Tomorrow

It is such a bizarre feeling knowing that I am due tomorrow. I don't think she's coming tomorrow but I've been waiting for this day for years and have literally been counting down to it ever since I found out that I was expecting. I noticed lately that I've become incredibly impatient waiting for her arrival. I don't know if its mostly motivated by fear and worry of something going wrong or just pure excitement and anticipation of this next chapter. I've been hoping to go into labor on my own, as I really do not want to have to be induced. I realized this week why. For years, I didn't think I was going to be able to get pregnant on my own. It was as if my body didn't want to do what it was made to do. I often wondered if I would ever have kids. Now, I have the same sort of feeling wondering if again my body won't do what its supposed to. Obviously its not the same thing, not the same emotions as before because I know I am going to have this baby at some point. Its just a vaguely familiar feeling of waiting for my body to do something that I'm not sure its going to do on its own. When we were trying to get pregnant, we tried every suggestion, no matter how stupid or ridiculous. Most of them to no avail. The last 2 weeks, we've been doing the same thing trying to induce labor, also to no avail. I've walked, ate spicy foods, ate eggplant, bounced on an exercise ball, hung out outside during the full moon, took some old lady's advice who told me "you get out of that situation the same way you got into it." Nothing seems to work and it does remind me to a certain extent of the feeling I would get every month when I realized the hormones/temperature taking/Clomid/etc didn't work.

However, this baby will arrive soon! Maybe I just still think its too good to be true. Last week, I had nothing to do on Friday and Beth invited me to go to the park with her and the twins. It was one of the first truly beautiful and warm days of the season so I decided to take her up on it. As I was getting ready to leave, I remembered that Kelly would be spending the day cooking and cleaning in preparation for weekend company so I called and offered to at least relieve her of mommy duty for the day. She quickly and gratefully surrendered her child to me and off to the park we went. I've never been to the park in the middle of a work day. I don't really know what I expected but I ended up at what looked like some sort of underground mom's club. It seemed like every stay-at-home mom in Forsyth county was at the park that day. I brought Kate who at 11 months old hadn't experienced the club yet either. Walking around with an 11 month old and a 9 month pregnant belly didn't even phase some of the women there. I wasn't even the only one great with child, toting around a young one on what used to be a hip! Women made friends with other women with their sole connection being the kids running around their feet. I ran into a few people I knew and in the various different circles, the conversations all revolved around how long each woman's labor was, how they felt about the age-spacing of their children, where their kids were developmentally compared to where they should be, and other very pertinent "mom issues." I still didn't quite have my own stories to share so I told them about Kate as if she were my own and shared my fears about induction and c-section with women who understood and had been there before. Afterwards, I went to the grocery store and without even realizing it, my mind was surveying the aisles for lunch ideas that I could easily make for myself at home and creative ways to get Mary Elizabeth to become an adventurous eater from the start. Definitely a shift in thinking. Not only that, as I began to see myself as a stay-at-home mom, I started to get so excited. I thought about all the times since I've been married where I was at home during the day either because I was in between jobs or working part-time. I always felt a little guilty being at home while Parker worked but deep down I really did love being at home. Now I'm about to enter that new chapter, guilt-free. Like I've been working towards and waiting for this for so long, its hard to believe that its close enough to start planning for it. Now we just need to get her here!

This week, my goal is to enjoy this last week of being pregnant. I'm not expecting that to be as easy done as it is said. For the last week and a half, I've finally understood what people mean when they say that God makes that end of pregnancy so uncomfortable that labor and delivery no longer seem scary. I am definitely uncomfortable. But I've spent the last week or two cooking and freezing for after the baby is born. I now have 2 freezers full of meals. I've spent the time cleaning the house to the point that I will sit and look around trying to find something else to clean. I've slept as much as I have wanted. I've taken bubble baths every other day. I've read almost 3 books in the last 2 weeks. I plan on continuing all these things that I enjoy until my sweet little girl gets here and the next chapter, the mommy chapter, begins.