Hanging on by a Thread and Baby Blues before the Baby

While lying here in bed in the complete quietness of both kids asleep in bed, no tv, and no snoring husband lying beside me, I've had the chance to spend some time tonight enjoying Eva. While watching my swollen belly move around like a waterbed, I sit here tonight thinking back to doing the same thing with both of my other babies. Before I was ever pregnant, I imagined pregnancy as this big comfy hibernating being I would become. Pregnant women look so comfy with their bellies poked out, comfy maternity clothes, just lounging and eating.... until you feel a hard jab from the tenant inside to your ribs that is...With Hayleigh I got to enjoy it all very much. That pregnancy lasted a good while and I felt so vibrant and uncomfortable, but most of all not ready to take the plunge into caring for a baby when the time came. Allen and I celebrated each kick, hiccup, and just really loved on my growing belly with our dreams of what would come. With Reid, I had 2 year old Hayleigh running around, and I tried to enjoy being pregnant as much as I possibly could. That pregnancy went by fairly quickly. Allen only saw me every two weeks, and we would enjoy kicks from him every night Allen was home.  Now, here I sit doing the same once again, knowing all fully this is the last of the bump, the last of the kicks, hiccups and pregnancy to enjoy. I find myself loving my maternity clothes more, my growing belly more, and just the full of life while feeling drained as much as I possibly can.

 My youth is slipping away faster and faster anymore, and it will not slow down. In less than a month, I turn 32 years old. I don't even really know what to say about it really except it just keeps moving faster and faster. I'm almost afraid to shut my eyes and wake up to being 40. I really just cannot believe I just typed that... 40. Forty is coming for me whether I'm ready or not. When I turn 40, we will have a 12 year old, a 10 year old, and an 8 year old. How the hell did that happen??!!!

Back almost 2-1/2 years ago, I was lying in the hospital bed, hooked up to monitors, drugs, and ivs, thinking to myself while laboring with Reid, "this is the last time I will have to do this"... that actually brought me more comfort than you will know. Afterward, it brought me great sorrow. I got angry about growing up- you could say Eva has been my midlife crisis as you will. Allen and I had agreed Reid was it, we were done- one boy, one girl..DONE.... Then, Allen got a mowhawk at work, one of my friends was pregnant, and I refused to give my youth up and say I was done. Lead me out to pasture like an old show horse.

My babies grew up way too fast. Hell, they are still growing way too fast, and I really do not like it one bit. When we started trying again, it was like I had a hold of my youth by a hair... by God, it was not leaving me yet. I was not done. Now I fully understand why the Duggars have 19 kids... it's hard to admit you are done growing a family, and to just move on and away from that stage in your life. When I got pregnant with Eva the first month after my D&C, I thought ha! take that old age! My body has finally figured out what to do and to do it right without having to be prompted with drugs and charts. But in that same moment of seeing those two pink lines, I knew that would be the last time I would have that rush, to be experiencing the excitement of new life to come, and that moment turned very bittersweet for me. Allen could care less how many kids we have- he would go to the ends of the earth with me, and a brood of 10 kids, if I really wanted to have 10 kids. He is happy when I am happy.

So, I sit here tonight, clinging onto 25 weeks with Eva, and knowing full well in 3 short months and a week or two give or take, it will all be gone. The special little kicks, hiccups, rolls, and the bump will all be a distant memory as we go into sleep deprivation once again with a newborn, and get Hayleigh ready for kindergarten. I will miss the snotty nose I get every.single.time I am pregnant, the big boobs, the uncomfortable parts that we all forget once we hold that sweet bundle of joy, and most of all that magical bump. That bump that makes you feel so motherly, womanly, sexy, and just full of life. Just wish my hair would be lovely like it was with Reid, but alas, my belly will be an empty shell of what brought life into this world, and my voluminous wavy curly hair will return along with the normal dreams.  Yet, life will never be the same again once Eva enters this world.  We will question what life was really like before her because you can no longer imagine or remember what life was like without her in it.