I don’t consider myself overly emotional. I’d like to think I’m pretty normal in the things that make me upset. After having a baby, I think maybe I am moved to tears a little more frequently than I used to be, but no more than what I still consider “normal.” (I know, it’s subjective, but hear me out for a moment.)

Yesterday afternoon, I had a moment with my two year old that hit me pretty hard.

I had just given her a shower and it was nearly naptime. I was seated on the floor of her bedroom, trying to coax to move her closer so that I could lay her down and put a diaper on her. With the towel wrapped around her tiny frame, she stepped toward me and fell into my lap, resting her head on my shoulder. This is what she usually does right after a shower when she doesn’t want me to get her dressed, so I was used to this.

I wrapped my arms around her and rocked a little from side to side. I told her that I loved her and that we would need to get dressed so we could lay down and she could nap. I don’t remember what I did to cause it now, but I had her laughing and she started to wiggle around. She slipped down and fell so that she was laying across my lap, with her legs hanging off to one side and her head resting in the crook of my arm. As I looked down at her, I realized that this was how I used to hold her as an infant, and I couldn’t remember the last time I got to hold her that way.

And I started to cry.

There was a post floating around on social media for a while about the weight of motherhood, and there was a quote that stuck out to me. “‘One day, you’ll put him down and won’t ever pick him up again’… because he will have outgrown it. And me.” I fully understood the meaning of that sentence yesterday.

My little girl isn’t so little anymore, and she’s getting bigger every single day. There will come a time when our cuddling will stop. She will stop asking me to pick her up. She will stop asking me for stories before bedtime. She will stop wanting me to tuck her in. She will stop hugging me after her showers. One of these times will be the last and I won’t know it until after it’s happened, and that saddens me.

One day, she will stop being the child I know and she will turn into a young woman, and then I will watch her leave and start her own life as an adult. It’s inevitable, and it will probably happen faster than I could ever imagine. These first two years of her life have already flown by.

Sometimes, I need a reminder to appreciate every single moment with her while I can, because I never know how things will be tomorrow. Yesterday was that reminder, and I’m going to make more of an attempt to be “in the moment” and to appreciate the little things she does, because there will come a time when those little things will stop, and then I’ll be left wishing I had paid more attention… but it will come too late.

Always appreciate every single moment. You never know when it will be the last time your child asks for something.