Life through stroller eyes

Never before walking the streets of my beloved city did I notice the frenzy. I always felt invigorated and stimulated by the hustle and bustle and rush of energy out on the streets. The noises, tastes, smells and people are the life blood of Manhattan.

Now strolling around with a baby you notice a whole new world of dangers. Will we make it over those pot holes and cracks? Does everyone really need to smoke on the streets? Do you really have to scream on your cell phone? Can you not blast your horn right next to me?

Perhaps a little over protective of my 2 month old, but I am navigating the world with this tiny baby that I have to keep alive and not damage. I am sure my heightened ear capacity has something to do with my over sensitized brain right now. I hear every peep, cry, eek, gurgle this baby makes, even when I am deep in slumber. But that's what seems to be happening as you become a unit with your kid. They are an extension of you.They go everywhere you go. They are your side kick until they don't want to be anymore. I am certainly a test study that genetics have nothing to do with this.

So I have become that mother with the stroller who is stopping up traffic on the sidewalk, bumping through chairs and tables at restaurants, crowding a bathroom to change a diaper, and scowling at those predators who threaten her young. This was a person I once despised. The amount of rage I had seeing a stroller is immeasurable. As I might have suspected, have I joined "the club?" I now smile knowingly at other parents. I chuckle at other crying babies and rambunctious toddlers. I exchange ages, names, and stroller preference with women in bathrooms. Jesus.

When I think about what I can write these days, it's precisely things I was never interested in reading. So my apologies to fellow infertiles still in the trenches trying. I hope you still visit me. For other mothers, I hope that we learn to love our mothering experience despite all our infertility baggage. It's a challenge but I try to remember I had to dig really deep into my soul to invite this baby into my life. My choices were hard and I still sometimes yearn for the biological child I tried so hard to have. But this doesn't make me less of a mother. Already my world is changing in the most subtle of ways, even down to how I walk the streets of my home.