Where does this love come from

I love my family and I love Rick, but this love that I have for my children is within another realm. Not to poo poo the love I have with those I've just mentioned, but this kind of love is one that is absorbed into the body as soon as you see that baby come towards you covered in gunk and weird white chalky stuff. It's as though someone did an adrenalin shot right into your heart and makes you spasm all over.



Me & Beau



Me & Olivia

But then I wonder, where did it come from? was it always there living in a tiny pocket somewhere growing quietly and waiting for the right moment to reveal itself.

You take for granted the love you have for your family as it's always been there since you were born. That kind of love is like a very stretchy elastic band that can be pulled away from quite a distance but then always rebounds back.

Then the love that you have for a partner, you've often dreamed about as a youngster, that idealistic nature of falling in love - all the physical stuff obviously, but then the whole feeling of connecting with someone who "gets" you. So sub-consciously we kind of know what to expect when we fall in love.

The love that comes with having a child is something you can't prepare yourself for.

I look back now at things that happened to me in my life that were at times frightening for my parents and realise how painful it must've been for my mum and dad to feel like they were losing their daughter

Throughout all  my teen years I had Anorexia but the worst part was quite early on when I was about 13 -15. My illness was so extreme at one point that I had to go into hospital and on the second night I became very angry and irrational (not to make light of it but the girl from the Exorcist was timid compared to me that night). I screamed and cried for many hours until, exhausted, I fell asleep in my mums arms and she held me all night whilst I slept. When I woke up, she did not see I had opened my eyes and I looked up to her and saw that she had been crying.

It pains me now because now as a mother I can look back and remember the anguish that I saw in my mum's eyes - a look that said "I'm afraid Leah that I cannot save you -  I don't know what to do to make it better".

Whilst I've thought about this many times over the years, it's not until now that I'm fully aware of how difficult it must've been for her.

I had that same feeling when Olivia got jaundice when she was born and lay motionless in a incubator for three days. On a lower level a couple of weeks ago when the twins had terrible coughs and colds, I felt so helpless because kisses and cuddles weren't going to take their sickness away. It really hurt.

However, it's a love that I am glad I've got the opportunity to feel because with all the scary parts to it comes an almighty warm feeling. It reminds me of the old Ready Brek adverts where anyone who ate the sloppy porridge went out with an orange tinge around them as though they were glowing. I reckon if it was dark enough people would seem that exact same colour floating around my body which I think has been there since June 24th 2010.

Like I said, this type of love comes from out of the blue, but I think in some part I owe my mum some credit because if I can give even just an ounce of the love that my mum wrapped around me then my children will never feel the cold.