“Just as there is no warning for childbirth, there is no preparation for the sight of a first child. I studied his face, fingers, the folds in his boneless little legs, the whorls of his ears, the tiny nipples on his chest. I held my breath as he sighed and laughed when he yawned, wondered at his grasp on my thumb. I could not get my fill of looking.
There should be a song for a woman to sing at the moment, or a prayer to recite. But perhaps there is none because there are no words strong enough to name that moment. Like every mother since the first mother, I was overcome and bereft, exalted and ravaged. I had crosssed over from girlhood. I beheld myself as an infant in my mother’s arms, and caught a glimpse of my own death. I wept without knowing whether I rejoiced or mourned. My mothers and their mothers were with me as I held my baby.”
-The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
This is EXACTLY what I have been trying to say. Exalted and Ravaged. Exactly
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