*

It has been said that being a parent is like watching your heart running-around outside of your body.

This has, absolutely, been my experience.

I have always been an emotional, caring, deep and sensitive person. But, being a mother has quadrupled these things and shone a light on them that burns me up like an ant in a magnifying glass.

Everything is so much more extreme now.

I have rage that even terrifies me sometimes. I can only imagine what my husband must be thinking when this beast comes out in place of his wife. He must think I’m a total Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. And, believe me, he wants to hide, when that monster is on the loose.

There is something that was unleashed deep inside of me that is so primal and utterly overpowering the day my son was born. I swear that this juice would allow me to lift an airplane if I had to, or rip a mountain out of its socket. I often picture myself grabbing an intruders rifle in my bare hands and bending it in half as I protect my family. I feel fairly certain that there is nothing I couldn’t do if my child’s well-being depended on it.

The rage I feel towards his safety sometimes reminds me of a cartoon character. I become Yosemite Sam and the smoke starts bellowing from my ears, my face flushes red and my nose starts to screech loudly like a kettle ready to boil over.

But, it’s not just the rage that has intensified, it’s the love as well.

I have always considered myself someone who tends to love too much. And now I find that  I love my child so intensely that it physically hurts at times. Do you remember what it was like when you were a young, early, teen or preteen and you had those first crushes on people? Remember how it would make you feel physically ill and achy at times?

Well, it’s been a long time since I’ve felt that way about a peer, but I feel that way about my son every single moment of every single day. The poor kid. When I’m with him, I can’t stop kissing him. I’m a serial kisser. And, now that he’s growing a bit more independent, every time he says something like “I sit in my own chair”, my heart crumbles just a little bit.

I love him more with every day and I’m terrified that one day my heart will just give-out under the immensity of love it has been expected to manage.

I will never be the same person that I was before I became a Mom. This little life has totally transformed me. I could never be the same. He has unleashed so many things inside of me that are completely beyond my grasp.

I am a wild-eyed, steam-whistling, heart-pounding, serial-kissing, intense, dangerous and endless-lovin’, mama.

And I couldn’t be happier.

*