on time, two kids, and the importance of marveling.

Lee Brown Photography -34

"It’s almost as if I had no concept of time prior to having children. I’ve spent my whole life waiting for the next stage, the next season that was surely going to be better than the present. The grass was always greener on the other side---in the future. I spent all of high school dreaming of college and all of college dreaming of my career. I spent all of my years dating dreaming of marriage and all of my marriage dreaming of babies. Dreaming, always dreaming, of what’s next and what’s to come.

And now, for the first time in my whole life, I’m not dreaming of what’s next. Because I know the season on the horizon; I know what’s next. And what’s next is me not having babies anymore. It’s a body that is done being pregnant, done birthing babies, finished breastfeeding forever. That thought haunts me in a hundred different ways.

Because as exhausted as I am today, right now this minute, pouring every ounce of myself into this newborn and toddler, wiping spit-up off my shirt and emptying that stupid dishwasher for the eighth time this week, I cannot even begin to imagine a life without babies."

....read the rest over at Coffee + Crumbs today.