Thirteen is good – growing up fast.

Thirteen is good.
Today she’s thirteen. It seems like so many years ago and not just thirteen, that she decided to arrive earlier than expected as my body also decided that it had had enough of being pregnant. She came into the world dramatically and changed my life, our life.

She made me a mum. She made me realise and still does remind me regularly of my own flaws and faults as I parent her, far too much like me, with splashes of her dad thrown in for better measure. 

Unconditional love is what I would describe motherhood. You love it because that’s all you know-how. 

She’s feisty, intelligent, compassionate, kind, a worrier like her mum (we watch that carefully) and an organised being like her dad) she’s brave, she’s faced hard things, and she cares about the people and the world around her. 

She thinks her parents are old, haven’t a clue about life and spends more time now rolling her eyes and muttering under her breath as she grows up and tries to prove and find her way in the world. When we try to tell her that we were teenagers once, she refuses to believe us. 

She makes me laugh, she occasionally makes me want to cry when I realise I have NO IDEA how to parent what is essentially a better but still miniature version of me, although now she’s taller than me that doesn’t quite sound right either. She’s growing up and it’s going faster than I would like it to. I am trying to hold onto the time as much as I can.

She made me a mum. She’s amazing and life is before her. Let’s hope I can do a good job of sending her out towards it. It’s a privilege to be her mum.

Thirteen is good!