As I’m sure all of you know, Connor was not the young man that bestowed the title of Mom on me. That honor belongs to Kyle S. Powers, the young man that came screaming into this world on 1/1/97. Yes you read that right, I have a New Years Baby, a 21 days early New Years Baby.

I don’t care how old you are when you have your first child. You figure things out together, sleeping in car seats, swings, co-sleeping, you nap when they do. Cutting their fingernails (or biting them off as I did), which bottles do they like, which formula works, and which causes projectile vomiting.

I was the woman who never thought I wanted children, and if I had them, I sure was not going to stay home with them. Kyle changed all that, I went back to work, but lost my daycare when he was 9 months old. So in the blink of an eye I became a Stay at Home Mom, and loved it.

I relished every milestone, sleeping through the night, crawling, first steps, walking, then running, then first words, then he was unstoppable. We built block towers together, played with matchbox cars, watched Barney Videos more times than I have fingers and toes to count. I loved being a mom, Kyle got 3 years of undivided attention before Connor joined the show and he became a big brother.

I don’t know about Kyle but I wouldn’t change those 3 years for anything. Even with all the sleepless nights, when he was up screaming with an ear infection, or the fact that his favorite way to sleep was in his battery operated swing in our bedroom. Many nights after he woke up to eat he went back to sleep, between us, sleeping on my right arm. Who needs feeling in their fingers anyway?

I read all the parenting books (this was 1997 pre internet). No blankets, they might suffocate, sleep them on their side with wedges, footed pajama sleepers to keep them toasty. But no one told me I had the anomaly of children. Kyle HATED to be hot, I didn’t know that at the time I just thought he was being a pint sized ASSHOLE. He took his footed pj’s off so I safety pinned the zipper closed. Houdini figured out how to circumvent that, I put them on backwards, he figured that out too. I did backwards and safety pin and he still escaped.

Finally by then he could talk. “No pj’s too hot mommy!! So my furnace of a child slept in a t shirt onesie in the middle of winter, and was just as happy as could be!! He hated to be hot so much he preferred you give him his bottle and prop him on a pillow on the floor, you holding him was too much body heat, it was his own personal version of hell!!!

I always knew he would do something that had to do with motors/wheels/machinery. I am convinced his first words were neither Mom Nor dad, but “Vroom Vroom Go”. He is now a heavy machinery operator and loves it.

I know generally this blog is all about the loss of Connor, but this time I am celebrating Kyle. My firstborn, the young man that I grew up raising, we figured things out together, what worked, what didn’t. From him driving matchbox cars, to him driving my car, then to his own cars, and now to operating heavy machinery. You make me proud every day Kyle, proud to be your mom, and proud that you are the young man who bestowed that title on me!!