The journey from the womb to Otherness

The journey from the womb to Otherness began the moment the pink line appeared on my pregnancy test.

Beloved, you were once like cells of my own body, so small and undifferentiated that I could not detect your presence. You were closer to being a part of me, and I a part of you, than any other being I have known.

You grew; my abdomen swelled and you kicked to make yourself known. You were in me but not entirely of me. Your presence dictated the sensations of my body, my emotions, the way I cared for myself. You gave me the gift of health because knowing you dwelled within my womb demanded that I respect my body.

It happened. The pushing, the chaotic but rhythmic surges of birth, and I was suddenly so vastly empty. What a strange space where you once were.

Now in my arms, you were outside but not far from my being. You still controlled my hormones – your skin against mine, sleeping for hours swaddled to my chest, drinking almost constantly from the fountain of life that my body made for you. I was your habitat, the environment that stabilized your temperature and your shocked senses as they knocked hard and fast against the raw, bright world. When I sweat I knew it was your doing, when I wept it was also you – you left me, but the signs of you were vivid on skin and soul. My stomach was loose, my breasts full, red lines had not yet faded to silver. I felt naked, incomplete, stepping outside without you because I was so accustomed to us being one body, moving and being seen together, inseparable in the world’s eyes. I rushed home.

Now faster, now further, you tumble from the microscopic unity. The first smile of delight that opened to me a personality and humor not my own. Emotion that, though deeply connected to my actions, belongs to you. The first roll, a scoot across the floor, the desire to face outward towards the world instead of curled with eyes shut against my chest. The movement from my bed into your own. And now this newfound mobility that takes you across the room and out my sight before I can blink. I turn and you are gone, exploring. You squirm in my arms to get down on the floor. You are Other. You are on a mission – a mission to find yourself slowly over the years of growing. You rear the startling head of your own strong will and I crash into it, bewildered and uncertain how to proceed when what was once a seedling in my body is now asking, insisting, taking stand as someone distinct.

Today surprised me with the return of the blood that marks my rhythm as a woman, my fertility, and the patterns of my body before you took root in my womb. Nineteen months of a body altered by the making of you, the giving forth, the tending, and now the chemical messages of your existence have let go of their reign. The evidence of you in me is fading back into the pale seams of my single body. We are two.

I could bemoan the speed at which this is all taking place. But perhaps that would not be fair to you. Instead I say Welcome. Welcome Other. I am here as a haven of security. To nurse you when you crawl back into my lap, to rock you off to dreams, to hold you close when strangers laugh too loudly. But I am also here as a springboard off which you can fly forth into the unending process of discovery and growth. I fear, as all mothers do, with the urge sometimes to quiet you again into my body, envelope you back into the certain walls of my womb. But for your sake I must believe in the goodness of the slow emergence of Other. I must put out my hand each day to shake yours and say, “Hello, so good to meet you, so good to know you, so good to find this new human, bursting with potential, this fresh start on the earth. Welcome.”

You are cherished. You are loved. You are you. As you change each day, may I always respect the Otherness that springs up from your soul even as we are, and I pray always will be, deeply and richly connected.