The Mothers

Today's HAWMC prompt is to write about a memory you have, in third person.

The woman is sitting in the hospital room, holding her baby. Her husband is at her side. She's just finished nursing him. He's so tiny, so sweet. She doesn't know what she's done to deserve this beautiful baby. She waited so long.

She's been in the room all day, tending to their son. Taking in his new baby smell. Twirling his soft, fluffy curls around her fingers. Rubbing her fingers and own cheeks against his, so velvety smooth and soft. Feeling the slight weight of him in her arms, on her chest. Feeling the heavy weight of responsibility for him settle in her happy heart. Listening to his funny little cries, that sound more like a kitten than a baby. Listening to his soft breaths while his head lays on her shoulder, peacefully sleeping.

She hasn't hardly put him down all day. Not even to let her husband hold him. After all this time of waiting for him, she can't imagine letting him go. She feels perfectly content and calm. This is who she is meant to be.

And then his mother walks in the room. Quietly. With both resolve and pain in her eyes. She is being discharged home to her partner and 2 other children. She hasn't seen her son since after she gave birth to him almost 36 hours before. The woman and her husband have kept her updated on him, but it's not the same. And now she is to say goodbye to him.

The woman hands the baby to her. Trying to hold back her own tears. It is hard to know what to say or do. She wants to ease his mother's pain. Wants her to know that she already loves this baby and will be the best mother she knows how to be for him. She wants her to know that she knows his mother loves him, too. That she will make sure he also knows this.

She stays quiet and watches mother and infant watching each other. There seems to be an understanding between the two. The woman doesn't know what they say to each other with their eyes, but it is something. Something that the mother and the baby both seem to understand. A calmness settles over the room.

The mother hands her son to the woman, who is now also this child's mother. At least that seems to be what she is trying to tell the woman without saying a word. The two mothers share a long embrace. They each love this baby. Neither seems to have the words to tell the other what she wants her to know. The joy of one mother, and the pain of both mothers, they are all mixed up in the small room. It is palpable.

The baby starts to root, hungry again.

The mother takes one more look at her baby. Nods her heads towards the husband. Pats the woman on her arm. The woman kisses her son's other mother on the cheek. There are no more words to be said.

The mother leaves the room.

The woman cries as she feeds their baby. She is finally a mother. But at what cost to this other woman, her son's other mother? She is fairly certain she will ever know.


Today's lesson: Adoption is ever so complicated.