Heartstrings.....

There is just something about watching your baby girl grow up that tears at your heart. My girls are my pride and joy. Watching them grow into the young women God has intend for them to become is both wonderful and terribly hard at the same time. My eyes swell with tears.....for the joy I feel and the sadness of my babies being young women now and not my baby girls.

Tonight....well this morning now....my middle daughter is on my mind. She is in love. Really really deeply in love. Twenty-one years old and ready to make decisions to determine the path she will walk the rest of her life. How did we get here so fast? Where did my time go with my baby girl? I want to tell you a little about the baby girl that has now become a young woman.

I should have known from the moment I knew I was expecting that she would be my strong-willed child. My pregnancy was far from easy with her. Our life at the time was far from calm or easy. We had one baby girl, were both in school, working and trying to make ends meet. To say the least...it was not an easy time in our marriage. When I knew I was expecting it made me happy and scared at the same time. I wasn't sure Mike and I were stable enough to hold everything together and have 2 babies. How would we make ends meet? I could barely afford daycare for one baby! What about finishing school? Could I even love another baby like I did my first born daughter? Through all those fears, I still was so excited about this baby. This baby would complete our family....or so I thought at the time!

Pregnancy isn't an easy road for me....sick is an understatement!!! I was ever so sick with this one. Morning sickness lasted for months...more than 3...and it was not just morning sickness, it was all day sickness. Mike was working out of town and nights. I was working for a mean boss that hated any time one of us was pregnant and was determined to make life a living hell. Stress in our marriage was at an all time high, and then I had my wreck! I was 5 months pregnant and a teenager with no license or insurance decided to pull out in front of me. Scared to death for the life of our daughter and our unborn child, I went to the hospital to be checked out. Baby girl #1 had slept through the wreck and was fine....baby #2 was fine and well protected in her warm little womb. Me....I was sore all over and even more determined to love this little one who was strong enough to survive her first wreck.

Not only had she survived the wreck, but she was one of about 5 babies expected around our church and family that actually lived to birth. There were 5 of us pregnant. Three of the babies did not make it to term. There was something wrong with each of them and the fear that something was wrong with my baby took me over. I finally convinced my doctor to do a sonogram...which was a big deal back then...to make sure she was okay. That was when we learned we would be having another daughter. The rest of my pregnany went according to plan. I survived a HOT summer of pregnancy and was anxiously awaiting my September baby......September came and went. October was over a week old and finally the doctor decided she had to be born. She was big. I WAS BIG! So we scheduled for her to be induced. October 8th EARLY morning we arrived at the hospital expecting a baby in the next 12 hours or so. After 17 hours of pretty hard labor....my blood pressure dropping...no pain meds....and no progress being made, the doctor decided to do a c-section. Again, at this point I should have known what her personality would be. Strong....determined....stubborn....and a "I'll do it my way!" kind of girl!!! She was turned wrong, not dropping and perfectly comfortable where she was...until the word c-section was mentioned. I think at that point she "decided" it was time to make her appearance in this world! And she did!!! Within 30 minutes of the doctor mentioning taking her....she was here! She decided to get here so fast that it hurt my body pretty badly. She was my big baby. Nine pounds but beautiful! Head full of hair, darker skin and beautiful blue eyes! Instantly she was totally different from her sister....who was blond, fair skin and blue eyed...and bald when she was born. Tara, on the other hand, had a head full of hair....one plus from the months of sickness and heartburn!!! She was jaundice and "high maintenance" from the beginning! Luckily October was warm and sunny that year so we could take her home and let her "sunbathe" in the window for hours to help with the jaundice. We had to do several heel pricks and blood tests during the next week.

I'd like to say that was where the stubborn-will-of-her-own personality stopped, but it didn't. She was never a cuddler....which I wanted to do with my babies. She fought like a wild cat if you tried to hold her down for anything..changing diapers, giving medicine, etc. She loved her mommy but she wanted her daddy!!! She was sick often and we had many doctor and hospital bills. She scared us to death when they started testing her for lukemia after an extremely high white blood cell count that landed her in the hospital with 5 nurses fighting to hold her down and to put an IV in her little 2 year old arm. Then again when she was about 10 she decided to scare us again with a battle with meningitis that kept us all at Children's Hospital for a week with spinal taps and me signing papers about procedures that were risky but needed to make her better! Her life seemed to be in my hands once again.

