Mothers’ Day Mommy Reflections: News Flash — Transitions are Temporary!

My baby girl will be seven months old on Tuesday. I’m very baffled by this because I swear she was only born three weeks ago. I just can’t believe how fast the time has gone. Yet at the same time the past seven months have felt like a lifetime — of course! — Kaeta’s lifetime! And my lifetime of being a mommy. Things inevitably change when you become a parent. You hear people say after a few months they can’t even remember what life was like before they had a baby. Well there’s a reason people say that — it’s because it’s true! I can still kind of remember what life was like before Kaeta was born, but only as far back as the night we found out we were pregnant. Everything before that gets pretty blurry; I can still recall individual memories, but those moments really do seem like they happened a lifetime ago.

The thing I remember the most about my pregnancy is feeling like it would never end. Toward the end, of course, I did get pretty tired and big and itchy and just wanted it to be over…. But that’s not quite what I mean. Even though I knew in my head that the pregnancy would of course end, and then we would begin our new life with our brand new little baby, I never quite believed it until, well, I think I still have trouble believing it sometimes. But the thing that strikes me now is just how transitional my pregnancy was. Well duh, you say, but it just never occurred to me at the time. It was a time of preparation, a time for growth and change, a time for moving from our old life to the new…. it was a time of purpose.

But did I think about such things then? Hardly. I think my main concerns during pregnancy were more along the lines of what was I going to eat next, and what shoes will fit me today? Some of my friends worried about things like going into labor and what if my water breaks in public? I didn’t really worry about things like that because I didn’t honestly believe I had to; afterall, I was never going to have the baby.

I remember feeling the same way when I was engaged. I promise you 2002 was the longest year in history, I don’t care how many calendars you show me. It was because no matter how many days passed, December 21st was just as far off as it had ever been. It was this unattainable date that would never arrive. Then I remember waking up the morning of December 21, 2002, and thinking that it finally, FINALLY came! And suddenly it was over in the blink of an eye. And now I have this new life to live that I never even really thought about in more than a dreamy, happily-ever-after kind of way. And it never dawned on me how temporary that time was.

And I can think of so many more examples of this in my life. Like when I was 12 and counting the days until my 16th birthday (when my life would suddenly and completely fall into place), and when the year 2000 was still mere science fiction (by the way, where are all the shiny silver spacesuits we were all supposed to be wearing?). So you’d think I’d have learned by now. December 21st will come. The baby will be born.

And what’s more, someday she will be seven months old. But not just someday, TUESDAY she will be. And someday she’ll be wearing the clothes that we received at our baby showers and I thought, “The tag says 9 months. The baby doesn’t need this. Don’t these people know how small this baby will be?” And it suddenly occurs to me that even this time is transitional. Kaeta is growing and changing every day. She won’t be a baby forever. Such an obvious statement, I know, but you wouldn’t believe how easy it is to deny until I’m packing away another set of clothes that I know she will never, ever wear again. And I’m looking back at pictures of her from Halloween, remembering how that little leapard costume swallowed her whole. Then I see her friend Abigail getting ready to toddle away, leaving her parents chasing after her. And I can’t help but notice my almost-8-year-old nephew deal with his broken arm with the courage of a young man. Wasn’t it just year before last that he was Kaeta’s age??

Then I realize that life will always be like this. Life, as we know it, is temporary. It’s a transitional time; a time of preparation, a time of growth and change, moving from old to new… a time of purpose. With every day and every season God sanctifies me, showing me how things will always change, everything goes from old to new and new to old; only the Word of God lasts forever. And we can too because of the salvation that was won for us on the cross. Because with the cross there is renewal. There is purpose. As hard as it is to believe, this life is merely a transition period.