Today, the baby girl that started it all is 7.

SEVEN.

I can still feel the weight of my first gorgeous baby girl in my stomach. I can feel how anxious I was on this day 7 years ago because it had been 9 torturous days since the beginning of our induction because my exhausted body couldn’t take the weight and pain anymore.

I just wanted to meet her, hold her, be her mum.

Imogen was born via c-section at 2:34pm. We had reported to hospital at 7:30am that morning so I was very anxious that the day wore on that another day would pass without my daughter born. There are some fantastically sour looking photos of me in my last hour of pregnancy with Imogen because I was terrified there’d be no baby again today.

Then, she was here. Red & wrinkled. My baby.

Today, 7 years old, she’s much less red and wrinkled.

Now, she is so bright, so full of love and questions. She is hilarious, she is wise to a fault (“No more chocolate Mummy, it’ll make your tummy hurt!”) & she is always by my side, holding my hand and calmly repeating the loving phrases I have raised her with. (“I’ve got you. You’re safe. You’ve got this.”)

She’s so tall, almost up to my chin. So I don’t get to cradle her singing “You Are My Sunshine (My Immy Sunshine)” as much as I did when she was brand new. But she is still absolutely and completely my Sunshine. My baby.

Not a baby anymore, she is at great pains to tell me, but thankfully she is fully at peace with being my baby.

I don’t know how old Immy will be when she finds this space. But when you do Squidge, I want you to know that you made your mummy be the best of herself. You are the most loved and wondrous girl I have ever been blessed enough to know. I am so lucky, so happy to be your mummy. Thank you for choosing me.

Happy birthday Squidge, my Immy Sunshine