Dear Elliott,I did it. Or rather, we did it. We are no longer a breastfeeding team. You are weaned. Lots of people thought we were crazy or odd to continue our morning and evening ritual of mommy milk and cuddling this long, but I cherished every moment (other than those few times you bit me, those moments sucked).
I nourished your little body from the time you were an hour old until Saturday, March 21. Seventeen months and two weeks. Feeding you is the most important thing I've done in my entire life. I'm incredibly proud of us.
Perhaps it was a cowardly way to end our nursing journey, but I left. First, I went and stayed with my best friend, Mary, and her new baby Owen. You see, Mary is feeling like I did when you were just a few weeks old. Unsure about her changing role as a mommy/wife/teacher/friend/sister/daughter/professional. Tremendously in love with a creature that does nothing but take, take, take from her physically. And completely, utterly exhausted. She needed me, and I needed her, so I left you with your very capable Daddy and went to Indianapolis for a few days. Owen will smile socially soon, and my bet is it will be at his mama. She's pretty amazing.
I cuddled Owen and changed his cloth diapers and laughed when he got squirted in the face with milk like you did. You see, Mary is at the beginning of her feeding journey, and we are at the end.
Daddy says you will be Owen's older, bad influence friend. But I like to think you will teach him like his Mama taught me. About friendship, fun and mischief without breaking the rules.
I raced home on Wednesday to find you climbing the furniture at Brenda's house. I kissed and hugged you until you squirmed and took you home. We immediately went outside and picked up rocks and sticks and chased kitties. Whenever we went inside you stood by the gate at the bottom of the stairs and made your "milk" sign and told me "night night" despite the fact it was 5:30 and you hadn't had dinner. You found your Boppy pillow downstairs behind the chair and brought it to me. In short, you made it clear what you wanted and I did not give it to you. This was incredibly hard, (as were my boobs), but I was able to distract you and you did just fine when your Daddy put you to sleep.
And then I left again the next morning. I went to Chicago to see my sister, Meredith, your "Auntie M," with Gram. We took the train and met my favorite blogger, Dooce, shopped, saw the Millennium Park "bean," ate amazing food, introduced Gram to Ikea, went to the spa and talked, talked, talked. I got home on Saturday night to find you cuddling Pap, who took amazing care of you while I was gone and Daddy was enjoying his annual pilgrimage to the MHSAA boys basketball state finals. You smiled at me, ran around the house for a few minutes and then went to sleep without a peep and without asking for Mommy Milk.
I feel like singing "I can see clearly now, the rain is gone." Not because my boobs are no longer shared property, but because being away from you, Daddy and work for a week made me see clearly the path before me. It's amazing what eight hours alone in the car can bring to the surface. And your Gram? Three full days with her is like tonic for my soul. My head is clear and sharp and I'm ready to tackle my astounding workload tomorrow with a new vim and vigor.
I hope someday you feel about me the way I do about my mommy, your Gram.
Tomorrow you will go back to Brenda's house , no worse for the wear. You will climb her furniture, read books, stack blocks, take a walk, drink cow's milk, eat canned carrots like it's going out of style and continue to amaze us with your exploding vocabulary. We've stopped counting your new words, and I take advantage of your willingness to say "mommy" and "love you" perhaps a little too often.
You are doing more complex tasks and problem solving (or shall I say, problem creating?) like a little person. You really love opening containers and putting items inside. Rocks, blocks, books, puzzle pieces, anything you can find you carry around like precious cargo and find a container to squish it all into. And you narrate. You string together sounds into a cacophony that makes your Daddy and I stare at each other and smile. I've said before that when all of your sounds become words, I will be karma's bitch. You see, Mommy was rarely quiet when she was a small child, and it looks like I will be learning the art of tuning out someone you love. Never say never.
Other than the great outdoors and anything you can climb, I think books continue to be your favorite toy. When it's quiet in the living room I'll often peek around the corner from the kitchen to find you flipping the pages of your favorite board books. Sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes upside down and backwards, but you love books.
And climbing.Just when I didn't think I could love you more, you love books! Let me tell you, it touches a place deep inside me, Elliott. I love books, too. I can't wait to share hundreds of thousands of pages of wonder, knowledge and imagination with you through books.
I'm so proud of the toddler you've become. You're strong-willed, vocal, tough, friendly, engaged, busy and loving. You would never come inside if we didn't lure you with "hot" (that's food to other people). You throw lots of things, but definitely throw anything round after calling it "ball" repeatedly. You love people; being in stores and restaurants gives you a chance to show off your skill of saying "HI!" to someone and then coyly grinning and looking away. You size up any new place and immediately find something to climb in, on or up. You give kisses and hugs freely and have learned to pet kitties and Gram and Pap's dog, Bella, very nicely.
You are my favorite person in the world, and I love watching you grow.
Love,
Mommy
