A lifetime ago…or maybe just a childhood ago….I stood over an isolate in the NICU staring at a wrinkly smushed little creature with a purplish bruised head. He was hooked up to wires and tubes as the machines around him hummed and beeped and I put my carefully washed hand over a tape-free spot on his tiny arm and prayed,

“God, how am I supposed to do this? I have absolutely no idea how to be a mother to such a fragile little thing. My heart hurts and I don’t know what to do next.”

In that moment, in the quiet that somehow appears when so many continuous noises cancel each other out, God answered me: “I know how to do this. Give him to me.”

And so I did. Over and over until this little creature grew and ate and came home and became part of a new daily chaos. Life filled with loud plastic toys and Baby Einstein videos and wooden train tracks and giggles. Days full of toast with jelly, playdates (for mama’s sake), trips to walk around the mall, naps and a new understanding of how a part of my own heart could actually live and breathe and walk outside of my body. 

Then one day I found myself standing at a doorway watching boys and girls with bright new backpacks and lunch boxes march into a new world full of desks and pencils and hard little blue chairs. I held more tightly to a squirmy little hand than it was holding onto me and prayed,

“God, how am I supposed to do this? I have absolutely no idea how to be a mother who sends their sweet little boy to school every day. My heart hurts and I don’t know what to do next.”

Again God’s answer quieted the sniffling and noise in the hallway as He answered, “I know how to do this. Give him to me.”

And so I did. Prying my hand off of his and forcing a brave smile onto my own face as he tentatively stepped, then walked, then ran into his new life full of new friends and faces and pizza for lunch every Monday. Days filled with spelling lists, flag football games, after school chats over ice cream (for mama’s sake), valentine boxes, and summer breaks that were never quiet long enough. I began to understand how amazing it was to see this part of my heart grow into a new life where he could actually introduce me to new things and experiences. 

Then one day I found myself standing by a window in the Department of Motor Vehicles watching a handsome young man with a huge grin on his face walk toward me clutching a piece of paper like it was a billion dollar check. I tried not to let my tears be seen as a uniformed man next to my baby told me that it was now ok for him to drive away on his own. I knew the man meant that it was “legal “ for this boy to drive off and leave me, but I wasn’t sure that it was “ok”. As I robotically nodded while the officer began to list all of the new rules and regulations I prayed,

“God, how am I supposed to do this? I have absolutely no idea how to be a mother to a legal driver who gets behind a twenty-ton pile of moving metal and goes anywhere they want on their own without me. My heart hurts and I don’t know what to do next.”

In the middle of that dark government building over the whirr of the licensing machines I heard the answer, “I know how to do this. Give him to me.”

And so I did. High-fiving my taller-than-myself baby I motioned for him to go ahead of me to the desk so he wouldn’t see the tears sneaking down my cheeks. I let him drive me home and then sent him off on his own before he even came into the house. Days filled with waving goodbye from the front door, reminders to text when he arrived, figuring out curfews, helping him pick the right tie for prom, and relishing the rare moments when we were all in the car together. I watched this man-boy learn responsibilities and begin to create a life where he needed only to depend on himself for many things. As this big part of my heart grew more independent, the rest of it swelled with amazement at the things he was learning and becoming.

Then one day I found myself standing at the kitchen counter watching my beautiful child carefully fill out his draft registration papers. It was the week of the birthday that would officially make him an adult, and college brochures were strewn all over the dining room table. As he talked excitedly about his future plans and which far-away-from-me city he wanted to start his “real life” in I prayed,

“God, how am I supposed to do this? I have absolutely no idea how to be a mother to an adult who is going to be going off to places far from my reach. My heart hurts and I don’t know what to do next.”

Again, God stilled my heart and over the exuberant chatter of my baby man He whispered, “I know how to do this. Give him to me.” 

And so I did, but this was somehow harder than all the other times. I had to unwrap each tendril of protectiveness and comforting and advising and teaching and correcting and holding and guiding individually from around this precious piece of my heart. I had done my part, and now it was time to place him again–but wholly this time–under his Father’s care. To be there whenever my baby needed me, but to wait for him to come and ask, as opposed to what I had been doing for the rest of that lifetime. I watched that beautiful boy blossom and step forward into the life that God had prepared for him. I watched him shine.