Motherhood Firsts

When my youngest girl was born, I had barely recovered from a car wreck I had experienced just two weeks before. She was six weeks premature, so quickly after she made her entrance into the world, the doctors took my baby to check for any unseen damage that may have been caused by the wreck. My husband and I were happy luck had been with us and she held no ill-effects of any kind. And I could not wait until her first smile.

The days and weeks moved along slowly, with me slowly recuperating from both the wreck and labor. As my baby closed in on her two-month "birthday," I longed to see her first real smile, or really any sign of interaction on her part, besides the normal baby stuff.

I waited patiently, hoping the day was coming soon. It seemed she was never going to smile and I was beginning to worry that maybe there had been some 'unseen' damage she had taken that had been missed by the doctors. I decided to be patient just a little longer for her tiny, precious smile to appear.

Then one night, as I placed her in her crib, I hoped tomorrow would be the day. I gently stroked her head as she drifted off, then quietly got into my own bed. The night went as usual, waking up at 2:30 for feeding, then again at about 6:30. I watched the sunrise through my bedroom window as my little one took her bottle. When she finished, I placed the bottle to the side, and when I looked back at her, she was smiling. Her first smile was even more brilliant than the newly risen sun, and made the day one I would never forget.