Pregnancy Update from a Full Term Mama

Here I sit at 37 weeks and 3 days- big bellied and tight-skinned, hula-ing on my birth ball, having to pee, and grateful for a sleeping toddler.

Today, I am grateful to be full term with a baby safely growing in my belly. I am also grateful that my discomforts are relatively few. They are mostly limited to heartburn, hemorrhoids, and the natural challenges of carrying an extra load around. 🙂 The reminder that both I and the baby are healthy is often enough to dismiss the various complaints that come creeping into my mind.

The baby is beginning to slow down as he/she is running out of room in its home. (Don’t worry, still plenty of movement- just not as boisterous as before.) I pass the evening hour in bed belly-watching, observing the rolls and juts that disturb my taut baby bump. I remember doing this with my son, but now I know him. It seems so different somehow, to see a baby on the inside instead of the outside. I wonder who this second little one will be?

The baby is completely posterior now, so I’m trying to coax him/her to turn around to ease the labor process. So far, this little free spirit has not obliged. Hopefully this will change by the time Labor Day arrives.

I’m happy to be experiencing lots of strong Braxton-Hicks, with the occasional crampy bouts of pre-labor warm up. They are reminding me to breathe, to release and relax, to soften my brow and jaw- you know, all those good things I repeat to my clients during a birth. They really are good practice, even if they’re not as intense as the real thing.

I’m feeling much more at peace with both the approaching birth and the prospect of mothering another child. I came to the realization that I was allowing my fears to rule me, instead of trusting that God would provide the grace to deal with each situation as it comes.

As for now, I am trying to be regular in Scripture reading & prayer, and to begin seriously immersing myself in birth preparation while remembering that only God knows how all of this will play out. And I must trust Him in it- not my own strength or knowledge.

This passage popped into my mind the other day as I was thinking about surrendering my worries. I don’t think it is out of context to assume that it could apply to physical needs in birth and mothering just as much as the given examples of food and clothing. I hope it is just as helpful to some of you expectant mamas as it was to me.

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷ Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

²⁸ “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. ²⁹ Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ³⁰ If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? ³¹ So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ ³² For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³ But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴ Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

Matthew 6:25-34, copied from Bible Gateway.