October 2024
Pregnancy has been an incredibly difficult journey for me. Bombarded by articles with titles like, "Millennials Choose Happiness Over Having Children," "American Women Exercise Their Right To Not Have Kids," and "Given The State Of Our Planet, Does It Make Sense To Have Kids?"—the pregnant women on my Instagram feeds caption their pregnancies as "The Most Blissful 9 Months Of My Entire Life." I felt there was no space for the in-between. The glowing feed from my phone screen paints only polarizing pictures of this entire experience that feels so intimately mine. I just couldn’t—and can’t—relate to any of it. The lack of that middle ground made it harder to take deep breaths and stay present. But my body has reminded me every day that the only speed I could truly excel at was the speed of one present day. My mind, which normally operates days, months, and years ahead all at once in a glorious multiverse of thoughts, had to come to a sputtering halt at the altar of my womb as she began her work.
With near-constant heartburn threatening to topple my throat over, I found—and still find—it hard to plan like I used to. Is that what parenthood is? Would I lose all my carefully laid plans to the mess of the present? Would I stumble as I walked and never remember the feel of the assured run? Or could I work with this pace and readjust?
Before having a child, I promised myself I wouldn’t throw away everything I had built—that I wouldn’t reconstruct a world based on reaction instead of intentionality. I spent so much time creating my life, learning about my inner workings, my partner, and our unique place in the universe. I found peace, happiness (coming and going, but mostly coming), and strength. I promised myself I wouldn’t throw that all away to give in to chaos. But in this first test, these nine months tried me in ways I never anticipated. I stumbled a lot. I cried and will continue to cry, like I’m trying to solve the water crisis with my tears. Oh, so many tears. I questioned everything, with my hormones playing my heart like a sad, frantic fiddle.
The first trimester felt like the world was closing in. The second trimester cleared my head, but my body started to feel like a trap in a lot of ways. I began to feel my baby girl kick, and I was in awe, but I also missed my pre-pregnancy body. The third trimester is when I felt the strongest, but as I got closer to birth, my body filled up with exhaustion. My pace slowed down to the movement of a glacier. I feel like a glacier—immense and slow, filled with an immeasurable density that drags me down physically and mentally.
Then the birth. Hours and hours of contractions to expand all the space of my birthing canal. My husband by my side—so close, yet not close enough. Not able to reach me in this small place I had crafted in my head to handle the level of pain. What a solo journey. Did it feel lonely? No, not at all. It felt like I was everyone. Every version of myself smashed together into one being, for once. No dissent among the cast, just one orb of energy and force. The epidural I whispered as a need to my husband at the start of the most painful, soul-shaking contraction didn’t work. And that was the mental green light I needed—the acknowledgment that no one was going to get me through this but me. I had questioned the mantras of inner strength I’d spoken to myself up until that moment. In that moment, I knew the words were hands holding up piles of sand, watching grains sneak out between my fingers. My beliefs cemented themselves into me, until the epidural didn’t work. Then, it was a gift. To be gifted a level of pain and to know I was strong enough—stronger than I’d ever imagined.
Now the baby. The perfect, sweet baby girl, like a relentless storm in my life. Actually, I take that back—a storm is not enough to contain who she is. She is water in every form. Sometimes she’s sprinkles, pitter-pattering on leaves, leaving me feeling at peace. And sometimes, she’s the 50-foot supernatural waves that haunt the sea.
I am in awe of the emotions she charges through me. A level of care and love that leaves me a bit shaky. No one has ever mattered so much to me—no one ever will. I cling to my partner, my lighthouse husband. His light stays on for me, reminding me I’m okay, she’s okay, we’re okay. We’ve hit the three-week mark since her birth. Every day has felt like a saga. I break the days out from the nights in my mind, never letting them meld together, because I need to know the end of a day is truly the end. My footing, as it has been since the start of my pregnancy, is loose and shaky. I try not to hold my breath. I can’t hold my breath and lie in wait for the day of assurance. I know that to reach it, we need to work for it as a family. Every day we take together, we build this foundation.
