Lost Innocence Found Again

I've noticed lately that I've become a different person, and not in a good way. I've noticed a certain cynicism about myself and about the world. I find myself doubting people, not trusting them, and not thinking the best things about them. I've often been told that one of my likeable qualities has been my naivete, my ability to trust people, and believing in the world. I don't know if this new cynicism is just a reflection of my age, the changing world we live in, and just from pure experiences that have happened to me.

Yet the most beautiful thing has happened to me-something called motherhood. I don't know if it's God's way of reaching out to the cynical, but the gift that I've been bestowed is that of a baby. My whole days are spent with my son. It is no wonder that I am the person of preference for him. At night, when he is tired and wants to be held, he'll cry loud cries and big tears will fall until my husband wearily hands him over to me and says, "He loves his momma. He only wants his mommy."

In the beginning, when motherhood was so foreign to me (the movies and television are in no way a true reflection of what motherhood is truly like), I was so afraid of this baby, my son. I did not know how to comfort him. I could not feed him naturally a way a mother should be able to feed one of its own. I felt as if I was experiencing a dream, except I knew that it was my reality. Everything felt wrong that I was doing, nothing felt natural at all. I did not know how to be a mother. My expectations of what motherhood was supposed to be like felt all wrong. I hated myself for feeling like I had failed at motherhood when all I wanted was a baby to love who would love me unconditionally.

And magically, as the weeks and months have passed, I started to feel like a mom. All of the family help left and it was just me and my son. I was so petrified, yet I survived. Each day my son and I started to know one another and understand each other more.

I can still recall vividly in my mind the day that I knew in my heart that I was changed forever was a few months after my son was born. One of my favorite things to do with my son is to dance with him in our sunroom. I was listening to a Michael W. Smith song called "Give it Away." The lyrics are below:

She asked him for forever

And a promise that would last

He said, babe, you know I love you

But I can’t commit to that

She said love isn’t love’til you give it away

A father lived in silence

Saw his son become a man

There was a distance felt between them’cause he could not understand

That love isn’t love’til you give it away

You gotta give it away

CHORUS:As we live

Moving side by side

May we learn to give

Learn to sacrifice
We can entertain compassion

For a world in need of care

But the road of good intentions

Doesn’t lead to anywhere’cause love isn’t love’til you give it away

You gotta give it away

CHORUS

BRIDGE:

Love is like a river

Flowing down from the giver of life

We drink from the water

And our thirst is no longer denied

You gotta give it away

Chorus

There was a man who walked on water

He came to set the people free

He was the ultimate example

Of what love can truly be’cause his love was his life

And he gave it away

You gotta give it away

CHORUS

And as I danced and sang the words to this song, I could truly feel the love swelling in my heart for my son as the tears flowed freely from my eyes. I got the lyrics, "Love isn't love, 'til you give it away." I finally had the love for my son that I had heard so many mothers talk about...I had given him my complete love...and love isn't love 'til you give it away. I'm not sure when the love had appeared...whether it was slowly over time but it was there and I felt it in that moment as I danced with him in our sunroom. My son had fallen asleep by the time the song was done.

I remember dancing the next day with my son showing my husband our new song. And the same thing happened-I started to sing the chorus, "Love isn't love, 'til you give it away" and started to get choked up again.

With each new day, comes new discoveries. I love each day that I have with my son. I am discovering the world through his eyes-through his first experiences, his squeals, and his joys. I can see again through my cynicism that there is pure innocence and pure love in this world.