Night Night

Just a very short one tonight.

My son has been doing something lately that's made the days so much easier and hopeful. It's nothing complicated and it's not one of the many milestones that we've been taught to train him for. It's not his physical development or any change in his looks. It's just this; he's letting me hold him quietly before he goes to sleep now.

From his infancy, he's fretted and twisted when we've held him for more than a minute or two. His movements have been so quick and unexpected that holding him had been like trying to hold motorized Jello. It made the nights that he wouldn't sleep more difficult and it made me sad that I couldn't give him any comfort, even simple comfort from being held.

But now, like tonight, he'll just sit in my lap with his head back on my chest and rest. His little hand sometimes pulls at the fleshy part of my forearm gently and he just sits and is content. We'll sit like this for maybe 10 minutes or so before I put him on my hip and head him up to his little crib for bed.

"Night night little man," I said tonight ... and so it was.

Nothing else is quite so wonderful as feeling the boy relax and rest. It's a gift that I could never have expected or hoped for; it's a gift I could never repay.

"Night night little man. Night night."