Yes, I’m ready….

My love for KC of KC and the Sunshine Band does not extend only to his hits.  This morning I awoke (to a pile of sharp Emily elbows and Fisher breath and a cat howling at me, but that is neither here nor there) with a song in my head.

An often overlooked KC & Teri De Sario duet, “Yes, I’m Ready.”

I don’t even know how to love you
Just the way you want me to
But I’m ready (Ready) to learn (To learn)
Yes, I’m ready (Ready) to learn (To learn)

To fall in love, to fall in love
To fall in love with you

And I am.  What changed between yesterday and today?  I am ready to catch the leaks.

The first time you become a mother you are encouraged to pamper yourself and focus on your pregnancy and your post-partum period.  Celebrate this new phase of your life.  This time I felt like there was no need to do that.  I am a mother already.  And I know better this time than to think I need to buy every baby item under the sun, so the pile of Baby Stuff is much smaller.  I thought that was what was making me feel like I wasn’t ready.  The unknown gender of Baby D makes shopping for newborn clothes virtually impossible.  We own everything yellow that has a duck and a giraffe on it already.  And really, that’s more than enough.

And yesterday I realized what I was missing.  I needed to be prepared to catch the leaks.

Yesterday afternoon I assembled an army of old friends.  A package of pre-fold diapers to catch the slime that oozes from a baby constantly.  A package of flannel receiving blankets to put down in my bed.  I washed and dried and brought back to life my Lily Padz and a dozen sets of reusable cloth nursing pads.  I made a pile of underwear that I know will end up covered in blood.  All alone in the Target I stared at nursing bras designed for sleeping, camisoles with snaps and pajamas that button up the front.  I stood in the feminine care aisle longer than anyone in my family would have tolerated until I could remember whether I liked wings or not.  Until I recalled that an absorbent core is really just like having a plastic sack of jelly in your underwear and that I hated those.  I stashed those little packs of Kleenex in every purse I own, next to my bed, near the couch.  Because I know how quickly I will cry over the next few weeks as I fall head over heels in love again. While leaking from everywhere but my ears.

And now I’m ready.  To fall in love.  And to catch the leaks.