Gillian turns 12

Last night we celebrated with a sushi dinner, and a cake of course. Can't believe that 12 years ago, I gave birth to a small, white-faced baby who came out posterior, eyes shut tight. She was only 2.95kg. The smallest of my babies and yet, today grown into a great strapping Amazonian warrior like her Aunty Vivian.

You know when you celebrate birthdays of children, you also celebrate their births and the mothers who were there, bringing them forth into the world.

Gillian's birth was everything I never wanted to have - induced, epiduralised, monitored, amniotomied, episiotomied, forcepted with early cord clamping, fundal pressure (excruciating!) etc. She had the formula, the vaccinations galore.

If you told me back then that one day I would have five kids and advocate for and teach natural birthing, I'd say you were stark raving mad. But God always has a plan I suppose and that day 16 January 1995 was really the first step in this path that I am now on.

I look at her now, poised on a whole new journey. I wonder how long more she will stay under our wings. She looks like an adult. But still a child. Look how far she has come. How big she has grown. What hopes I had when she was a wee baby, when I first held her in my arms. They have changed, but I still have hopes.

I look at her with love and with regret. All the pain I caused her. And she, me. All the anger that washed over me so many times when we did not connect - and still persist in not connecting. The underlying fear and despair that she will fall - and we cannot save her, hence the urgent desire to do something, to force her into a mold where she can be more responsible for herself. But yet, how can this be forced?

Maybe it is her nature, her happy-go-lucky nature. To be impulsive, to speak thoughtlessly, carelessly, to trust with abandon.

I will just have to learn to let go and find my own trust - trust that she will find her own path, her own journey and that she will be okay. And maybe as parents, we can never be our children's safety nets forever. We can never protect them from every harm. But hopefully, we can be there if they do fall, to soothe what we can or just cry together in shared pain without judgement. And for me, ever so critical, so judgmental, so damningly reliant on form, so dogmatic - it will be a huge challenge to let go and do so.