A Love We Didn’t Know Existed

They are fighters, and as fierce as a wild bear robbed of her cubs.

—2 Samuel 17:8

Once Henry was born, the world turned a color I never imagined, and I never dreamed that one little person could capture me so deeply, could change my entire life so completely. That year I lost some things that were very important to me, but as I held his little feet, I knew that I had everything the world could possibly give me, that I was richer than a Rockefeller and luckier than a leprechaun. Life sneaks up on us, every once in a while, and gives us something we didn’t even know we wanted, and lights within us a love we didn’t even know existed.

I was stunned by the intimacy of this, by the ferocity of feeling. I felt like I could turn inside out if something happened to him, like my mind could melt or my heart stop if he experienced one moment of pain. I wanted to touch him, hold him, protect him with a panicky, fierce love, like a bear or a dog. I had visceral, wordless feelings that woke me up in the night and made me tremble, and other moments when the world seemed so deeply right, so good and perfect I couldn’t help but pray.