I was holding my son just now. Putting him to bed. He’s two and a half and he still can’t fall asleep without being held by mom. So I usually come in and help put him down now that he’s getting kind of big.

I picked him up off of my wife.

He rolled over into my chest and snuggled in. Let out a contented sigh, and just slept. Comfortable and happy and safe.

And I just stood there for a few minutes. Because I realized that one day, I’m not going to be able to hold him like this anymore. My older one is four and I can pick him up just fine…. But I can’t really cradle him anymore. Parents, you know the difference. Or, if you don’t yet, you will soon.

Because today that just hit me. It just hit me that my son will probably never be…cradled by me again. Certainly not by his mom. But I still put him to sleep every night. I’m still there every night when he drifts off, sitting next to his bed. And there will be a last time that I do that. I get annoyed some nights because “I have stuff to do”. And there will be a last time that was annoying. Because there will be a last time that it happens at all.

We finally got the two year old weaned off of breast milk fairly recently. Maybe a few months. And like…there was a last breastfeeding. And neither my wife nor I remembers when it was. We celebrated the next day when he went to sleep without breastfeeding. I remember celebrating. And now I’m mourning.

No wonder he doesn’t want to go to sleep without mom; there will be a last time. And he probably doesn’t know why it upsets him, but that time will come and pass and he won’t remember. Only my wife and I will even know that something ended, that something was lost.

One day my baby boy is going to be a kid. And one day my kid is going to be an adult. And that adult will be…someone else.

My kid. My baby boy. But not.

Eventually the time without me will make up the bulk of my child’s life. He’ll have been an adult for longer than he’d ever been a baby or a kid or both.

Oh, shit, yeah, I dunno, something something computers, or whatever it is I usually post about.

#parenting

@b4ux1t3

There was a last time I read my teenager a book. I kind of miss that.

@starhawk yeah…that was one of the things I thought about while I was standing there.

I love reading my kids books. But the last thing I want to do after a 15 hour day is read the Super Mario Golden Book for the hundredth time, and I get annoyed that he wants it.

I’d rather we sit there let me read stories to him. I want to read him the hobbit and whatever other books I liked as a kid.

But… there’s going to be a last picture book this one has already moved past board books, I to paper books… don’t know the last time he read a board book except with his brother.

And one day there will be a last story book.

Dammit, you monster, you brought the damned ninjas back

@starhawk yeah…that was one of the things I thought about while I was standing there.

I love reading my kids books. But the last thing I want to do after a 15 hour day is read the Super Mario Golden Book for the hundredth time, and I get annoyed that he wants it.

I’d rather we sit there let me read stories to him. I want to read him the hobbit and whatever other books I liked as a kid.

But… there’s going to be a last picture book this one has already moved past board books, I to paper books… don’t know the last time he read a board book except with his brother.

And one day there will be a last story book.

Dammit, you monster, you brought the damned ninjas back