Babies are adorable, and I am already nostalgic about my baby’s childhood. They are so cute that you always want to have them in your hands. You enjoy every minute that you spend with them. You fall in love with their cheeks, their lips, their tiny fingers that grab everything and the most beautiful thing that you will ever see is the smile of a baby.
Once a baby is around you, you will just get addicted to their sweetness. It doesn’t matter if the baby is yours or not; you could literally cry by looking at the face of those beautiful creatures when they are in their prams. You can’t help but envy new parents that have to hold that new-born squishiness in their hands. Babies are just adorable.
Most people cannot even bring themselves to get their eyes off babies no matter what they are doing. Your heart melts when you see those beauties laugh for no reason or even when they fart innocently. It is not difficult to understand why babies enchant parents.
But we were all babies once too. Babies must grow just as we have grown.
They now have to go to school with big backpacks and come back now wearing a long face. They are still your beautiful children that you are proud of, but they are no longer those squishy new-borns that you want them to be. They leave all that behind.
The reminders on your social media don’t make it any easier for you. You can now only look back at those photos and think of how much time has passed since your babies were babies. One minute you are holding them as little babes while they try to put everything in their mouth and the next minute, they are outside on their own cycling with their friends.
You cannot help but miss when they were babies. When you held them and rocked them till they slept? You will even miss when you fed them as they threw their little limbs in excitement. Even though you hated when they woke up in the dead of night for no particular reason, you will miss those moments when you stayed up with them. You simply just miss everything.
What does all of this mean? Does it mean that you want to have another baby? Or could it be simple nostalgia? What really is going on with you? Some specialists have opined that it is as simple as just looking back and holding tight to the memories of baby years. It was romanticising what used to be.
When your children were babies, way before they became their own person, having their own identity, voice and personality, you could stay with them while holding and watching over them and have the time of your life. You imagine your baby growing up and becoming a fully realised adult. You bond with the babies, and you begin to miss all of it when they actually now have to go and grow.
There is another reason why you often look back and miss the days when your children were babies. Aside from their cuteness and squishy new-born looks, there is something else that pulls you towards babies. One reason that has you gravitating towards babies is the helplessness of babies. Babies need you to do literally everything for them. You decide what they need and when they get it. They cannot say anything or want anything in particular. They are thankful and grateful when they see you doing things for them. Babies choose you over anyone else that’s why they cry when other people hold them and stop immediately, they return back into your arms.
But the babies are still right there in front of you although a bit bigger. Why are you so nostalgic even though the people you miss are sitting across you? Why are you holding strongly to sentiments of baby years? Is there a reason that explains all of these?
The point where most people decide not to have kids anymore is when they begin to feel like they have lost something. People can feel like they have lost; they lost something when they are child begins to grow and develop. They feel like they lost that person that always wanted or needed them, they want to go back to when they spent all their waking moments with their babies.
This feeling is not abnormal. You may miss the days when your children were just babes even though you can see them playing in the park a few feet from you. You might keep missing doing everything for them. Parenthood comes with nostalgia. This is not strange since as a parent, you watch your children grow, develop and pass different phases. It is not abnormal to hold on to the most intimate moments of these phases.
It is good to look back once in a while and think about what it used to be, enjoy the memories of the past, but it is also essential that you do not neglect the present. You have to come to terms with the fact that they are not tiny babes that need you to do everything for them anymore.
THEY GROW SO FAST
The crazy thing is that when you have them as little babies, you cannot help but imagine a future where they are grown and a bit more independent. Sometimes you even want to have some time to yourself. There are other times you wish time could move faster so you can go back to your career or whatever you had going on before the baby came. You want to hop on a time machine and get to the future already, but you would only get to the future to start missing having them as babies. You will miss the sleepless nights, the vomits on your shirt, the irritating crying for no reasons and literally everything that made you want to get done with the phase.
There is this guilt that you feel when you remember that you wished for your baby to grow up soon. You regret not taking some more of your time with the baby, and now that the future you so coveted is here, you would instead go back to when they needed you so badly. Looking at the future makes you miss the present most times. There is something that you are missing at the moment that you are yearning for tomorrow. But the truth is that no matter how much you live in the moment; you will still miss the things that you loved and enjoy doing. This is what it is with your baby. You cannot soak up all the good times to avoid nostalgia. Nostalgia must come, and you may just have to wrap yourself in the comfort of your memories.
WHAT YOU CAN DO?
Who would have thought that there could be any trace of sadness associated with watching your kid grow? It is supposed to be a thing of joy, something to look forward to, but apparently, it is not all of that. When you are dealing with the longings of nostalgia, you would have to brace yourself as little things could set it off and have you in a bad mood. You would experience varying emotions. You would feel both joy and guilt as your child grows and as you miss cradling them all day long.
You may have absorbed every moment that you had with them as babies, but it won’t stop the sadness that comes as the year passes. Most people prefer not to admit this feeling of sadness that comes with the children growing up, some people think it is a terrible way to view parenthood, but it does not take away from the fact that it is the reality, nonetheless. As a parent, you can look forward to the future where your children are grown and becoming their own person, but you can also allow yourself to look back at the past and cherish the memories you had with the kids as babes.
You must not allow yourself to become overwhelmed by the feeling of nostalgia that you forget to be there for your kids in the present. You need to understand that they are still the same babies that you raised even though they may not want to be in your arms all day long. You must realise that they have passed a phase and that you must pass this phase as well.
Enjoy the present, appreciate the past and be hopeful about the future. Children will make you feel a lot of things, but you must be able to control how much the emotions control you. It’s normal to be nostalgic about your baby’s childhood, embrace and enjoy it.
