My thoughts (today) on pregnancy

I am awake. Mostly due to the fact that I had to use the restroom and also physically wake up so I could heft my belly from one side to the other to get comfortable, and this is no easy task now-a-days! As I was trying to get back to sleep, my mind kept going through the millions of thoughts about this pregnancy. Alone and with my own thoughts is a rare place to be in this household, and even much less likely in a month or so! An hour and a half later, I'm still awake, so I'm putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard as the case may be. It's all such a jumbled mess, I'm hoping my thoughts make sense!

Each night once the kids are down, Casey and I unwind in the basement family room. Without fail or asking, Casey will take my aching right leg and give it a great rub. As silly as it sounds, it's one of those little things that reminds me that he loves me and that he appreciates what bringing each child into our family has done to my body. I commented to him the other night as I made funny sighing noises that just came out as I was trying to "gracefully" get up off of the carpet that now that I'm thirty, pregnancy is NOT for wimps! My leg looks like it's been through a war zone due to pressure on those veins, along with the exhaustion, stretch marks, pudgy body and belly. I'm at the point in my pregnancy where it takes real courage to just leave the house & face every day knowing I don't look exactly how I'd like to!!! Oh the vanity of it all. I'm embarrassed to say that I can get caught up in it.

Then random things gently remind me of the MIRACLE of it all. I was sitting next to my visiting teacher in church on Sunday. She's an awesome lady whose kids are growing up and starting to leave the nest. I had my elbow resting on my belly and was holding the hymnbook along with her when this little girl gave a great big kick. Susannah looked at me and said "Even I felt that!" We started giggling, looked at each other as I mentioned what a great feeling it was and started tearing up. She whispered how she missed and had forgotten what it was like and I was relishing the moment of THAT FEELING. It's true that you can't explain in words until you've been lucky enough to be pregnant. The great and wonderful things really do far outweigh the hard stuff. There truly is something beautiful about it. It's just that the traditional definition and characteristics that define beauty are tweaked & put into a new perspective.

So, I will take the aches and pains, as I know so many dear friends who have far more difficult aches and pains from struggling to bring children into their own families. The exhaustion and sleep-less nights are a sign that I've had a healthy pregnancy and am nearing the end, where so many have been robbed of that miracle. And with each new child has brought a new stretch mark or two, and a new "ailment" that will most likely leave a permanent mark on my physical body that will be my reminder that I am a mother, and I will try to treat them as a badge of honor, rather than an imperfection. For the next few weeks in particular, I'll try to remember that the miracle of it all trumps any woes, every time.