On Getting Pregnant . . .

Birth Story Part I-A

'cause there's just way too much back story to my first pregnancy to tell it all at once.

This is also A Commitment Story . . . (as in, she should be committed.)

I'm done with subtitles now--for reals.

In my life, I have struggled with commitment, as evidenced by my engagement story (which, being a prequel to this post, I'll share at some point as well). But, as I was reading MommyJ's birth stories, I felt compelled to share my own.

Having been raised Mormon, I was always taught that families can be together forever--that our family relationships will continue beyond death. While this sounds great to most people, those of us who change our minds like we change our shoes, find the smell of commitment in this doctrine to be a bit overwhelming. I mean really, it took some doing for me to commit to the whole married-for-eternity thing, now you're telling me I'm going to be a parent forever? What if I don't like it? What if I don't like my kids? What if they don't like me? What if I screw up and am a terribly terrible mother? Oh, what's that you say? Does it always have to be about me? Well, is there anybody else?

But here's the thing. Having been raised Mormon, with a huge extended Mormon family, and having lived and traveled a myriad of places inside and outside of Utah, I could not help but notice something. On the whole, married people with children are the happiest people I know. No, that does not mean that every married couple and family live in un-ending bliss. There are plenty of married parents who are miserable and have apparently been failed by or failed in either their marriages, or family lives or both (I'll get to that). But, the happiest people I know, the people who have had the biggest influence for good on my life, have, for the most part, been married parents. So, in contemplating this evidence against the principle of "God's great plan of Happiness", I could not but draw the conclusion that it is indeed a true principle.

So, I took a huge leap of faith, and I got married, and was immeasurably pleased that I did (prequel forthcoming). And, after a couple of years, we began to consider having a baby and again I contemplated faith and commitment. I enjoyed being single. I also enjoyed being married without children. There is a lot of freedom in both. A baby, obviously would cut seriously into my freedom. But, again, and here's the kicker--all the people I knew who'd seriously pursued their own personal happiness in commitment-free childlessness, appeared to me to be empty. Sure, they looked like they were having fun, but it also looked like they were desperately trying to fill some hole in their lives with that fun. And that somehow the fun was never enough, and the fun was never deep, nor satisfying. Whereas the happiest and most satisfied people I knew drew deeply from life and we're filled. And they were parents. No, they didn't travel much, nor have a lot of stuff, but they were full.

But that fun sure looked, well, fun. And, here's the other thing (I said I'd get to it) not everyone who was married with children, was satisfied like that. Some of them were really miserable. Some of them really screwed up their kids and their marriages. So, what if I ended up one of them--miserably married and stuck with kids who daily reminded me of how much I failed them. Wouldn't it be better to be childless, empty and having fun? And pregnancy didn't sound like a cakewalk either.

Let me digress momentarily--I realize that there are so many women out there who have wanted motherhood so badly it soaks into their soul, and for that I feel deep sympathy. But I cannot pretend to feel empathy--I have never longed to be pregnant. I have never longed for parenthood. My longing and my challenges were very different. Perhaps easier, perhaps not. Perhaps more shallow, perhaps not. God was teaching me in a different way--things that I needed to learn. Lessons about learning to want what God wants for me. And if I am to share my experiences, I need to be honest about all the emotion, particular to me, that I felt. Maybe someone else has felt the same, maybe not.

So why not just wait you might ask? And so I'll answer with way too much personal detail. I was married at the ripe old age of nearly 27. In mormon years, this is well into old-maidenhood. Most of the people I went to school with married in their early twenties and have teenagers at present. So, a couple of more years into marriage and I was pushing 30. I refused to intentionally raise an only child, so I knew I'd have to be in for more than one. I also knew that all the women on my mother's side went through menopause around the age of 35. So, if I wanted kids, I had to get crackin'. My other big fear was, what if I put off motherhood so long that suddenly, when I wanted it, it was too late? Not to mention that having babies in your thirties is very different then having babies in your twenties--or so I'm told, and have observed.

To begin my quest, I surveyed all the mothers I knew. Why did you decide to have a baby? What I found was many versions of the same two answers. 1) I really really wanted a baby and knew it was time. 2) It was not really planned. No one it seemed had, or would cop to getting pregnant solely because they felt like they should. So, since I couldn't work up a big desire to get pregnant, I started hoping for an "accident" and I prayed for guidance and to help me understand God's will for me. The lesson I learned from God, was that, as usual, He wanted me to choose--to choose to do this, of my own free will. He wasn't going to let me off the hook with an accident.

Matt and I discussed adoption. I was coming to terms with the idea of parenthood, but was still really struggling with the idea of childbirth. Really struggling. He really liked the idea of fostering. We talked and talked. Matt tried to help me overcome my fears. He was very very patient. One day he reminded me that when we were married, were commanded to multiply and replenish--not seek out and raise other people's children--not that this wasn't noble and worthwhile, but he felt that in our case, maybe God wanted us to at least see if we could have our own first. I realized he was right. So, I took a huge leap of faith, and we started trying to get pregnant. A few months passed. Every month that I wasn't pregnant, I contemplated dropping the whole idea. We requested a foster parenting application.

It was about this time that his sister-in-law was due to have a baby. I was driving home from work and Matt called--

Rhi is in the hospital in labor.

Okay.

Everyone is there already and I'm stuck and can't come up.

You mean your whole family is in attendance at the hospital?

Yes.

Oh, um, should stop by? I was going biking, but I'm driving past the hospital right now.

Would you?

Okay. I suppose.

So I went to the hospital and found 3 of Matt's sisters, his brother and I believe his parents (or maybe they were out of town--distraught to be missing the whole thing) and his sister-in-law, the guest of honor. My memory is a bit hazy here, I can't remember if Matt and I discussed prior to this event, or as a direct result of this event, the fact that the only people invited to my childbirth (should I ever have one) are HIM and MY MOTHER (only because Matt is likely to pass out, and somebody ought to be coherent enough to help). And no, NO VIDEO TAPING ALLOWED! But, that is another post altogether.

I came in the hospital room, said my hellos and sat down because I was feeling a bit faint at the whole idea--I don't think any of them knew that we were trying ourselves to get in on this whole gig, and the whole thing was hitting a bit close to home. I asked when they would take her into delivery and she said that we were there. The baby would be born IN THAT VERY ROOM. Watching all color drain from my face, my sister-in-law--the woman in labor--asked if I was alright. I said I need to go for a bike ride, but I'd check back in later, after the baby was born. You see, in my family, couples go to the hospital, have babies, then call their family to tell them the important details--they don't come to the hospital. But perhaps that's only because I am the only daughter in my family and my brothers and their wives all lived in different states. In Matt's family, it's apparently a family field trip event.

So I left, and biked long and hard. I went home and pulled out the foster parenting application and contemplated going back on the pill. I also prayed a lot. I decided to stick it out a little bit longer. And within a couple more months, my fretting about whether I should quit trying or not was moot. I was pregnant. And freaked out about it.

Okay, way too long post I know, but if you made it this far, tune in next time for Birth Story Part 1-B, On Being Pregnant . . .