We Wait

Patience Being in the now, that is what I am doing as I wait for our fourth to debut him or herself to us. My first due date has passed yesterday, my second one is imposing on me with it’s inevitable arrival tomorrow, and I wait. I know due dates are only estimations, a best guess as to when to hope your baby will emerge. And, while I have never been one to rush the baby out, knowing that they are easier to care for inside than out, I must admit this go around I am getting a little impatient. Just slightly. Perhaps I wouldn’t be, but my other two girlfriends due the same days as me have already received their babies, a boy and a girl respectively. Perhaps, if I didn’t feel like I might be pregnant for the next five years, I would be more ok with the wait.

So for now I am enjoying my big, round, full belly. The way this baby moves across my abdomen in waves and then pauses to extend his feet to the upper left, and stretch his fingers to the lower left while his back hammocks to the right like a crescent moon embraced. Or how occasionally I feel the baby bouncing on my waters, almost willing himself to come out like my others did by starting with the breaking of the waters, the seal that separates us. Or how at my touch to his foot he retracts and extends playfully. I release my fears I have of birth, of becoming a mother of four and embrace the amazing-ness that is my good fortune. This pregnancy I am grateful for winter caps and darling scarves that have helped keep my shedding head warm, and me feel somewhat normal when an abnormal thing is occurring. I am grateful for the love and amazing support Peter has been to the boys and myself.…knowing by now when I am having a hormonal shift that can’t be argued only assuaged and making meals, and singing for an hour every night to the boys at bedtime to settle them from Johnny Cash to the Beatles. I imagine his sound track he is creating with them will live with them for their lifetime, classic songs they will come across as they grow and listen to music. I am in deep awe of the wonderful girlfriends I have who support and encourage me. Some physically near and many far, all who call and check in and encourage, others who whisk me out for one last pedicure before baby—I’m donning blue toes at the moment, and text me to invite me over for pancakes. I go to bed in a sea of abundant gratitude, perhaps my last night pregnant, perhaps not, with the fortitude to wait for my baby’s sweet debut.