My Baby is Not a Burrito

Imagine this scenario. Eight weeks pregnant, feeling like a bloated, nauseous beast and basically just trying to keep my life together. For the past three weeks my new best friend had become the big green bowl that I carried with me everywhere I went. I’ve been elated and felt blessed to have a new little life growing inside me, but man this kid has been kicking my butt. Obviously my husband has known from the beginning about this pregnancy, but our two kids still didn’t know that there was another sibling in their future. They just thought “mommy was feeling a little sick and needed some prayers.”

One evening when I had just reached the eight week mark, I was cleaning up the remnants of dinner and decided that the shirt I had been wearing for the last 48 hours was in desperate need of changing. I felt a slight twinge of annoyance (and a little guilt) because I realized that since I had been riding the morning sickness train so much lately, I was almost completely out of clean clothes. Who has time to keep up on laundry when you’re just trying to keep your oatmeal down? I figured there had to be at least something I could put on so I huffed and puffed my way up the stairs to my room. I threw open my drawer of t-shirts and found it almost completely empty. I quickly scanned my options and hesitantly picked up a plain red baby-tee and stared at it for a moment. I was hesitating because I knew it would fit a little tight. In my current state of baby-growing, I was in that awkward middle ground where it sort of looked like I might have an emerging pregnant mound OR a complete stranger may have easily thought that I just really like to eat burritos and cheeseburgers. You couldn’t exactly tell yet if it was a food baby or a real baby. I had been trying to wear looser fitting shirts lately so that my daughter wouldn’t start to grow suspicious about my stomach getting bigger. So, I wasn’t all too excited about wearing this shirt that I knew would emphasize my recent weight gain. We still had two whole weeks before we planned on telling her. As I continued to stare at the shirt I thought that I was probably just overreacting. She’s only four. She’s probably not paying attention to my belly. I quickly changed into the red shirt that I knew would hug my baby bump just a little too tight and then slowly met my reflection in the mirror. Confirmation. This shirt made me look pregnant. As my mind flashed back to those first “belly pics” I took when I was pregnant with Grace, I realized that the way my eight week belly was currently looking was more like my 18 week belly pic with her. My how things change the third time around. I stood there staring and my protruding mid-section and decided in that moment that I could either let this be something that got me down, or I could laugh about it and embrace the fact that I’m not in my twenties anymore. The first time I got pregnant my stomach muscles were actually in descent shape. Somewhat tight, not over-stretched by the pressure of an eight pound human. This time it was as if my stomach said to the rest of my body “Oh? This again? Meh why even try to hold it together?” and then it raised its figurative white flag and completely gave up. Imagining my stomach with a lazy personality somehow made me feel better. It actually made me chuckle a little to myself. Tis the season for growing babies and having ab muscles that just totally give up. 

As I marched back downstairs after having given myself a pretty good self-esteem pep talk, I passed by my daughter, Grace. She looked stunned as I rounded the corner to the kitchen and halted all conversation by throwing her hands up in the air and proclaiming, “OH Mom! Look!” I paused and said, “Look at what sweetie?” She ran over to me and put her hand on my belly. I froze and felt speechless because I realized what was going to come out of her mouth next and I had no idea how I was going to respond. She then blurted, “MOM! Your tummy!” Next she pursed her lips to the side in a matter-of-fact sort of way and said definitively, “I think you got a baby in there Mom. Because, look at how big your tummy is! Yep. You gots a baby in there.” My eyes about bugged out of my head and I suddenly heard the muffled laughter of my husband who was standing five feet away. My glance shot over to him with a look of “Please help me NOW!” but all I saw was a man holding the collar of his shirt over his face to try and hide the fact that he was totally losing it over our daughter’s allegations. He finally met my eyes and I had to nearly pinch myself to keep from erupting with laughter. I pressed my lips together dramatically as I tried not to panic. We weren’t ready to tell the world yet about the baby, and if we told my daughter then the world would surely know about it. I didn’t want to lie to her though so I went for the classic “Oh..wouldn’t that be cool? Hey look we still have some cookies from yesterday! Do you want a cookie?”  Maybe not the best method, but hey, it worked. She bounced away down the hallway, cookie in hand, and the talk about a baby being in my belly ceased. 

