They say “love needs no words”. I know Courtney loves me, I don’t need to hear her say it. I know Courtney knows me, I don’t need to hear her say my name. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t have moments where all I want to hear is her say, “I love you”. Or hear her call me “mom”.

Her feeding therapist shared with me recently that she showed Courtney a picture of Joe and I and she was able to verbally label Joe as “dad”. She was very sensitive in telling me she couldn’t exactly say “mom”. So today I pulled up a picture I took of her, Joe and me. I pointed to her dad and sure enough, she said “da”. I smiled. I almost didn’t point to me because I didn’t want to feel that disappointment. I’m so glad I asked her! I pointed to me in the picture and asked her who it was, and the most beautiful sound came out of her mouth…”ma”! Tears of joy.

Love needs no words but it still is nice to hear certain ones!