Surprises

When I had my first baby, I was completely unprepared for the way that I loved her. Immediately, irrevocably, unconditionally, love. Here was this teeny tiny person whom I'd never met, the nurses kept calling her by the name I gave her, and calling me "Mom". She was a complete stranger. She did very little, nursed, cried, pooped, peed, spit, slept. That's pretty much it. But I was immediately smitten with the deepest, strongest, most pure love I had ever experienced.

As I prepared for the birth of my second born, I was concerned (I'm not kidding), knowing how much I loved my first, how could I love the second less. But I didn't think it was possible to love that way again, and at the same time.

Then my son was born and I was reminded of the story How the Grinch Stole Christmas, when "the Grinch's heart grew 3 sizes that day" - my heart grew and I found I was capable of loving 2 humans in that amazing way.

Of course now, having grown so many times, my heart fills my entire rib cage. And I have anticipated that when I meet my baby girl, currently residing in her birthmom's tummy in Florida, I will also fall completely in love with her. We have prayed for her, longed for her, prepared for her, gone through all kinds of weird adoptive self-examining form-filling out for her - I will love her.

The surprise for me is how I feel about her mother. I have talked to this woman twice now, for a total of maybe 20 minutes. I've been praying for her and others for months, and praying just for her for a couple weeks. I've been nervous about talking to her, I've thought about what it would be like, I've tried to imagine how she feels.

But I didn't know I would love her. I just want to hug her. I can't wait to meet her. She is a treasure too. I knew this, that the mother is as precious as the baby, that Jesus died for her, that He loves her, that she is important to Him. But I have, in the last couple days, experienced how much He must love her, and I'm overwhelmed with love also. I had no idea.