Mum Kelly Dirkes took to Facebook to explain the heartbreaking reason she chooses to ‘spoil’ her baby. The amazing post was published as a response to a woman in a supermarket who told her because she was spoiling her baby she would never learn to be “independent”.
“If only you knew,” said Kelly.
Kelly is the adoptive mum to a special needs baby who spent the first 10 months of her life in an orphanage “utterly alone inside a sterile metal crib, with nothing to comfort her other than sucking her fingers”.
She says when they first adopted this baby, she would lie awake in her crib and never cry, because she knew that no one would come. She says anxiety was a standard part of her day, along with banging her head on her crib rails and rocking herself for sensory input and comfort. She says when she cradled her for the first time she looked terrified because no one had ever held her like that before.
She says her baby is in fact “heartbreakingly independent”.
“If you only knew what I know,” she wrote in the post.
“If you only knew that that baby now whimpers when she's put down instead of when she is picked up.
“If you only knew that that baby "sings" at the top of her lungs in the mornings and after her nap, because she knows that her chatter will bring someone to lift her out of her crib and change her diaper.
“If you only knew that that baby rocks to sleep in her Mama's or her Papa's arms instead of rocking herself.
“If you only knew that that baby made everyone cry the day she reached out for comfort, totally unprompted.
“If you only knew what I know.”
And this is why Kelly says she’ll spoil her baby, no matter what anyone says or thinks.
“Spoiling that baby is the most important job I will ever have, and it is a privilege. I will carry her for a little while longer – or as long as she'll let me – because she is learning that she is safe. That she belongs. That she is loved.”
Aside from being a beautiful tribute to the love and compassion she has for this vulnerable child, it’s a stern reminder never to judge other parents.
What a wonderful thing this woman has done, devoting herself to caring for this baby. We are sending them both nothing but love and light.
