Love at First Sight

There are moments in life that set our course and define who we are. These moments are few, and we are almost always unprepared for them.

I am thirty-four years old, and I’ve had such moments:

When my sister got pregnant while still in her teens.
When I became editor-in-chief of our high school paper.
When I was accepted at the University of the Philippines.
When I reported for my first job.
When I realized that I was claustrophobic while nearing the summit of Mt. San Cristobal during a mountaineering training climb.
When I realized how much I love my dear friend (now my husband).

None of these prepared me for the moment when I first beheld my child.

I should not have been surprised. After all, for the last nine months, my husband and I had excitedly prepared for the coming of our child, the baby lovingly conceived during our honeymoon. But surprised, I was.

The day that I first saw my child had been a happy but rather tiring one: I had given birth the night before, and my morning was spent entertaining well-wishers. I was impatient. I wanted my first sight of the baby to be a very special, private moment with my husband. As soon as I could stand, after the visitors left, I asked my husband to wheel me to the nursery.

There, through the mirror, the sight of our swaddled baby – red, tiny, and sleeping peacefully – made us catch our breath. Awed, my husband and I inched closer and held each other’s hands as we examined each of his features. His head, covered with fine, spiky dark brown hair, looked too big for his body. He was oddly-colored and wrinkled; puffy-faced with bags under his eyes.

He was the most beautiful thing we have ever seen.

I went inside the nursery, changed into a nursing gown, then asked the nurse to give me my son for breastfeeding. He was asleep, but as soon as I held him (a little gingerly, since he was so tiny), he woke up. He opened his mouth, yawned prettily, opened his eyes and looked straight at me. Our eyes met and held, his expression solemn and searching, as if he was asking, "Is that you, mommy?"

I felt my heart constrict. I could not breathe, and my throat felt tight. Suddenly, tears welled up in my eyes and flowed freely down my cheeks.

Words are not adequate to describe how I felt then: relief, joy, surprise, even fear. After years of waiting for a child, after nine months of carrying him in my womb, after seventeen hours of difficult labor, I was holding my baby in my arms, and he seemed to know me!

Breathless, I held my child close to my heart. I felt his warmth, his irregular breathing, and I was filled with happiness that was almost painful. My baby opened his little mouth, waved his tiny fists, and kept on looking deep into my eyes. I was mesmerized.

There, inside the crowded, noisy hospital nursery, I held my baby for the first time. I felt his heart beat, and all other sounds ceased. We stared at each other, and everyone else – the nursing mommies, the impatient nurses, the other babies – disappeared. It was as if the world stopped and there was just the two of us.

It was love at first sight.