I was blessed with an unhealthy baby.  I was blessed with a child with disabilities.

I am blessed to be Kiran’s mom.

I know perspective is everything.  I know, because I have been in the before.  I know how terrifying and overwhelming it was when we initially heard about Kiran’s heart defect.  How terrifying and overwhelming each additional concern, fear, diagnosis has been.

But my heart absolutely BREAKS when I read comments like “We just want the baby to be healthy.” or “We had a scare, but in the end, we were blessed with a healthy baby.” or any other take on the same idea.

I get it.  I do.  I have written about it before.  We all want our babies to be healthy.  No one (that I know of, anyway) prays to be blessed with an unhealthy child.  We never ask for life to be more challenging or for grief to be more complicated.

But to any mom out there, right now, facing what feels like the end of the world, in the form of an uncertainty or a greater risk or an absolute diagnosis……I PROMISE YOU, you will be blessed and changed in ways you can’t even imagine right now.  I PROMISE YOU, this tiny human will bring you extraordinary joy.  I PROMISE YOU, every moment that brings the darkness, the hard, the fall-on-your-knees-kind-of-grief WILL BE WORTH IT.

I know, because I have been where you’re sitting, and I have been to hell and back multiple times in the last four years.  I am the first to tell you how hard it can be, but I am also the one to tell you, with absolute certainty:

I wouldn’t change a damn thing.

It’s a long road ahead, but we journey together.  Together, with Kiran, is where I was born to be.  He is what makes the hard road worth traveling.

Oh, Mama, I promise you.