Years of soccer showed her personality as well as gave us many more doctor bills. Hunting and fishing with her daddy...climbing mountains and white-water rafting with her youth group...wrestling with her boy cousins and uncles....never letting me put hair bows in her hair.....playing with horses, not DOLLS....I had my full blown, beautiful dark haired, blue-eyed, tom-boy little girl. My beautiful independent baby girl, with a mind of her own, grew to be just as strong-willed teenager with her own ideas of how she would live her life. Her faith was strong but never did she buy in to the "regular" way of doing things. She pushed the envelop with me every time she could. She made me challenge why I did and believed what I believed. She constantly would strive to be totally different from her sister and to be as tough as any boy and as pretty as any girl!!! She was born in to a natural strength and beauty of her own.

High school beat her down at times and she made some poor choices as we all do during those insane years but she recovered from them and learned valuable lessons. She dated some less-than-wonderful boys than never knew the real her. However, she held on to who she was and survived high school. Now she decided to venture out to a college all by herself. NONE of her friends and no one we knew would be there with her. She made friends and when she decided she needed a change...she changed...moved to another college and started a whole new adventure with new friends. To say she has found herself might be an understatement. Living through drama of roommates with different morals than she has made her reevaluate her path once again. Somewhere during this time....her friendship with a special young man grew. He became her rock. He was there to listen and help her through stuff any time she needed it. She could talk to him about the stuff she didn't want to worry us with. She learned she could tell him anything and he would listen and not judge. Watching their friendship deepen caught my attention. It scared me to be honest.

You see, this young man is special. He is the son of one of my best friends. He is also living on the other side of the world from her. Dustin is in the army. He was stationed in Germany at the time and they could only communicate via skype or internet. She talked a lot about him and I encouraged her "friendship" to stay just that. I didn't want her not going out and spending time with her friends and having some of those good "college" experiences. Little did I know that he was the most stable friendship she had during all those college days. When he came home for leave before deploying to Afghanistan, the sparks started flying. You could almost see them. EVERYONE noticed it. They just were instant. From that time on, we should have known. Actually, Mike swears he knew then how they would be now! Once again, she was following HER heart and had HER mind made up. He was the one. He was going to be part of her life for a very long time. I think it almost scared her too.

After 6 months of deployment, he is home for a short 2 weeks period. They have been in a relationship for over 6 months while he has served in one of the most active and dangerous areas. He has grown to be a young man instead of the boy I knew. He has captured my baby girl's heart. He is her best friend. He.....I believe....always will be.

Watching my daughter become this young woman who loves this young man who puts his life on the line daily for our freedom is almost too much for this momma. Watching my baby girl...my strong-willed...determined...independent...spirited...wise beyond her years...baby girl make life decisions with this young man makes my heart hurt....good hurt...and hard hurt. That's the only way I know to describe it. I'm so excited and happy for her and scared and sad at the same time. She has been my spirited child. She has been a part of my heart that I can't expalin. You never have favorite children....it is impossible to favor one of my girls over the other...they are each unique and hold special parts of my heart...but this one...this daughter....has a part of my heart that is very soft. Maybe it is because she was born during a time in my life where all I wanted was to take care and protect my two girls. I held on tight to her. Maybe it was because of the hard pregnancy, wreck, impossible delivery of her that she has this spot. Maybe it was because of how sick she was as a baby and the other close calls through her growing up. Maybe it is because she wouldn't let me hold on to her that I try so hard to hold on still now. Maybe it was because she loved me...but wanted her daddy more. Maybe it is because she has some of the best of me in her that I have lost throughout the years.

My heart strings are being pulled tight this morning. She and Dustin are making choices and decisions that could take her far from me. She is no longer my baby girl....well, not my baby....she will always be my girl. She is a young woman. She is at that time where we choose to leave our families and hold tightly to a new family.....her very own little family some day. I know the days ahead will be hard for her. Saying good-bye to this young man and sending him back to danger and away from her arms will be hard. My watching her survive these next months without him here will be hard. Preparing to give her to him one day will be one of the hardest joyful things I will do.

My heartstrings are playing a song of love for a baby girl I love deeply.....