So the old rumor is true: The second kid most definitely gets the shaft in a lot of ways. Lucy has no baby book. She is the subject of far fewer photos than her brother was. I have not recorded the date each of her teeth came in, or when she rolled over or crawled or walked for the first time, nor have I made a tidy list of her immunizations and illnesses. And perhaps worst of all, nearly everything I've ever written or posted about her consisted of nothing more than paragraph after paragraph of self-indulgent, whiny complaints about how nobody is getting any sleeeeeeeeeeep why won't this kid sleep OMG WE ARE NEVER GOING TO SLEEP AGAIN NEVERRRRRRRRRR.
However, despite a lack of tangible, documented evidence that we love this child, I don't think she'll grow up feeling slighted or second-best, as I absolutely cannot keep my hands, my arms, my lips off of her. I squeeze her and cuddle her and I spend 90 percent of her waking hours grinning like an idiot as she climbs up her nightstand or into her doll stroller, or when she brings me a book to read or fake sneezes to make me laugh. (I would do it 100 percent of the time if she'd SLEEP THROUGH THE NIGHT ALREADY.)
It's not that I love her more than I love Asher. But everything about parenting Asher at this age was new and foreign and I think, for one thing, I held back. I was intimidated. I reigned in my emotions and my urges to spoil him; I spent a great deal more time contemplating which t-shirt I'd cover his belly with, rather than blowing raspberries on it.
I think the other thing is that a lot of times (most of the time? all of the time?), a child's personality should dictate how you, as a parent, respond to them. And this is kind of a big DUH, but Asher was a quieter baby. He was happy, yes, but he wasn't much of a giggler; he was more serious, more serene. He never really RESPONDED to the raspberry blowing; he was never a silly baby. Truthfully, I don't remember his exact response to raspberry blowing, but I'm guessing it was in the Rolls Eyes arena. He is still rather shy and reserved, and even though Lucy is more than two years his junior, he is clearly her sidekick, not the other way around.
I guess it makes sense that I love her (and demonstrate it) the way I do because I see so much of myself in her. I see it and I know how to respond to it because I know who I am. She loves an audience, she's independent, she is also stubborn and demanding and sometimes VERY ANNOYING, like when I'm opening the refrigerator with her perched on my hip and she opens the freezer door above me and whacks me in the face. But then she'll grin at me and snuggle onto my shoulder and OMG YES, PLEASE, DELIVER ONE PONY TO THE DOORSTEP ASAP.
Of course, last night she bit me on the stomach and HELD ON WITH HER TEETH WHILE I SCREAMED FOR MERCY.
When you're pregnant with a second child, it is SO HARD to imagine a child different than the one you already have. Or is that just me? I mean, I only had intimate knowledge of ONE baby. It was really hard to imagine that a whole DIFFERENT kid was going to pop out of me; it was hard enough to wrap my mind around the idea of a GIRL, when all I'd ever known was boyboyboy. And then she got here, and every day I am just astonished at how absolutely and insanely UNIQUE she is. When I look at them side by side, I just can't believe how my body made two such delightfully opposite individuals.
And it doesn't end there, because now that I know my body can and will do such unbelievable things (MY GOD, IMAGINE A THIRD CHILD DIFFERENT FROM THE FIRST TWO!), I am faced with the bizarre prospect of parenting them differently. It never occurred to me that this would be necessary! And it's not that I can't do it or am flustered by it (ok, yes, maybe SOMETIMES) but it's just another of those DUH moments: I have two children. And I am no longer surprised that they aren't carbon copies of each other. Should I now be surprised that they may need different kinds of things from me? Such a simple concept, and yet it continues to blow my mind.
Unrelated, but aren't you proud? Look who can write his own name, provided we draw boxes for each letter? (Otherwise he makes a capital A that takes up the entire page and cries about not having room for the rest of it.)


