If I could go back I would tell her . . . 

That one day she’ll look back once the fog has cleared and realize those days were filled with magic. The type of magic you only see long after the trick. The beauty and then the bittersweet.

I’d tell her that the memories she’ll lose herself in won’t just be the milestones, but those long nights. She will never forget the pain of fatigue, but nostalgia will color her memory and she’ll find herself aching to breathe in those cuddles again.

I’d tell her about the tears, that with each cry she is learning.

I’ll tell her I’m not just talking about her baby.

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I’d tell her she’ll have alone time again, but it will feel like two hearts wandering in different directions. She’ll ask if it will always feel like that. I’ll tell her I don’t know yet.

I’d tell her that her eyes will close, the sun will rise, but in between those moments, she’ll feel so alone in the company of the stars. I’ll tell her each of those stars is another mother feeling exactly the same way, that she is never alone.

I’d tell her she doesn’t need to be the perfect mother, and the moment she believes there’s such a thing is the moment she believes she is failing.

I’d tell her that she is moving mountains, even when she loses her footing. Especially, when she loses her footing.

I’d tell her in some ways it gets easier, but for every first, there is a last. The hardest part is not realizing till later that a chapter has closed and you’re turning back the pages trying to pinpoint when you forgot to say goodbye to that mispronounced word.

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I’d tell her it isn’t a typical love story, motherhood is the raw unedited version, with all the outtakes, which is what makes it the most beautiful story of all.

I would try to describe the power of the infinite love she will feel, how it will consume her, scare her, comfort her.

That a love like this is a silent language that speaks in volumes.

But only I won’t tell her these things, because she will forget, like we all do, so that we can discover them for ourselves, as we’re meant to.

So instead I would simply tell her that she is seen, she is amazing, and she is enough.

Originally published on Jess Urlichs, Writer