Monday, November 28, 2011

My Girl Oona

I remember snow on the bare branches of the trees that lined the building back in 2002.  I walked down the hospital corridors with Jack by my side for support.  Mike's working the video cam, stopping with me every few minutes as each contraction gripped my big bowling ball belly.

She came in the late afternoon of the 28th, my girl.  All nine point six pounds of pure baby love with flared pink nostrils, pretty long fingers and chest heaving up and down as she breathed fast.  Even at birth, I knew and felt she was spirited and all-sprite.  My feisty one.

Oona Gabriella Zaynab was my first natural, drug-free birth. Sol, our eldest, was unnecessarily C-sectioned out of me in Manila (Makati Med) two years earlier.  :(



She had the sweetest, biggest and earliest smile, this one.  As it turns out, my sweetheart would have baby eczema, a very itchy and uncomfortable and sleep-depriving affliction, both for her and for me.



This was one of my best happy fake smiles during that time.  This was the beginning of post-partum nightmare for me.  The was the beginning of the process of getting broken.  Open.

Family, here in Toronto and back home in Manila, came to the rescue.  Shown here with my sister, Joey, when we visited and the beginning of a slow healing process for me.
My dearest Oona, your love for swings, for fun...for life itself showed me the way out.  You taught me this in your very special way, the Oonabella way. 
















You embrace all of it - be it the songs you sing, the drawings, yes - even your brothers' Spiderman tatoos on your arm! - you are pure light, my darling girl.

"Mommy, Sol seid I smel like poo.  He even seid I am a baby.  Sol smells.  I love you Mommy.  I hate Sol." ~ Oona




And even in your hate - which we older folks know is really fierce love between siblings masked as rivalry - you make me love you more.  Because you are real.  Everything about you is real and raw and you.



You know what you want and you let everyone know it.



You saw this hairstyle in a flyer on a Thursday and got this haircut from Veronica the very next day.


You love to sing - "When I grow up, I want to be a singer just like Mommy..." and you do it with such courage and passion every.single.time.





You loved your Lucky Charms in the mornings and hated having your thick, unruly, buhaghag hair brushed before school by anyone.  Yes, even if I asked your hero and Babalove to do it.


















You loved Aunt Badaw and still do with an Oonabella kind of mad biglove.  Big LAUGHS, too.






Oona Soaring, 2006


Oona Soaring, 2008
Oona Soaring, 2010






On this ninth year of your lush life, your sparkling existence, my sparkling child, I wish you nothing but more of YOU.  If there's just one thing I want you to remember, it is this:

You are perfect just the way you are. 


 And so are the two boys, your brothers, who you love to "hate" so much especially these days.

 

 I love you so much, my brave and beautiful birthday  girl, Oona.

May the Angels of Light guide and protect you always and all ways.

Always,
Momiya



2 comments :

  1. Pictures are delightful.
    Words are endearing and tender.
    What a great ode to your Oona.
    I lovey it!

    Cha-rot

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    Replies
    1. Thank you, Chawing, for your constant rahrahrahsisboombah!!! Love you talaga, CP

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