Lillie, in writing.

Lill,

You have expanded. The two days we were in the hospital with Matilda, you became someone entirely different. Your intensity has increased 200%. You are way more angry, vocal, wound up, exasperated, excited, hyper... all stemming from this huge shift in your life. You were pushed up one notch to become an older sister. You accept your role mostly with frustration.

You demand three helpings of juice or milk before 8:30 in the morning. You defy any food I set before you. It has to be your idea or you won't eat it. If I attempt to lie down in bed for a rest, you run in, rip the quilt from my shoulders and cry, "no, no, mommy!". You scream. All the time. For joy, for pain, and mostly for things you don't agree with. You throw Matilda's rolled up dirty diapers across the room. You clear all the items off my nightstand with one sweep of your toddler arm. You draw on the walls, pour milk on the carpet, take your diaper off and go potty on the front porch. You cry most of the day.

I wish more than anything your communication would pick up mighty speed and skip to the part where you can say exactly what you want and you don't get frustrated. It's a hard time right now, we can't understand you and it throws you into orbit.

Sometimes I wish that someone could take you for a few hours a day. So I can hear what peace sounds like. And then that thought fires up something inside of me that makes me want to protect you, to keep you to myself. All 30 fighting pounds of you. I'm your mother, I can handle you, I want to handle you.

Your hitting, screaming tantrums are hard.

But.

I laid in bed with you last night, you had a hard time going to sleep. You couldn't stop crying every time I walked you back into your bed. So we laid there and sang a few songs. After we discussed bugs for a good ten minutes you nodded off. I watched you breathe. Felt your strong spirit that had been fighting so hard all day settle down into your milky white skin, resting for once. Your little soul thriving, your eyes closed tight.

My throat swelled up in that one spot. That spot that swelled whenever I used to remember your birth, so shocking and traumatic, but one that bonded me so strongly to you that I clutched your infant head to my chest every chance I got. That feeling... of being kicked and hit and rolled over by a truck, and that one little person that's been responsible, the one that is so intense that it makes all the colors of my world more vibrant...  is one I would absolutely give my life for.