Toilet Epiphany

Surrender.

Surrender was the one word I chose to explain my birth experience when I attended a birth class a month later. I was the "experienced mom" talking to the women on their journey to their own home births. Cathy and Briana talked to these women and asked me questions. What was the one biggest lesson you learned?

Surrender.

Let go. Give in. Nature will win. Your body is designed to birth this baby, so trust it. Surrender to the pain, to the feelings, to the urges. Don't fight it. And once I did this, everything went so much faster. It got clearer and easier. And a baby was born.

Now with this new pregnancy, there have been so many good things, so smooth. And now we've found out there may be a hiccup. I may or may not get the home birth of my dreams. I may have to birth in a hospital. I may possibly have to have the dreaded Cesarean. I'm scared. I don't know how to handle this information. I've made this visual in my mind of what my birth would be, and a cold sterile hospital is not in that vision. I just... I'm so nervous to see how things come out.

And then I remembered. Surrender. Let go. Give in. Nature will win. And if my body needs assistance to birth this baby this time, that's ok. It's ok to let go of my preconceived notions of what this birth will be, and see where we end up. Surrender.

I'm scared. I can do this. I will fight for the best birth available for my baby. I will surrender when it's time to let go.

Uh oh.

So it happened. Mark lost his job. We knew this day was coming, and really we were just hoping it would wait until February...

I have mixed feelings about it. I'm really glad to have the stay at home support from him, but having that money just gone from our income is HARD.

Deep breaths. We can do this, I know we can. Plan. Budget. Save. Breathe.

I am glad that stress is out of his life, I really hope our relationship will be better sustained, and this pregnancy will be a little easier (along with the mandatory overtime) with so much support at home.

Here's hoping.

Hello fresh page. Clean book. Here I am, here I start.

I've been wanting to write for a while, about what I'm not sure. So many changes going on in my life, so many unanswered questions. Some days I don't know what I'll wake up to. Will Mark still have a job? Will he have a bad day? Will I?

Instead of focusing on all this, this is my sacred space. My quiet place.

Today I'm going to smile about the marvel of feeling my unborn child move within me. She moves so much, how can I miss it? She's so active, with very distinct awake/asleep times. I'm really getting to know her I think. She's a little stubborn like her sister.

Eating in awareness is a new experience. Trying to remember that everything I eat goes to her, is in her body... makes it easier to skip the coke. I'm still struggling to gain weight, but at least I've stopped losing. I'm able to eat more now, I think maybe she's just growing faster than I am!

Today my thoughts are on my inner goddess. The strength within me. I'm going to need it, looks like we have a rough week ahead of us.... I'm thinking of myself in this moment.

This was a moment of strength. I can do it. I can do it.

I'm also looking toward this lovely lady moon. Strength for all women. 

Goodnight world.