Transient Times

None of us have a clue about how heartbreakingly fast time goes when you become a parent. How it rips your breath away when you see how much your child can change, sometimes seemingly overnight. How Facebook memories has you peering, misty-eyed, at year-old photos of different, more rounded faces; how you wish you had a little more time when they are so young, cute and small enough to fit on your hip. 

Yet as a first-time parent of a baby, then toddler, then little boy with Down’s Syndrome every stage has been stretched out and elongated beyond belief – and patience – sometimes.  I had plenty of time to enjoy, get to know and ruminate over the various versions of Theo.  I had to get used to the slower pace and often worried when that next stage would finally arrive.

So when Freddie arrived and we were swept along with the swift tide of typical development, alongside the blackhole that was Covid, those early years have raced by leaving a painful longing in their wake. The pace is entirely different. I’ve experienced daily nostalgia for moments just passed, tangibly feeling the shift of time, knowing that I never felt anything of the sort the first time round.

The first time round I wished time would speed up, willing it to go faster just like everyone else’s. Or rewind and take me back to when Down’s-Syndrome was not in my world. I wasted great swathes of time longing it were different, struggling to accept reality.

Now I know what a typical journey is like, as well as one that is different, as Freddie has taken me on another route which is why it’s been so cherished. This summer, now essentially a closed chapter, spells the end of this family’s early years. That fleeting, precious, tiring time when your children are little, require endless amounts of kit, constant snacks and bum-wiping yet their world is wholly you. And, if you never returned to work like me after baby no. 2, your world is entirely them. I can count on one hand the days where I might have wished to be back at work because it was hard-going, tiring and, well, a bit of a poo-y mess sometimes. I basked in being a mum again, savouring all those mind-blowing moments of pure joy only your children can give you. Quite simply: it’s the best sort of love.

But Freddie is going to pre-school; this week and from now on: he’s out the house Monday to Friday, to join Theo whose just started Year 2. ( And that’s another ‘you-what?’ moment: it only feels months ago that Theo running into reception classroom).

‘Oh, you’ll be glad of the freedom,’ I’ve been told or ‘You’re going to love it: all that time to yourself’. Well, yes, but actually no. I can job-hunt and plan my next moves in utter peace, yup. I can take a full five minutes to go to the toilet and have a cuppa (as opposed to peeing so quickly and not having enough time to properly pull up your trousers to attend to a sobbing child).

But I know that I’ll be the mum crying the hardest because I don’t want the early years to end. I’m not ready; I could, quite happily, stay in a permanent loop of baby – 3 year old until nappy-changing has well and truly worn me down. These last few years, I have walked behind a pram and pushchair with fervent pride, I’ve loved having a mini companion, finding dummies in our bed and empty milk bottles on shelves. It’s just been so incredible second-time round, which has been first-time round in many ways.

Of course, I would be starting all over again had my pregnancy in January this year stuck around. Turning 46 a few weeks ago has sealed that door shut; Mother Nature has shoved me out of the fertile quarters to pastures new where hot flushes are my new normal. But why do I feel the end of this stage so much more than anyone else, it seems? All routes point back to Theo.

His early years were sadly so different: firstly, they were a time to recover, to put myself and my vision of the world back together as best I could. Second, they were filled to the brim with appointments, test and hospital visits so therefore, a good deal of anxiety. Thirdly, everything was so slow. We had a baby for 3 years, a toddler for 2 and now get asked quite a bit if we have twins. My six and a half year old is the same size as my three year old. Convenient, sure, but a bit strange when you think about it. It’s a unique situation to be in (but I suppose it always has been..) I knew the day would come when Freddie takes over – not just in size but understanding – and I think we’ve arrived there already. Another harbinger of the shifting times. The baton of older brother has been unknowingly transferred.

So, goodbye to that special time of babies and bottles, high-chairs and rattles, of napping and wake-up snuggles, the constant discovery; being kept on your feet by emerging personalities and preferences. What a unique and miraculous era of motherhood.