Away from Milestones and Toward the Light

“Slow down, you’re doin’ fine 

You can’t be everything you wanna be before your time 

Although it’s so romantic on the borderline 

Tonight, tonight 

Too bad, but it’s the life you lead 

You’re so ahead of yourself that you forgot what you need….” 

— Vienna (Billy Joel) 

I remember walking through southeast Portland on warm summer’s days, a baby strapped to my chest, cooing to her as she drifted to sleep. We napped together. We played on the back deck. She sat quietly on my lap at the coffee shop while we read books and talked to neighbors. 

I wasn’t her parent. I was her nanny. Still, each moment with that sweet child in my care made me feel full of love and empowered to be a calm, nurturing supermom.  

Obviously, that was before I was a parent — before the sleepless nights my first colicky baby boy brought; before the impatient stares at the grocery store while my child screamed for hours on end; and way before a prenatal diagnosis would shake me to my core and erase my preconceived notions of how my baby would look and act.  

The realities of parenting rarely meet our expectations. But as I reflect, that shift to a new track, a different place than I imagined all those years ago has softened my hard convictions, sanded my rough edges, and made me better for the kids I do have. Even with my son, who is 7 now, every milestone was marked on an app.  

6 months is coming!  

Get ready for baby to sit up and start discussing solid food with your pediatrician!”  

“12 months! Baby should be walking. Congratulations you have a toddler!” 

Of course, all these prompts were written in bold, italic certainty — like so many facts from a standardized manual every baby is given in the womb. 

And whenever my son wasn’t at those milestones, I would lay awake at night wondering what else I needed to do. Should we call a doctor? Does he need more tummy time? Why isn’t he talking? I knew he shouldn’t have started watching screens so young! All these timelines made me impatient, always looking ahead, missing the moments he did achieve. I was deep in the forest but not seeing the trees. 

I think I would have kept on that track from toddlerhood through elementary school — wondering if he was learning fast enough, reading well enough, talking good enough, being social in the right ways. Thankfully, our three-person train headed for Stereotypical-ville took a slight derailment when we learned I was pregnant with a little girl with Down Syndrome.  

From day one, the apps no longer applied. There was no option to select “neurodivergent baby coming.” There was no alternative timeline — just a big blank void where normal was only normal because it was happening.   

She grew behind the curve and moved less prenatally, but she was alive and reminding me every day that she was coming! The baby books all went out the window. Instead, I focused my time on meeting families with kids with Down Syndrome. I went to mom’s teas, parent groups, and Special Olympics. Sometimes this filled me with hope, other times it left me feeling completely unprepared and overwhelmed.  

But I knew I wasn’t alone, and I knew this path had been walked before. The map just wasn’t as well marked. I had to learn that even without the landmarks, we would get where we were going. 

Five years into our Down Syndrome journey, I believe that letting go of milestones has made me a better parent, more present and relaxed. Whenever my daughter learns a new skill, our eyes well up with tears, we hug her with deep joy and pride, and we marvel in awe.  

There is no calendar she was given marked “walk now/talk now/ jump now.” It doesn’t matter when she hits these targets. She has no timeline, no landmarks — only a lifetime of skills that she will master when she masters them.  

And with this grace, my daughter’s journey is teaching me that I can now be the parent my son deserved all along: A mom who sees him and his sister as beautifully unique — fulfilling their potential one day at a time, one foot in front of the other, at their own perfect pace.