I’ve heard it time and time again and seen it stitched on about a thousand sweatshirts. The good old saying, “I never knew how much love my heart could hold until someone called me ‘mom.’” Well, I don’t expect to be a mom anytime soon, but with the recent birth of my first niece, I can finally say that I learned what true love is. I am thankful to know, even if it took me eighteen years to figure it out.

By the time my niece came into this world, we had all been sitting in the waiting room for over 15 hours. I had slept on the cold, unforgiving tile floor. I watched the sun go down and then watched it come back up again. The Olympics were on, so I watched the event take place, then I watched countless hours of newscasters reporting on what I had just seen. My family sat with anticipation, not wanting to fall asleep for fear of missing that magical moment when we would receive the message that our new member had made her way into this world. Other families came and went with the arrival of their babies. I remember talking endlessly with my parents about how this new baby girl might look. Would she have big eyes like my brother and I? Would she like sports? What kind of attitude would she have? What would her first words be?

Then, suddenly, all of our anxieties were silenced. We got the message that finally, our little girl was here. But, those next few minutes waiting for her to be brought out were practically endless. I stared at the TV, trying not to imagine the joy of finally holding the little baby I had been so excited to meet for months. My dad saw them wheeling her little baby carrier to the nursery to check all of her vital signs and asked the nurse to stop. Thankfully, they did. All 16 of us that had stayed all through the night flooded the carrier to try to get just a glimpse of her. That’s when it happened.

I looked at her, with her big, bright eyes looking around. She was mostly covered by her blanket and her hat, but her face was exposed. She was brand new. I was overwhelmed. This little darling had been what I had been looking for to all summer, and now she was here. My eyes welled up with tears as I looked down at this new life. She was just a few minutes old, but she was already completely surrounded by love. All of the grandparents swarmed around the carrier, trying to snap pictures and look at her. The nurse stood back, just watching all of us marvel at our baby girl. We didn’t have much time with her then, so we migrated to the window to the nursery. We watched as they took her temperature, checked her heart, and performed about a million different tests on her. Some of the family left by that point, but I was transfixed.

“That’s...my niece,” I kept saying.

After a while, some of the family had to travel back home and try to recuperate from the lack of sleep. Some went to go buy my brother some breakfast. It was just me and a few other family members in the room with my sister-in-law. That’s when they bought my niece back for the first time. My heart leaped up into my throat. There weren’t that many people there at that time...I was going to get to hold her. A few of the other family members held her first, and I patiently sat there and just watched my niece. Finally, it was my turn. I felt my pulse start to race. I was finally going to officially meet this beautiful baby. I felt like I should have prepared some grand speech like I had won an award.

But, that’s not how it happened. I took her silently, just staring at her small face. Someone took some pictures, but I was in my own world. I looked down at her. She was so small, so new. She had done nothing in this world yet, but she had captured my heart. I was her aunt and I knew from the moment I laid eyes on her that I was going to love her in such a different way than I loved anyone or anything else. I felt a new sense of purpose, like my life from that moment on was to be dedicated to being the best person I can be for her. During our first meeting, she was asleep, but it didn’t matter to me. I held her close to me and tried to rock her slowly to keep her from waking up. I actually held her for about three minutes, but it only felt like I had a split second with her. Not trying to be rude, I handed her back to her mom. Then, I immediately grabbed my phone and looked at the pictures.

Flash forward to two days later. It was the last day we had in Alabama and we had to drive home the next day. We were eating burgers and fries in the hospital room with my brother and sister-in-law. I wasn’t able to eat much because of this growing pit in the bottom of my stomach because of what was going to happen next. To be honest, I can’t tell you exactly what I had because food wasn’t important then, I was trying to soak up the last moments I would have with my niece for months. No one else in the room seemed to understand that in just a few short minutes, I would have to say goodbye to the new apple of my eye. I was going to have to look at that little round face and walk out of the door and get in the car to drive hundreds of miles away.

I would never have guessed it, but this little girl that can't even talk to me has taught me about true love. True love is sitting in a car for twelve hours for those few hours you'll get to see her. True love is posting hundreds of pictures of her because you just want the whole world to know that this little girl is here and is just so...perfect. Becoming an aunt has opened up a part of my heart that I didn't even know existed. I am so thankful for this little girl and that somehow, I got lucky enough to be called her aunt.