He has escaped!

Thursday, August 11th

My baby is officially crawling. He has been unofficially crawling for a while now, for about a week and a half, possibly longer. He has been pushing up on his hands and knees, rocking, then falling to his stomach and sliding backwards. On Sunday he began going from stomach to knees to sitting. He was then crawling about two motions forward, then sitting. Which made him go forward for 2 paces, and backward about 4. The sitting maneuver really impeded his forward progress.

Today was the first day that he actually went forward for several paces before stopping to sit, or pausing on his belly to inspect something. I cannot believe how quickly he went from having a 3 foot radius to having no sense of boundaries at all. He was following me around today as I was getting some laundry done. It is nice to have a little follower, but at the same time I have lost that peace of mind I used to have when I sat him down and walked away. I used to be able to predict where I would find him when I would return, but now all bets are off. He could literally be anywhere.

I didn't realize how terrifying motherhood would be. Every step of the way there has been something that absolutely terrifies me. And it is not that that fear ever really goes away. No. After a while I become immune. Ever so often I am reminded of the reason I was terrified in the first place, but miraculously I am able to get past it.

Examples:

• Holding Riley for the first time while alone in the hospital, I was so scared that I would drop him onto the cold, tile floor of my hospital room. Fast forward to a couple days ago when I had him in bed with us, I became suddenly fearful of dropping him from the bed to the floor as he was climbing all over me.
• Those first few nights in the hospital, I was thankful that Riley was a loud breather. It was easy for me to distinguish his breath. I could hear it from across the room. As he has aged he has grown out of his noisy breathing, which has caused me a lot of anxiety. It was difficult to hear his breath over the rhythmic creaking of the swing, so I would close my eyes and focus until I could hear him breathe. At the beginning of this month we moved Riley into his pack-and-play, as he had grown out of his swing. We also moved him into his own room, and with this move the fear has resurfaced. The little mister loves to sleep on his stomach. Face down, arms up, butt in the air. It is adorable and frightening all at the same time. He puts himself there, every single time. I nursed him to sleep with him next to me on the couch, left him on his side, and shortly after that he rolled to his stomach where he slept for the remainder of his nap.

I could go on like this for days. Before I joined the motherhood club, I knew that babies were fragile. But I sort of thought after the first few weeks to months I would get over being scared/worried/anxious. This is not the case. The trick is to not get consumed by the feelings of anxiety and fear, but to focus more on what Riley is learning and gaining from his discoveries every day. 

I cannot believe how much my heart has grown since little Mr. Boogs was born. He is my precious little angel. :D

I started this post a week ago! Where does the time go?!