“Before you were conceived I wanted you. Before you were born I loved you. Before you were here an hour I would die for you. This is the miracle of life.” ~Maureen Hawkins

When my daughter Claire was nine months old she began to rock her baby dolls and say, “Aaaw baby, aaaw baby”. My eyes got teary that first time I saw my little girl nurture something of her own. It truly touched my heart. 

Growing up I have always wanted children. In fact, I have always wanted four. My Mom was one of nine and consequently, I was the oldest of almost 30 grandchildren. I got to hold, cuddle and love on lots of babies. My Aunts still tell stories of how I would beg to hold their babies, even at 2 years old!

This year will be my husband and my tenth anniversary, from the day we met. We fell in love that day and have basically never been apart. We were married five years ago, so we had plenty of time to talk about our future. We talked about everything; even how many children we wanted – or so I thought.

Now that I think about it though, he didn’t really say much during the “kid” conversations. He never really held a baby before, so I guess the whole thing was basically an abstract concept for him. I always said I wanted four babies and he just nodded and smiled. Ok, so maybe we didn’t actually talk about it, but at the time I thought we had.

Fast forward to now.

We have two beautiful children. They are twenty-one months apart and are the light of our life. But these past few months I have been aching to smell that sweet, soft smell of a new baby’s head. I want so bad to put those tiny lips to my breast and feel the voraciousness of his suck. I want to kiss little feet. I want to see drips of milk dribble from the mouth of a milk-drunk, sleeping angel.

Sadly, my husband wants nothing to do with this.

At first I just hinted, then I asked, and finally I begged. When we began to fight about it though, I decided it was time to put the issue to bed, at least for a little while.

As I mentioned, from the day John and I met, we have pretty much never been apart. At the most, the kids and I may visit family for a four or five day extended weekend. When we recently stayed in NJ for over three weeks, while my broken ankle healed, we all missed Daddy more than is imaginable. 

Being apart actually put the spark back into our hurried, monotonous marriage that was getting to be more like a habit than a relationship. The first several days after we returned were a time of reconnection for John and me. It was a lot like falling in love with him for the first time. We couldn’t keep our hands off of each other. It was fun again!

The last time we felt this way was probably when we were on our honeymoon. Just a few weeks after that I started to feel nauseous, tired and generally not “in the mood”; our oldest is a honeymoon baby. After that came the days of bleary eyed parents just trying to make it through the day on little sleep, poopy diapers and lots of spit up. Needless to say, the romance in our marriage pretty much ended before it started.

Anyway, after our passionate, teenage-like reunion, I realized that it was the perfect time to “make a baby”. That tiny window of opportunity was wide open and we danced away without a second thought. I do admit that I half way knew, but since I’m not the one who is so concerned about not having a baby, I didn’t mention it . . . Besides, it is his responsibility; that’s one thing we have agreed on.

This may be way too much information for you but there is a point . . .  now I have Baby Lust again!

I want so much to be growing a baby. I long to feel those fluttery movements inside me; elbows pushing on my ribs, the hiccups, those wakeful nights as she practices her soccer moves.  I want so much to feel that unconditional love that overtakes me the minute I meet her, the minute I put her to breast, the minute our eyes meet and lock for what seems like eternity.

I love babies and if I could, I would have twenty. (I sure hope my husband doesn’t read this!)

The days are now moving at a turtle-like pace. I have already done two pregnancy tests. Keep in mind I am not even due to have my period for another several days but I am the Queen of Pregnancy Tests. It might sound silly but a while back I bought them in bulk from an online wholesale supplier. Otherwise I’d probably need to take out a loan for all the tests I’ve done!

Tick . . . tock . . .

Tick . . . tock . . . 

Will my Baby Lust turn into Baby Love?

I really hope so, but only time will tell.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 11th, 2007 at 8:50 pm and is filed under Babies, Breastfeeding Carnival, Marriage, Parenting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.