The Only One

My brother and me

A Story of Firstborns, Shared Histories, 

and the Ones Who Knew Us First

For 3 years and 2 months, he’s been my only one.

“I love you more than anything,” I whisper as I kiss his cheek. Usually, he laughs and scurries away, his little feet pounding on the floor, just like always.

For 3 years and 2 months, he’s been the sun our world orbits around. Every decision we’ve made, everything we’ve done, has centered on him. My heart is full of him. Of him. Of him. He’s never had to share. All of our love has always belonged to him.

My only one.

For awhile, we wondered if we’d ever have another. Maybe it just wasn’t in the cards. After 14 months of trying — including an ectopic pregnancy loss — I began to truly doubt my ability to have a second child. Though I didn’t want to, I reluctantly started to imagine a life with just one.

He would get more of our attention, our time, our love. Our money and energy could be focused entirely on him. Though we wanted another, maybe our family could still feel complete with only one — even if part of me quietly questioned that. I started to picture family photos years from now: just the three of us. Caleb growing up an only child. And still, in my mind, those photos looked beautiful and full of joy. Our sun, our moon, our stars — our Caleb. Our firstborn. The one who made us parents. The one who calls me Mommy, who cries out from his room when he's upset, or sick, or just needs me near

I love him enough that, for awhile, it felt like enough. Like maybe this could be our whole story. Like maybe I was — we were — complete.

And then, one day, two pink lines. A positive test. After hundreds of negatives, I laughed out loud — stunned, disbelieving, overjoyed. And just like that, I knew: Caleb would no longer be the only one.

In September, after 3 years and 8 months of being our only one, he suddenly won’t be.

He will be a brother.

He will share the role of the sun with someone new — his sibling. Our world will now revolve around two — two small hearts pulling us in different directions, and somehow, closer than ever.

We won’t love him less.

Our hearts will simply expand.

Our decisions will now consider the best interests of two children — and those interests may sometimes collide.

“I love you both more than anything,” I’ll have to say, so neither ever wonders if I love one more than the other.

And I’ll be honest: I’m a little scared.

This is what I’ve hoped and prayed for… but change is always a little scary.

It’s unsettling to shift what we’ve known — to disrupt the rhythm we’ve only just mastered.

It’s hard to think Caleb might feel less seen. That his world, once so centered and certain, will be shared.

He’s been our only one for so long — longer than we ever imagined.

But I’m grateful.

Grateful for the time we had, just the three of us.

Grateful that he got to be the only baby for nearly four years.

Grateful that he grew into toddlerhood as our only one, when every laugh and milestone belonged just to him — and we soaked it all in.

We watched him blossom into a little boy, and we were there for all of it.

Still…

It’s scary, isn’t it?

And yet it’s also miraculous.

Miraculous for me to give my son a sibling — to give Caleb what I had, what shaped me. Though my brother and I are not the best of friends, we’re close enough that we can count on each other. We’ll always have each other’s backs — probably more than anyone else ever will. We don’t always agree, and we certainly didn’t always get along — but he knows me and gets me in a way no one else can or ever will.

He is the only one — the only human on this planet who lived my same childhood. Who holds the same memories. Who experienced the same traditions.

He’s the one who slept in the room next to me growing up. We’d sometimes shout through our doors at night, talking from our beds. He grew up on Journey and Boston, just like me — with Mom singing (badly) along in the car. He listened to Dad strum Beatles songs on the guitar, like I did. We both woke up at 6 a.m. on Christmas and tiptoed into the living room in our pajamas. We wore matching Old Navy flag shirts on the 4th of July. We shared family vacations — our favorite was always Cedar Point.

We fought with Dad every Christmas Eve because we didn’t feel like cleaning for the party. We screamed at each other over whose turn it was on the computer (he once almost rolled me down the stairs in a desk chair during one of those battles). We argued over the front seat every morning before school — he often refused to get in if it was my turn. And yet, I felt cool being known as “Nick’s sister.” Me, always following the rules; him, always testing them. 

We went to the beach and watched movies on the sand while eating Abbott’s custard — Jaws, Back to the Future. 

We collected Beanie Babies and rode bikes with our cousins. 

We swam together every summer. 

We hated each other. 

We loved each other. 

We caused trouble together. 

We pointed fingers at one another.

Our memories are shared, are linked, and always will be. 

We were shaped by the house we grew up in, the people who raised us. 

I cried when he had his first son and I got to watch him be born. He was one of the first people to meet mine. Even now, at nearly 30, I still love to make him laugh. It fills me with a sense of pride — my cool, older brother thinks I’m funny? Well, how about that.

I will never have this relationship with anyone else. He is the only one. My brother.

And I am beyond grateful to give Caleb this very same thing. Because there is nothing quite like it — nothing like having someone who understands your childhood down to its marrow.

A sibling.

A fellow witness.

The only one who was there for all of it. 

When we become a family of four — when my son is no longer the only one — there are some things I will want him to know.

Though I will love his sibling just as deeply and fiercely as I love him, he will always be the one who made me a mother. And there’s something so sweet, so sacred about that.

He’s the one I learned with. The one I stumbled through the long nights with. The one I cried with at 2 a.m., whispering I can’t do this — and the one who showed me, day by day, that I actually could.

It was harder than I ever imagined it would be — but it was also more beautiful.

Because of him, I discovered just how deeply I’m capable of loving — of forgiving, of trying again.

And I still do it, every single day.

He may not be my only one anymore… but that will never change the way I feel for him.

Because of Caleb, I learned how much my parents must love me.

Because of Caleb, I learned how much I could love, too.

There’s no greater gift in the world than that —

except, perhaps, the gift of a sibling.

Caleb — you may not be my only one anymore, but you will always hold the same giant space in my heart.

And I think — I hope — that one day, you’ll thank me for giving you your brother.

Your built-in best friend. The one who will become the only person who understands you in a way no one else can.

The one you may “hate” during childhood but grow to love more than you can imagine.

I hope someday you’ll look back and remember — together — the ugly kitchen in our first house. The needy dogs. The horror movies Mom and Dad love. Mom’s country music and musical theater (and how she sings along to every single song). All of Mom’s books. All of Dad’s games. The fall festivities we dragged you to (and still will), because your mama is obsessed with Halloween. (It’s bigger than Christmas in this family.)

I hope you’ll remember that Mom’s not so great in the kitchen, but Dad could be a chef — especially with his Mexican food. That together, you’ll say: we had fun. That you’ll smile when you think of us — even if things changed. Even if the story looks different now than it once did.

I hope you’ll laugh someday with your brother about what it was like growing up here, in this family, in this love.

Because one day, the two of you will look back — at your shared childhood, at your life history, so perfectly entwined — and you’ll smile.

No one else will get it the way the two of you will.

Your sibling will get it.

Your sibling will get you.

They’ll be the only one.