Got an email yesterday from a college friend of mine. I haven't heard from him for a few years, and since then he's gotten married and just had his second daughter three weeks ago. His first daughter is 19 months old - almost the same age as mine - and she was born with Down Syndrome. He sent a photo of the whole family, and it just made me cry to look at it. I don't know if I can precisely describe what I was feeling. Sad, not so much because the child has a disability, but more because I know it must have been so, so hard for my friend and his wife to be faced with the prospect of raising a child with a disability. I was sad for the moment that they had to endure when they realized that none of this having-a-baby stuff was going to be the way they'd always imagined it. I also cried because I was so proud of my friend, sitting there with his beautiful family and so full of love and it all working out for him in spite of the intense challenges his family faces. And I suppose I wept a little out of guilt, too, for all the times I thought my situation wasn't perfect and got stressed out about it.

I would never not be a mom now. I am so addicted to this love (I know, I know . . . Robert Palmer got into my head just now, too - sorry) that I can't imagine living without it. Of course I get resentful sometimes that I can't just go to a movie or out to a restaurant or shopping for clothes by myself and take my time. And have things that are MINE and pretty and not stained or wet. But those are low moments, and luckily they are becoming a lot fewer and farther (further?) between. I think my situation now is just about perfect, stresses and worries and all. I'm sure my old college friend thinks his is, too.