Dear Arlandria,
This month I felt you kick inside me for the first time. I've felt twinges and flips that I assumed were you, but this week I was able to truly feel your presence. You kick, and you kick hard. For a long time during the early stages of my pregnancy, I denied your existence. I saw you on ultrasounds, heard your heartbeat, and felt my stomach churn with morning sickness--but I refused to believe that you would make it this far.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: I never thought I would get pregnant this easily. Genetics and health issues were stacked, and not in my favor. I assumed my future would hold fertility treatments, costly medical bills, and many disappointed pregnancy tests.
Yet that isn't what happened.
In fact I took a pregnancy test on a whim, because I felt cramping in my stomach and hadn't had a menstrual cycle. I remember seeing the faint blue line appear on the test and swearing that I was simply imagining it. I yelled for your father, and looked at him with wide, terrified eyes. Three days and $100 worth of pregnancy tests later, that blue line remained and my future shifted.
Since day one I have been so scared to lose you. So terrified of miscarrying that I refused to let myself get excited. I was so fearful that losing you might make me less of a woman, less of a mother, less of a person. I couldn't handle that failure so I pushed it in the back of my mind and tried to live life. I told myself that I wasn't ready to be a mother anyway. I liked to sleep too much. I was too selfish, too career driven.
Yet you still continued to take up space. You grew and formed and before I knew it, you were impossible to deny. You were a tiny bundle of kicking toes and wiggling fingertips. You made your presence known; loudly and without ceremony.
Which is exactly how I want you to live your life.
Take up space in rooms where you feel scared to enter. My darling, never make yourself small for others; never allow yourself to fit inside a box of acceptance that someone else has crafted. Smash whatever ceiling stops you, and walk with the knowledge that you are sacred and holy.
You were not created to live in a glass house. You were not given life to live it timidly. Your name is long. It is a mouthful to say, and will take longer to learn how to spell. Arlandria Clementine Elieen, you were given a name that makes people pause at your existence. Demand the time your name takes to pronounce, own the power that is laced within each syllable. Never let anyone shorten your name without your permission. Make them take the time it takes to say your name, because you are worth every second.
Live bravely and courageously in life as you did inside me.
I suppose this is why I started writing on this blog. I am a big advocate of love letters, but am horrible with making time to write them. Yet you, my dear, you are worth every minute of my day. You are worth every word I type and every sentence I string together. You are worth every artistic effort I make and so much more.
xoxo,
Your mother.
