happy birthday jack!

May 2nd, 2008, 11:30 am.  At 5 cm dilated my labor was jump-started with pitocin and at 1:21 pm, a screechy 8 lb 13 oz baby boy was in my arms, pink and perfect.  Just under 2 hours from start to finish.  What a good boy.  I remember feeling...terrible.  Like I needed to throw up and needed to eat and needed a blanket and needed the heat turned down.  I was shaking so badly I had to hand that precious bundle off to dad.

AJ, lit up like the 4th of July: "We have a SON!  You're so cute buddy!  Honey, what do you need?  What can I get you?"

Kim: "Um, drugs?"

AJ (laughing): "I'm on it - be right back!"

"We'll take him down to the nursery, get some measurements and give him a bath", the nurses said. "That happened fast, why don't you rest for a bit and we'll bring him right back!" My post-delivery shock would not allow me to protest.  They wheeled me into a recovery room after a brief visit from Aunt Carrie and gratefully, I crashed for a solid hour.  When I woke up I ooohed and aaahed my way through a dozen phone pictures AJ had sent of Jack in the nursery and texted my reply: "I'm awake and I want my son!! Don't come back from the nursery without him!!" Moments later, in strolled a glowing AJ and his new boy.  Jack buried his not so tiny body in my arms and we've been inseparable ever since.  

As I reflect on the last several years with all their many ups and downs, I'm reminded of Jack's 2nd birthday.  We gathered friends at the park on a cool and windy Saturday.  I remember that he was distant, disinterested in presents, the cake, and the other kids coming and going.  That was two years ago.  We had just been told that it was likely Jack was autistic.  We were at the beginning of our pain that this boy, who was once a happy, bouncing, smiling baby was now a frustrated, inconsolable child, unable to communicate and in a world of his own.  I remember that he kept wanting to run away down the path at the park by himself - no, not by himself, but with me.  And in my culminating worry about his development, I remember that it was a day God "caught" me right where I was and showed me a different and precious perspective.  Here was my healthy, energetic little boy, wanting to steal away with his mom for a run down the path and a soak in the cold creek water.  We laughed and splashed all alone, and I knew the way you know when you're front and center in a moment you will never forget with one of your kids. "You're going to remember this forever," I told myself, "because he won't always want you to scoop him up in your arms and steal him away."  So that day is etched in my memory, and now when I look at this healthy, energetic, smiling, self-appointed "baby sheep" and recently converted "birthday enthusiast", I  close my eyes and say, "Jesus, what a gift.  Thank you."

Happy birthday Jack Jack.  I love you so!

-Mommy sheep