along with Mommyhood.

(Oh' i phone, how I wish you took better pictures...)

"It's only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth -- and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up -- that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had."

Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross ~J