What Betsy is Teaching Me

Big little life lessons

As parents we think a lot about creating “teachable moments” with our children, using everyday life happenings to help them learn important lessons. This is a great thing. An even greater thing is making the effort to learn the lessons that they are here to teach us.

Being a parent has been one of the most humbling experiences of my life, and I’m fourteen years into it. It’s one of the hugest “you don’t know what you don’t know” awakenings, and it never ends. Just when I think I’ve finally got something nailed, one of the kiddos hits a new phase and throws yet another curveball my way. At the same time, I’ve found strength and abilities I didn’t know I had. I know without a doubt that being Miranda and Betsy’s mom is one of my main reasons for existence, yet there is so much more to me than that (something I am wrestling with a lot lately). The more I watch these beautiful girls, the more I learn. I have a theory about babies and very young children…most people think they don’t know much of anything cos they’re so young. I believe they actually know everything—they still remember who they truly are and why they’re here—but their bodies aren’t developed well enough to keep up with all their soul’s knowledge, and so they forget it. That, and everyone else’s ideas (like them knowing nothing) get absorbed and accepted into their psyches. This belief of mine has greatly shaped my parenting style, in that I decided to actively be their student, rather than arrogantly insisting on merely being the teacher. I’ve also always treated them like the intelligent beings that they are, talking to them like they know what I’m talking about, and telling them from the beginning how smart they are.

So here’s a few of the lessons I am learning from Betsy.

Don’t get comfortable.

I swear this kid has an innate ability to sense when I’m settled and comfy, almost down to the second. I get snuggled into the blankets in bed or in the recliner, and start to drift out of consciousness, and BOOM, she’s wailing. This is especially likely if I am feeling absolutely worn out. Admittedly, I have a hard time handling this.

Getting comfortable sitting up like a big girl in Mommy’s recliner

But let’s be real. There’s been a lot of discomfort here, in many forms. I’ve said before, Betsy’s here to challenge all my preconceived notions on like, everything. Here we are raising a special needs kid with zero prior experience. She’s not the first baby for either my husband or myself, but the previous ones were babies so long ago that we’ve forgotten a lot. We’re both in our forties this time, and my body sometimes acts like it hates me for undertaking this, even though it produced the baby in the first place. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m also quite introverted, and having an adorable baby draws lots of unwanted attention from strangers (see my post Yeah, Don't Say That for my thoughts on this). Add on Betsy’s slower development, two surgeries, and other unexpected things that apparently often come along with Down Syndrome, and I’m just done with even trying to find normalcy. (Like I always say, “normal is just a setting on the dryer.”)

They say that life begins outside your comfort zone, and I get that. But what does it mean when you’re just used to not being comfortable? I’ve got to very carefully choose my comfort moments, knowing there’s a good chance they’ll be short-lived. So I’ll enjoy them as best as I can while they last, and try not to be disappointed when they’re over too soon.

Celebrate every little thing.

Betsy is suuuuch a happy baby (except when she’s not). It’s absolutely adorable. Her smile is infectious, and she’ll offer it to just about anyone. I do my best to foster that, and offer her every encouragement I can. We are constantly telling her she’s doing a good job when she’s eating, talking, or working on her crawling. And I’ll do anything I can to make that kid laugh, because her laughter is one of the best sounds I’ve ever heard. Her sense of humor is rather sophisticated, as she will laugh at a thing once or twice, and then she doesn’t find it funny anymore. And no one makes her laugh as much as her big sister, Miranda. Their bond is nothing short of precious.

Her new favorite way of showing happiness is clapping, and it’s the best. It started out as waving her hands in the air, almost bringing them together but not quite, with her hands balled up. This was cute enough in itself, but then it started morphing into having one or both palms opened, and then actually coming together in a clap, silently at first. Early on when she would do this, we would say, “Yaaaaay!” as she did it. This made her more excited, and one day when her grandmother was visiting, she upped her game even more. I was telling Grandma about how we were saying “yay” like that, and she started making the clapping motion when she heard me say it, clearly making the association between the two things. By now, she is full-on clapping, even making a bit of noise as clapping typically does, and Miranda can get to her to clap just by asking her to do it. She actually reminds me of Kermit the Frog. So I showed her a YouTube video with a compilation of Kermit going “YAAAAAAY” over and over, and she absolutely loved it. Which is awesome, cos I love the Muppets, and maybe she will, too.

So Betsy gets excited about life. She’s teaching me to celebrate the little things. Life is short, it is flying by, and I want to enjoy it. She definitely makes it more enjoyable! Whatever we focus on in life will grow. So I want to focus more on celebrating every tiny win like she does.

Slow the heck down.

Betsy is not to be hurried, that much is clear. And I mean that on multiple levels. Obviously there is her delayed development to consider, but I’m pretty used to that by now. We can help her in small ways, making sure she gets plenty of time on the floor to practice crawling, and putting her in her Bumbo seat to encourage sitting up. But she is gonna do things at her own pace. Good luck stopping her. In some smaller ways, this can get frustrating. Meal times seem to take years, even when she’s feeling pretty hungry and gets impatient. It’s kinda funny sometimes when I’m getting her food together, and she’s already in her seat, but her dad sits down and starts eating before I’ve got hers ready, and she starts yelling cos he’s eating and she’s not. Even then, once her initial “Feed me now!” frenzy has abated, she takes her sweet everloving time. (A lot of this is because of how she likes to bounce and kick in her chair. I have to wait for her to stop moving before I can put anything in her mouth. For every. Single. Bite.) Since I’m typically feeding her and myself at the same time, it slows down my own eating. It’s good and healthy to eat slowly, savor your food and such, but it’s almost ridiculous how much time she and I spend at the dinner table. We’re always the last two remaining, sometimes thirty minutes or more goes by with just the two of us there, stiiiiiill eeeeeating. I might occasionally get a brain fart and try to hurry her along, but all that ever accomplishes is getting us both frustrated.

Given just how freaking much I have to get done on a daily basis, it does kinda drive me up the wall when she takes her time like this. But the gal has a point. Life is to be savored and enjoyed. So I’ll try to adopt her Ferris Bueller mentality a little more.

So those are the three biggest lessons I’m learning from Betsy for now, with many more to come, I have no doubt. As long as she’s willing to teach, I’m willing to learn. With such an adorable teacher, who could blame me?

Thank you for reading today! If you can take half a second and hit the heart button to like my post, that’d be awesome! If you can take like a minute or less and leave me a comment, I’d love that, too! If you haven’t subscribed yet, then I will make it super easy and put a little button below so you can do just that. And if you feel like showing even more support, you can upgrade to a paid subscription, and I’ll be eternally grateful. Feel free to share this on socials and/or with anyone you think would enjoy reading about our special girl. I am so grateful that you’re here! See you again soon.