The love of a heartbeat

You know what I rarely thought of before I was a mom?  How amazing our bodies are.  

Every one of us.

The other night Charlie woke up in the middle of the night and I was wide awake (I have been going on and off on whether I can sleep well), so I got up and decided it was a good opportunity to get some extra snuggle time in with my little man.

I rocked him and hummed a little and soaked in the smell of his sweet baby hair and skin.

{Yes - even at 18 months, I think he's still a baby.  He still smells like one, so that counts!}

When I laid him back in his crib, I stood there with my hand on his chest.  It was so quiet and completely dark and all I could feel was his heartbeat.  I stood there and soaked it all in.  And then I started to become sappy mom (maybe hormones kicking in?).  

I couldn't stop thinking about how special this little heartbeat was to me.  How I felt the first time we heard it when he was just 10 weeks along.  And how it was so strong and now over two years after the first time we heard it just how thankful I am that it is so strong.  I prayed for all the moms and dads that have sick babies and those babies that have health struggles. 

And I kept standing there.  With my hand on his chest feeling his sweet heartbeat.

I remember looking forward to every doctor's appointment just to hear his heartbeat.  How excited I was.  And it continued to blow my mind that his heart has been beating outside of my womb's protection for almost 18 months.  How is that even possible?  He might as well be 18 years old {ok...not really}.

And then I grabbed my stomach and thought about the sweet baby inside me.  And what a miracle life is.  What a blessing it is to be feeling Charlie's heartbeat in the silence of the night and holding my stomach where another sweet heart is beating away and a baby is growing. 

I remember the first time I heard this sweet baby's heartbeat.  To be honest, I was especially thrilled that there was just one heartbeat and not too (another story...).  But once I got over that, looking at that heart beat away on the screen at only 7.5 weeks along, I felt the same way.  

So much love.  So much gratitude.  So much to be thankful for.

Now, I am one of those weird people who really like being pregnant...and it's mainly because I think I'm just so fascinated at the transformation my body can make and the fact that I am capable of growing a person.  I mean - I have a little person to prove it.  Which still blows my mind.

But what a blessing it is to be a woman.  What a blessing it is to get the honor of creating life.

And no matter how you might get your own heartbeat to care for (naturally, medically, through adoption, surrogate), every heartbeat is so precious.  It never gets old hearing those sweet hearts beat.

So while there are days while I plop down on the couch after a long day at work, a fussy kid that won't stop whining and didn't want to go to bed and am sick to my stomach and tired from the other kid I'm growing - I'm thankful.  

For every single heartbeat.  But especially for the ones that their heartbeat inside of me.

We all have something or someone to be so thankful for.

Happy Wednesday!

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