To my beloved older son,
You turned five the other day. This happens all the time, all over the world, but this was special because you are my child.
milestones
Why I’m Taking Parenting Advice from a Cartoon Turtle
“Let’s start school in a year or two. Clearly you’re not ready and you’re not coming back until you are. You think you can do these things, but you just can’t, Nemo!” said a puppeteer holding a cartoon fish. I immediately burst into tears. Heavy weeping wracked my body as I tried to stay quiet.
“Are you okay?” my husband leaned over and asked.
“Noooo,” I whispered between tears. I absolutely was not okay. Because that cartoon fish dad was me and I was him and we were both utterly unprepared for our kids to be starting school.
I did not expect to have a parenting epiphany at Animal Kingdom in Disney World, but there we were. (Although maybe I should have, considering I had one last time we were at Disney World.)
And Now We Are Two: Loving My Baby on His Second Birthday
“Up Up Up!” my younger son cries, jabbing the air with his finger. I swing him up onto my lap, resting him on my left leg. He continues to clamber up me, holding onto my shoulders. “Up Up!” he says again. I can only say, “Dude, you’re as far up as you can go!”
But that’s his personality – always up, always bigger, always faster. Like his nickname of Little Bird, he’s both tiny and longs to fly.
Even when I was pregnant, he was constantly stretching and kicking, reminding me of his presence. He came into the world in a rush, almost a month early and with a labor so short that I gave birth less than a half-hour after we left the house for the hospital.
And now he’s two.
Turning Four: Looking Back on Parenting a Three-Year-Old
A few Saturdays ago, Sprout accompanied me on my community bike ride, acting as an enthusiastic second and playing readily with other kids on the playground. The next day, he broke down screaming three separate times when we were celebrating an early Fathers’ Day brunch with my parents and in-laws. I actually picked him up and left the restaurant so he could calm down, something I almost never have to do. This past year with a three-year-old has been full of contradictions: happy/sad, stable/falling apart, independent/clingy. With him on the cusp between being a toddler and school-aged kid, we felt the full-brunt of the threenager phase. With his birthday just past, I’m looking back at the ups and downs of living with a three-year-old.
What I Told My Three Year Old About Death
As I peered up between my legs at my ob-gyn, I learned that I couldn’t attend my grandmother’s funeral.
“You’re four centimeters dilated,” she told me.
“So I shouldn’t go to New Jersey on Monday then?” I asked.
“You probably shouldn’t travel out of state,” she responded.
She was right. My younger son was born that afternoon. Between not attending the funeral and the chaos of a new baby, I never told my older son about my grandmother’s death. He had only met her once, briefly, so it would have met little to him anyway.
But the whole thing made me realize how urgent it was to talk to him about death. That’s in part because my other grandmother is getting up in years. My older son (nicknamed Sprout) has met “Grammy” several times and knows her well enough. While her passing may be years away, there’s no way to know. Needless to say, I didn’t want finding out about her death to be his introduction to the topic.
But I had no idea where to start.
On Little Bird’s First Birthday
“Ah ah, come back here!” I yelp as my baby once again arches his back, flips over and stands up on his changing table. Somewhere between wrestling and tickling him, I finally manage to get a fresh diaper on. But that’s Little Bird at one year old – high energy and big emotions.
When he was first born, he was a touch over five pounds. He was just bigger than his teddy bear, swaddled in thin blankets. Still convinced that he belonged in the womb, he dozed in the pack-and-play even when his brother was sing-yelling next to him. At first, it seemed like he was going to be adorably sleepy and quiet.
Pajamas of Days Gone By
A pair of pajamas can make me choke up these days. Not just any pajamas, of course. Just the panda onesie. Or the fleece pajamas with the rocket ships. Or the ones that say “Out of this world!” Looking at them, I breathe deep and stare off into the distance, as if my younger son’s infancy was years ago instead of weeks.
Storytime with Hop and Bun, the Imaginary Bunnies
This is actually Snowball, our “pet bunny.” But good luck getting a photo of an imaginary friend.
“Tell me a Hop and Bun story,” Sprout says, his pants around his ankles as he’s sitting on the toilet. Perched on the side of the bathtub, I look off into the distance, as if I can pluck an idea from the mirror above the sink. “Hmmmm, well,” I stall, wracking my brain. “Once upon a time, there were two bunnies, named Hop and Bun. They were best friends. One day…”
Eventually, I always come up with something. The plots have ranged from the hapless bunnies getting lost on the subway to saving up money and buying a scooter.
While I love telling Sprout stories – despite the odd circumstances – that’s not my favorite part of this routine. No – it’s the fact that Hop and Bun are utterly from Sprout’s imagination. I played no part in their creation. They aren’t drawn from a book or TV show. One day, Sprout just declared that he was a bunny named Hop and Bun was his friend.
The “But Why?” Phase
I have to be the only parent in history looking forward to my kid’s “Why?” stage. I imagined a whole universe of learning lying ahead of us. I’d answer questions until I ran out of answers and then we’d look it up together, snuggled up in the light of the computer screen. When we didn’t have time, we’d write them down to investigate later. When I’d ask him what he thought, he’d come up with a brilliant but age-appropriate answer, showing equal parts creativity and insight.
Like any parenting fantasy, it didn’t work out that way.
Six Months with Little Bird in Our Lives
Despite his nickname, Little Bird has always strived to be big. When he was inside me, he wouldn’t just kick, he’d stretch, his feet jamming into my organs. He arrived 3 1/2 weeks early, scrambling out into the world unexpectedly. Now he’s been with us for more than six months, a half-year full of so many changes.
When Little Bird arrived, he was a peanut, just over five pounds. As Sprout said, “He’s so teeny tiny!” Because he hadn’t gained most of the fat babies do in their last weeks in utero, his wrinkly face looked especially old-mannish.