Lifeguard Training

My daughter is growing up. I sat at her swim lesson this week with a book, but ended up just watching her through the glass. It is unbelievable. She is the kid I never thought she would be.

When I am with her, watching her from afar do something on her own, I try to soak up every bit of the confidence and bliss that is her. I don’t want to miss one minute of it and hope that I remember it forever. The ease with which she finds joy and then spreads that joy to everyone in her orbit is maybe my most favorite thing about her.

I think the reason I feel so focused on being part of every moment with her right now is because I didn’t ever imagine us getting to this point. I didn’t let myself imagine it. Even after she was in this world, I never expected to one day have a daughter who I could take to a swim class. 

She was supposed to be blue and unresponsive when she was born. When that didn’t happen, she was supposed to be fragile and unable to shift for herself when it came to eating and breathing. When she blew past those milestones, she was supposed to have a hard time sitting and then standing and then walking. Last week, she brought home her costume for her first dance recital in April.

She has made friends and she can climb a ladder onto our roof. She can ride her bike just as fast and hard as her brothers. She is opinionated and puts on “makeup” every morning. She orders her own chicken nuggets and French fries from every Mexican restaurant in town. She argues her point and gets her way. She is adjusted and confident, so much stronger than naysayers told us she would be.

It is so easy now to see glimpses of what her life might be like as an adult and it really seems like she is going to be okay.

And that is scary. “How did we get here?” is a question my husband and I ask each other often, and I’m finding myself asking it more and more in my own head these days. I never saw past the fear in her first years to dream about what could be and what it could look like. I am thankful beyond measure that we are here, but I do feel duped. It’s like this self-sufficient kid was dropped in my lap because just one year ago, I never saw this coming. 

Ellie’s first swim

How am I supposed to be a good mother to a girl? I think about all of the milestones that come along with being a girl and wonder how we will work through them.

Will she find love? What will I do when she tells me that she wants a baby? How do I talk to her about not selling herself short to gain the approval of someone else? What about taking up all of the space she deserves? I am not sure how to do this myself, how in the world will I teach someone else to do it?

And, oh my gosh, she loves me so much. So much more than I deserve, for sure. I think her favorite word is mama, and I haven’t had a full night’s sleep in almost two years because the first thing she does when she is in between sleep cycles is come to cuddle with me in my bed. I can do no wrong, and I am the first person she looks for in a crowd. “That’s my mama,” she says with so much pride that I am embarrassed by how inadequate I feel.  

Ellie likes a schedule and a routine. That part is easy for me because I do too. She knows that when I start working in the kitchen, it is time for her to set out five napkins, five plates and five forks. She reminds me that it is time to brush her teeth because she expects it to happen at the same time every day, no matter what might get in the way.

My husband told me the other day, “Ellie brings the coffee in the morning, to the table between the recliner and the couch, then she brings me my book and my pen, and then sits in my lap, with Otis [our dog], making it impossible for me to read, or drink my coffee.”

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