Sing...if you can

I've been singing more with D.
I'm hoping he starts catching on to more lyrics - he doesn't really sing much - but he will say "row row row" if you sing Row Row Row Your Boat to him. But mostly these days he likes to listen.

Okay - maybe it was a result of a meeting with the infamous breastfeeding group of girls last weekend. One of the little girls who's about 6-8 weeks older than D can sing the entire ABC song flawlessly and clearly (along with many others!). Her mom politely "suggested" that she sing a different song after about the 5th time through the ABC's and they started singing You Are My Sunshine.

So I spent the car ride home singing to D, and most of the rest of last weekend. Mostly it was just a good reminder to do that. We don't sing with him a lot (occasional Wheels on the Bus or previously mentioned Row Row Row Your Boat), or do the cutesy nursery rhymes like we should. We read with him...a LOT...cause he loves it. But the idea that he's such a good reader and that's probably enough hasn't stopped me from hittin' him with the tunes.

I sang the ABC's on repeat around the block the other night on a walk. (Mostly because everytime I finished D turned around and said, in the cute voice, "ahh-gin" after every encore). I encourage Row Row Row Your Boat at tub time, and I even tried You Are My Sunshine.

Note: tried.

I can't get through that song without tears. Welling in the eyes, voice cracking, full-blown emotional tears.

I keep trying (tried again tonight in the car!) but that song pulls some serious heartstrings for me with D and I can't make it through.
Here's why: I sang it to him in the hospital when he was all hooked up to who-knows-what and being fed through an NG tube. I sang it, well attempted, everytime I could with him in the NICU nursery and in the following weeks at home when he was on the monitor. I cried then too. I was so so so so scared what was going on with him and seeing him all hooked up to monitors. I had no idea what any day would bring. Those last few lines are what I can't get through; not then, not now, and maybe not ever.

"You'll never know dear, how much I love you. Please don't take my sunshine away."

Here come the waterworks again. Maybe we'll stick to ABC's...