We walked around the Hospital parking lot still trying to decide what we were going to name our first child. We had no idea if it was a boy or a girl so we were throwing around different names again. The contractions got bad enough that Andrea would have to stop occasionally. We went back inside and the nurses announced that we would have a new baby soon. They put Andrea in a hospital gown and we kept doing laps, inside the hospital halls this time rather than outside in the parking lot.
As labor progressed I was fascinated by it all but there were also times that I lost focus. Andrea wanted me to watch the monitor and tell her when the contractions were coming, when they had peaked and when they were over. One time she felt pain coming on and saw I was watching ESPN on TV and she sternly told me, “You’re not watching!”
The end of labor is such a frantic thing. The room is busy with motion of doctors and nurses and the pain of a mother. In no time at all Tori came into the world. There was a moment of silence that seemed to take forever where the world stood still and I watched Tori take her first breath. Then she screamed and all at once I felt a flood of emotion I did not know I was capable of. First I realized what a miracle it is for God to breathe life into a human. Then the doctor handed me this little baby girl and the magnitude of the responsibility of being a dad was real to me for the first time.
As I look at my daughter today I feel another wave of emotion I was not prepared for. The emotion of releasing the arrow and letting the child I have been responsible for be free to be an adult and find her own way in life. I do not doubt that Tori will do well. She is more mature and ready for what is ahead than I was at her age.
I am not the kind of parent who wishes for the past. I like our past but I also like where we are in life as a family and I enjoy watching my kids grow up. Although Tori is not moving out of the house any time in the next couple of days or weeks, when she does set out on her own I will miss being in her orbit everyday.
Tori I am proud of who you have become. I have written that in your birthday cards the last couple of years and I mean it. You are who you are partially because of me but also in spite of me - and that is a good thing.
As labor progressed I was fascinated by it all but there were also times that I lost focus. Andrea wanted me to watch the monitor and tell her when the contractions were coming, when they had peaked and when they were over. One time she felt pain coming on and saw I was watching ESPN on TV and she sternly told me, “You’re not watching!”
The end of labor is such a frantic thing. The room is busy with motion of doctors and nurses and the pain of a mother. In no time at all Tori came into the world. There was a moment of silence that seemed to take forever where the world stood still and I watched Tori take her first breath. Then she screamed and all at once I felt a flood of emotion I did not know I was capable of. First I realized what a miracle it is for God to breathe life into a human. Then the doctor handed me this little baby girl and the magnitude of the responsibility of being a dad was real to me for the first time.
As I look at my daughter today I feel another wave of emotion I was not prepared for. The emotion of releasing the arrow and letting the child I have been responsible for be free to be an adult and find her own way in life. I do not doubt that Tori will do well. She is more mature and ready for what is ahead than I was at her age.
I am not the kind of parent who wishes for the past. I like our past but I also like where we are in life as a family and I enjoy watching my kids grow up. Although Tori is not moving out of the house any time in the next couple of days or weeks, when she does set out on her own I will miss being in her orbit everyday.
Tori I am proud of who you have become. I have written that in your birthday cards the last couple of years and I mean it. You are who you are partially because of me but also in spite of me - and that is a good thing.
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