“You have never before been a mother to this baby at this moment.”  The doctor’s response had caught me off guard and made me look at mothering in a very different light.  His words seemed so obvious and yet at the same time left me with so much to think about.  How often had I tried to do it the same way for every child because it had worked before and either I or the child was left feeling like something was lacking.  Or I felt defeated when what worked with child #1 was a disaster with child #2.  I was humbled by the reminder, that not only was every child different, but I was also a different person, now than I was a few years ago.  This was a reminder that I needed to look at each child, each moment and myself with new eyes and a willingness to let them and me be different than a similar scenario in the past.

The truth is, I LOVE being a mom.  I love everything about it and in a perfect world would just keep adding new babies as the older babies moved out.  But alas, I must at some point admit that it might not be the best decision to have more babies.  So much about being a mom has surprised me – I love being the mom of teenagers, I am not always in the mood to read a story (my younger self would gasp at this admission), I quite often get the giggles when I am trying to discipline toddlers and I like being up during the night taking care of someone who needs me.

When I was expecting, my fifth baby, I felt I was a seasoned mom.  I had done this before and survived, chances were high that I could do this again.  That confidence, that I was in control, should have been my first hint that I better brace myself for a humbling lesson from a tiny human.  If motherhood has been nothing else for me it has been humbling.

Baby #5 came a little later than we expected but all went well with the birth.  I should have been concerned when in the delivery room the nurses kept saying over and over again, “He’s so big!” and “Goodness, he is so loud.”  From the minute he was born he was big and he was loud!  I thought he was perfect and yes; he was big for a newborn but he was still so little and perfect in my mind.  I was blissfully in love with this little guy from the moment I saw him.

After getting home things did not go as they had with the other babies.  I could not figure this little boy out.  All the tricks I had learned with my other babies were not working with this very big, very loud and very stubborn baby.  I had successfully nursed my four other babies and I was determined to nurse him.  I tried every trick I knew, I read every resource I could get my hands on, I visited a lactation consultant, I asked the pediatrician for help, I made appointments with specialists, I called my mom and sister in tears multiple times, and I sat in the rocking chair with this new baby and cried and cried and cried.  I was out of ideas and it took every ounce of courage and determination in me to pick him up and try again when he would cry.  For days any time the baby would start to cry I would start to cry because I knew I was about to face some of the worst pain I had ever experienced (keep in mind I had at this point given birth to five babies without an epidural).  The baby and I were miserable and I felt so helpless and alone.

During this time, I was scheduled for my postpartum appointment with my doctor.  The doctor asked me several questions about how the baby and I were doing.  I was embarrassed at how hard this was and that after six weeks of trying I was still struggling.  I jokingly said to the doctor, “You would think I hadn’t ever done this before.”  This was an attempt to make light of the situation but it was also an honest reflection of how frustrated I was about the situation.  I had done this before, even succeeded.  Why then was it proving to be so hard this time?

The doctor’s response, “You have never before been a mother to this baby at this moment,”  would not only give me the courage to keep trying with this baby, but it would change how I looked at all my children and challenges that would arise.  After this humbling experience I would be better about stepping back and thinking about challenges with a new perspective.  I wouldn’t hold my children to the impossible standard of being parented just like older siblings.  I would be better about seeing them as unique individuals and I would not be so hard on myself when I had to try a new tactic.  I would also be kinder to myself about trying something new and not being afraid to say when something did not work. 

I would also not give up no matter how much it hurt.  I would try everything I could think of and when that did not work, I would look for new solutions until something would finally work and we would for one minute take a deep breath and brace ourselves for the next challenge.