Dear Mom,

Have you heard that whether you’re feeling mad/sad/frustrated with your toddler – or I challenge that and say to do this ANYTIME, but I understand the meaning of doing this in the hard moments – to look at your baby’s hands. Hold them in your hands and realize just how little they are! Realize just how fast the time is going. (Are you tearing up yet? No? Just me?) Instead, go into their room and take a look at their most favorite stuffed animal, then try and remember what it looked like brand new.

To be loved is to be changed. What I mean by that is:

Love changes us. Being loved changes us. Loving others changes us.

Understanding the love of our partner, close friend or sibling will change the way that we give love back. When we know someone, and I mean really know someone, we can hone in on what makes them tick; what makes them feel loved and seen. Over time, maybe some piece of us morphs into them as our behaviors reflect similarities where we overlap. Growing year over year with a partner means you will love so many different versions of them, and as they change, the way you love them and see them will change too. Receiving the unconditional love of our children will make you want to be a better Mom – have more kindness and patience. To show a little more grace to everyone that we meet. As you receive love in all of its forms, you will inevitably be changed because of it!

I saw a repost of a repost of a meme of a random tweet that said “To be loved is to be changed” and was a before and after thread of our most well loved stuffies. By some stroke of nostalgic, everyday-fate, when I was shopping the Easter aisles I came across a stuffed bunny that is the exact same Easter bunny that we used to announce our pregnancy with Layla three years ago, and then affectionately became known as her “Big Bunny” when she was born. Layla also has a pink bunny, Rabbs, that she received shortly after being born in 2021, and Sophia has since received the same style bunny that hasn’t been played with yet.

It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long, but putting Big Bunny and Rabbs next to their untouched counterparts felt shocking. Patches of fur are already worn down, you can hardly see their eyes, and Rabbs can barely hold her head up and Big Bunny’s ears have fallen. All I can see is the time – how much time has passed, and how quickly. It felt like not too long ago, these bunnies were brand new, and now they’ve been loved so hard that they are permanently changed. Just like us.