Confession

I unbuckle their carseats, and they hop down all by themselves and race/toddle toward the front door. My hands are free to grab the bags. I look around as I pick them up, as though unsure why my shoulders are so light.

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“I’m done with breakfast,” he announces, clearing his place. “Now I’m going to get dressed.” He skip-walks up the stairs and comes down five minutes later wearing what is more or less a matching outfit.

I haven’t even gotten up from the table yet.

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“Come on, Theo Bear!” I hear from my perch at the bottom of the play structure. “Let’s slide down on our bellies!” A moment later they come whooshing down, side by side and all smiles.

“Again!” Theo shouts to his big brother, and they each begin climbing up: Theo navigating the steps, Sebastian on the bigger boy ladder.

I move toward them, expecting that someone will need a hand. They don’t. I step back. And smile.

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It is an amazing thing, after more than four years of my body belonging to someone else, to have these moments where it is all mine again. It feels like every day – it probably is every day – they learn to do another task independently.

I can already see the light at the end of the tunnel, where there is a life without sippy cups or diapers or bibs or cribs.

And you know what? I’m not sad about it.

Every time a friend posts on facebook that her baby is now walking, someone always comments, “So sorry! ; )” Because yes, it is challenging in a different way than a crawling baby. But I was never sorry when either of my boys started walking. I was elated. Finally they could get around without me. Finally I’d have two hands free much of the day.

“I want another kid,” I declared to my husband the other day. “But I don’t know if I want another baby.”

It isn’t that I didn’t love the baby stage when my boys were little. Oh wait. Yes, it is. I loved them, but pregnancy and infancy were not my best stages as a mother. I enjoyed all the fabulous firsts we associate with those times, but I celebrated rather than mourned each move toward independence.

It’s true, there are times when I miss the days without disciplining. An infant’s needs aren’t always easy to meet, but they are uncomplicated.

I know that when they are teenagers, I will long to be able to keep them home and safe. I will wish they would let me hug and kiss and snuggle them.

But I am embracing boyhood with wide open arms. I love what their little bodies and minds can do now, and I can’t wait until they are big enough to ride roller coasters, to read Harry Potter with me, to zip around on their bicycles.

And that might also mean that… dare I say it?… I am done having babies.

I want to be able to enjoy my boys without the sleep fog, the distraction, the “wait until I’m done feeding the baby.”

I may come back here in a year and announce that I’ve changed my mind. But for now? I feel like I’m heading into the best years of our lives: no babies, just two amazing, changing little boys.

side by side belly sliders