A Magical Update from the Swift Family
Photo courtesy of Jess Swift
Last year, many of you gave to the Swift Family Doula fund, to provide postpartum doula care to a fellow mama, whose daughter would be arriving as she grieved the death of her husband. Now, Jess shares a magical update - and her thanks:
Sweet little Georgia Violet Swift was born 16 days early, on January 13th at 11:59pm, the last minute of her dad's birthday. I had a feeling she might decide to come that day; I'm not sure why, but I had a sense that she and Ryan would work together from the other side to turn what could've been a sad and difficult day each year into a bright, wonderful, bittersweet one. It's pure, unexplainable magic that she arrived when she did. We're adjusting to life as a family of 3 - mama and 2 young kiddos, a family without a dad in the picture - about as smoothly as I think we possibly could be. Georgia is a dream baby – she loves to sleep and she's very mellow and calm for the most part – and Coen is a wonderful, caring, (mostly) gentle big brother so far. He loves to knock on her head and say "knock knock, is there anybody in there?" Pretty cute. It's challenging doing everything myself, and I don't really know how I'm ever going to get any work done or have time to myself, but I'm trying not to get ahead of myself and know I'll adjust and work it all out over time. While Georgia is a good sleeper (way better than Coen ever was!), it's been amazing and wonderful to have the Bridgetown Baby doulas in our home for overnight help to allow me to get some good stretches of sleep without interruption. Goodness, do they make it easy to hand over your baby and just go to bed! So caring, attentive, and kind. In addition to knowing my baby is well-cared for, I've also woken up in the morning to a still-warm frittata in the oven, delicious lactation cookies, and freshly folded laundry and am just so grateful for this care. What a blessing.
Thank you so much from the depths of my heart to everyone in this community who helped make this doula care possible for my family. I cannot thank you all enough. I am so grateful for your support, your kindness, your generosity, and for wrapping my little family in love. I hope I'll get a chance to offer the same to many of you as time goes on.