I had a feeling I would be a bad mom when I went stood in front of the glass in the maternity ward looking more at my reflection than at the newborn babies that were before me. I was kind of pissed that everyone let me walk the halls like I looked – my hair was a total mess, I had dark bags under my eyes, I didn’t care to put on a bra and so my nipples were uncomfortably evident under the sheet-like material of the hospital gown. Although, for once in my life I didn’t really mind that because I finally had a decent set of boobs thanks for my newly engorged breasts. After I stood for a moment trying to fix my hair and wipe running mascara from under my eyes using my reflection in the glass window, I began to realize how ridiculous I must look to the nurses. I was being quite vein. So I started to look beyond myself and was now focused on all of the babies in their plastic bassinets. Among the sea of what looked like a lot of burritos with tiny heads thanks to swaddling, I found my daughter and couldn’t stop staring at her. While cooing to her, I was in mid-motion of putting my two hands together to make both halves of a heart when the nurse lightly knocked on the window and simultaneously pointed to the bassinet two over from the baby I was talking to and mouthed the words “that one is yours”. Awesome. I was bonding with some other baby. Could I be a good mother, even if I didn’t know who I was supposed to mother? Only time would tell. And this blog. This blog says a lot of my parenting. Yikes. That other baby in the bassinet really dodged the bullet.
