Twenty one!

Facebook has sent my memories this morning ....basically along the lines of me being unbelieving that I was now the mother of a 16,17, 18, 19, 20 year old son ...each proclaiming I'm surely too young but the latter saying I'm hitting the bottle....the skincare bottle in protest!

Today I wake up to discover that I am the mother of a 21 year old son and as I've hirpled to the bathroom ( only a few steps as cottage is tiny) and looked in the mirror and realised that despite my efforts last night to lie as far away from feather pillow and quilt as possible it's not been far enough....the swelling should subside later and I won't believe I have a son that age .
( I have a feather allergy...cottage has a feather quilt and feather pillows...I brought my own pillow and luckily some extra inner granny blankets! Eyes are puffy, nose is blocked and lungs feel a bit wheezy!)

Twenty one years ago ( allowing for Australian  time differences of course ...we will just stretch the celebrations out a bit) , we welcomed our son into the world. As soon as I was pregnant ( and all the way through the next 9 months and an extra 10 days of vomiting) I knew I was having a boy. Just knew. We did have a name for a girl on standby but I just always felt I was having a boy.

He was 10 days late ( I do not do late , I'm usually overly punctual ....so was distressed by his tardiness ) , he was round the wrong way , he was in distress and then he was ours. After months of eating oranges, drinking Irn Bru and then litres of Gaviscon he was finally ours... after 9 months of visiting the antenatal ward as a patient ( a few pregnancy related problems along the way) I finally got to be on the postnatal ward with my boy, swaddled in a hospital blanket and the proudest daddy ever by my side....the photos show the biggest, beaming smiled daddy ever and the most knackered looking mummy ever!

Three days later we took our baby home and that's when reality of a newborn starts . 1995 was a nice summer and I think we soon got into a routine ...it's not easy being a new mum, a tiny baby is such a responsibility but we obviously got there! A year later we had moved into a bigger house as we had another baby on the way and I couldn't imagine that I could share the love I felt for one but you do ( and as I know she will read this 💜 you don't share it, it doubles) , so within 17 months we had 2 babies, one walking (just) and very much talking and one newborn. I didn't drive at the time, I had a big silver cross pram that I hoisted a young boy on the top seat and off we went walking through country lanes every day just to get out. We read, we sang , we danced in our front lounge, we baked , we laughed ...I think we are still doing all those things. Maybe we need to dance more!

Then the following year we moved back to the town Scott and I grew up in and another new house. We would have daily walks down to our woods and castle, still reading and singing and dancing. I think painting and crafty stuff had been added to the repertoire. Play dates had also begun in earnest. Sand and Water group, toddlers, playgroup , nursery then another baby due in our family and then there were 5 ...and that's how we stayed. A family of 5, the five of us. One smily baby, one shy but oh so funny little girl and one boy , who liked to wear a hat and knew all there was to know about everything and a teller of silly jokes.

Then we had a daddy who had started a new job and then was promoted again and then again and I gave up my very part time, part time job of nursing once a fortnight and then the daddy started working away , a day here, a week there and we would all be excited for the daddy coming home,
We moved house again , our forever home. The daddy was working away even longer but would phone at odd times of the day ...usually when he got in as we were trying to get out....he would come home a hero with gifts  and tales of faraway lands.

Then we all moved to a faraway land, to be our family of five again , to be together everyday. This was at the cost of leaving friends and family behind, of not having them with us for family events, occasions. But to be together as our family of five is everything to me. I am so fulfilled being a mother , that's a very personal statement to me. I don't write it out of smugness or self importance , I write it out of truth. I love  being my children's mother , a journey that started 21 years ago today.

I know that at times it has been an  easier journey at times  than at others but always a journey filled with love ...the occasional swear word and a great deal of laughter!

Happiest of birthdays to my boy, who 21 years on still needs fed at regular intervals,  thank you for being my son, for going bravely into the world, for going on adventures that your mother will never be brave enough to do, be safe on that bike and watch out for snakes!