Gateway

This is what my husband saw moments after I gave birth to our second child.

His wife exhausted, overwhelmed with every emotion possible.

And in love.

So in love with the baby they created, she grew, and brought safely into the world.

And he managed to capture it.

A photo I will treasure for ever.

In its pixelated but completely real form.

This photo takes me back to that exact moment.

I felt so tired but powerful.

So raw but relieved.

The aftermath was wrapped in euphoria.

I was immersed in the calm after the storm.

And there was so much love and excitement in that room.

It was bursting out the doors into the corridors of nurses and other midwives.

It was cluttering the inboxes of those patiently waiting for the news.

It was exhausted whispers between us, as we all got to know each other through the sweat and tears.

We had done it.

I had done it,

Again.

And while it was the end, it was really only the beginning.

Because birth is the gateway.

I was the gateway.

And that exhausted mother in the photo is still there.

Now adorned in comfy maternity clothes and robes during all hours of the day and night.

Exchanges often still in whispers, now in darkness.

Sweat and tears falling in moments of too muchness.

I’m still there.

Months after the gateway opened.

After the fourth trimester ended.

After the excitement dulled down.

I’m still there.

And I’ll always still be there.

Because a love like this never fades.

Not like my exhaustion will one day, eventually.

My love only grows.

And I grow with it.