Ready for a dose of honesty? It took me longer to love Van than it did Hooper. I was a bit surprised by it because everything I read, prior to giving birth, talked about how your love multiplies rather than divides and blah blah blah. It wasn’t like that for me; not right away, at least.

When I was handed Hooper, on the operating room table, I loved him instantly. I immediately felt protective. And despite his swollen face and cone shaped head, I thought he was the most beautiful thing alive.

None of this is to say that my love for Van wasn’t instant as well. It was. I felt protective of him too. But there was a difference.

I learned, through loving Hooper, that my capacity for love on the day he was born piddled in comparison to the love I had for him just a few months later. It’s like the song says, I love him more today than yesterday but not as much as tomorrow.

So when Van was born, I loved him, but I knew that love would only grow bigger; I knew the love I had that day was naive to the love it would grow to be.

And I was right. Because the love I have for this little guy today blows any emotion that I referred to as love before out of the water. Right around the third to fourth month of life, he stole my heart. And now, at six months, he owns me.

And two more, for the sake of love and war: