Friday, April 18, 2008

She looks just like you: part two

Our daughter is now six weeks old – six weeks of experiencing what we had dreamed about for almost seven years. It is still unreal to me, to us, and yet it has happened. All the agonizing we did about using DE and how we would feel was mostly washed away over a year ago when we finally decided on this route and now that the little one is here I truly understand how all our fears meant nothing. I do not feel that oh she’s not genetically mine, that doesn’t bubble up at all. I look into her eyes and think here is a tiny human being and we have been trusted to care for her and give her roots so that when she grows her wings and flies away she’ll also be firmly grounded.

The thing that has continued to happen and I suppose will continue well, as long as we’re alive, are the comments from people on who she looks like and no I’m not just talking about strangers. My mother-in-law who knows all about the DE said to me last week she has your eyes and long fingers. How funny is that? I didn’t correct her and launch into a whole thing about how it’s totally impossible for her to look like me, I just smiled and fell back on my favorite response: you think so? It goes to show how little it really matters and how people will see what they want to see. For instance I’m pretty sure she and I stretch the same when we wake up…