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At 20 weeks I was told my baby wouldn't make it, today she turns 2

Today, our baby girl turns two. I hear a lot of parents talking about the time flying by, but this hasn’t been my experience.

More accurate, is that life before our little girl and the person I was before feel distant from who I am and where I am today.

Becoming her mother has been the making of me, it has taught me the depths of love in times of elation and times of complete despair.

Today Kokoro turns two.
Today Kokoro turns two.

It has taught me the strength required to get through the monotony of daily tasks after yet another sleepless night, and helped me to appreciate the generations who came before who did so without the “mod-cons” we enjoy today.

How did we survive without washing machines? And Netflix?

Becoming a parent with my husband has allowed me to see his strength of character.

I have seen him move quickly and enthusiastically from a loving partner into the dedicated, kind and present father Kokoro deserves, putting his own needs and wants aside to attend to hers. Today is the birth of him too.

It's a beautiful milestone for the family.
It's a beautiful milestone for the family.

While I am overflowing with joy at our little girl’s milestone, the joy of Kokoro’s birthdays will always be tinged with a catch in the throat and the shedding of a tear for the other gorgeous little souls in our community who have not made it this far.

As I hold her in my arms today in celebration, I am aware of at least one other parent who is watching her child slip into the last moments of her life.

This is the cruelty of love. As we give birth to these beings, we are doomed to spend the rest of our days with our heart outside of selves, at the mercy of the lottery of life.

Becoming a parent connects us all with the savage reality of existence and the exquisite terror of loving something so fragile.

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The moment I truly became Kokoro’s mother was months before I held her in my arms.

My husband and I were frantically driving to the Blue Mountains, in search of fresh air and quiet after one of the most traumatic and frightening events of our lives.

Holly's 20-week scan was one of the most traumatic exeriences of her life.
Holly's 20-week scan was one of the most traumatic exeriences of her life.

That morning we had walked into our 20-week scan expecting to see pretty pictures of our growing baby when suddenly the tone in the room turned.

Suddenly there were words like “heart defect” and “termination” were ringing in my ears and we were thrown into a world of terrifying choices and dark possibilities.

We were sent home after a number of tests to wait and to think, but needed to get away somewhere new to breathe in fresh oxygen after the suffocating air of the hospital.

We were driving through the twists and turns of the mountain highway. I was sitting in the passenger seat as my husband drove in silence, shell shocked from the day we had endured.

As we hurtled along, I held my belly and closed my eyes, trying to talk to the little soul who was inside me.

Kokoro brings so much joy into her parents' lives.
Kokoro brings so much joy into her parents' lives.

I wanted to know what she thought. At this stage we only knew that there was a possible heart condition but we had been told too that children with congenital heart defects also have a higher risk of genetic syndromes, which for our Kokoro turned out to be the case.

As I held her, and felt her moving inside me, I knew deeply that she was my baby and my job was only to hold her and love her.

Right there and then I decided that I was only going to give up on her when she indicated that she wasn’t able to go on.

I didn’t know when that would be; at that stage we were given possible scenarios such as her having Trisomy 18 and not living for very long after birth.

But I knew that for me I wasn’t ready to let her go while she was growing and thriving inside me.

After she was born and endured heart surgery, and the immensity of her diagnosis began to unfold, I worried that I had made a selfish decision that had left her doomed to a life of struggle, pain and misery.

The family have a lot to celebrate today.
The family have a lot to celebrate today.

But at two, already it is clear that I was wrong. At two, my daughter who I was told would never see, points to little stars on her bib and demands I sing “Twinkle, Twinkle.”

At two, my daughter who I was told wouldn’t hear, confidently tells me “The sheep says baa.”

At two, my daughter who has no balance system rides a trike down the road to the park and asks to go on the swings.

At two, my daughter sees my tears and says “Mumma sad.” No, Koko, I am not sad, I am overflowing with emotion.

All of the worry and the fear and the sleepless nights and the absolute mind-blowing, heart-wrenching joy of watching you bloom into a confident, happy little girl are too much to keep inside a human body, so sometimes those emotions leak out of my eyeballs in the form of tears.

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