I feel so relieved to have made it to the ten week mark. Now my girl knows all about the real reason why my belly is getting bigger and I no longer have to distract her with cookies to keep her from talking about it. Right after our kids found out about the baby I overheard my husband explaining to them that this baby means that Mom might need more help around the house. When I walked over to them in the middle of this conversation Grace was beaming and said, “Mom! Daddy says we can help you by putting our dishes in the sink and helping you clean because your tummy is going to get SO HUGE! Is your tummy going to get really big Momma?” I smiled down at her as I relished the joy that was emanating from her. She was so purely happy about us having another baby, and she was already feeling proud of herself for knowing that it means we might ask more of her. I chuckled and pulled her close as I said, “Hon, I will definitely need more help and yes, my tummy is going to get huge.” 

Cheers to the season of growing a baby. I like to joke about some of the unpleasant side effects (like abs that give up on you) but really, this is such an amazing journey. I’m honored to be on it …even if I can’t find a clean shirt that fits. 

Blessings,

Shantastic

P.S. If you missed last week’s post, surprise! I’m expecting baby number 3! You can get caught up here ——> My Baby is a Kumquat and find out what made us want to jump on this roller coaster one last time! 

My Baby is a Kumquat

"Hey Mom, remember how you told me to pray and ask God if we could have another baby in our family?'' An enormous smile erupted on my face as I thought, Ok, she is the cutest thing ever. Then, I nodded. Yes, I did remember encouraging her to do that. ''Well guess what?!?” she replied, “God said YES! He told me yes in my heart that we can have another baby!! And...it's gonna be my sister!!' At this point, I burst out laughing. I couldn’t help it. Still shocked at her decisiveness I said, ''Well sweetie, if God does give us another baby it might be a girl, or it might be a boy. Would you be ok if it was a boy?'' She didn't hesitate with her answer and said ''Noooo no. If it's a boy we'll just say Hi God. You actually gave us the wrong baby. Here you go! Can we have our baby girl now?’'

Well, she was right about the first part. When this conversation happened I was 5 weeks 4 days pregnant. I had only just taken the pregnancy test about a week before. My husband, Seth, and I decided to wait until I was 10 weeks to tell the kids, but my discerning little girl figured it out right away. Over the next few weeks we had many (many) hilarious conversations in which she kept telling me that she was so excited about the baby in my tummy. One afternoon I was just a little over six weeks and feeling terribly sick. I was resting on the couch while I watched the kids play in the living room and mostly just focusing all my energy on not throwing up (again). As Grace danced around the room in her typical Gracie way, she fluttered over to me and plopped herself at the foot of the couch. She had the biggest smile on her face so I grinned back, tilted my head, and raised my eyebrows as if to ask what she was smiling about. She caught on to my question and exclaimed, “I’m just SO excited about my baby sister!!” In one smooth motion she lifted my shirt just barely past my belly button and kissed my tummy. Then as quickly as she had arrived, she bounced back off towards her toys, completely unaware that I was frozen, wide-eyed, and had nothing but shock on my face.  

So here I am. 10 weeks. My Baby is the size of a kumquat (whatever that is). Sealed inside that tiny fetus are the hopes and dreams of completing our family. There’s a line in my favorite movie, About Time, where the main character is trying to decide whether he and his wife should try for a third child. He contemplates for a moment and then says, “You know, my dad always said he wished there had been more of us.” When I heard that line my body tensed and I subconsciously leaned in towards the screen holding my breath. Is that how I would feel if we decided to stop at two children? Would I have always wished there had been one more? To test these prompting questions as to how I would feel about stopping at two kids, I pictured myself dropping off my youngest, Emmett, at his first day of Kindergarten. As I walked back to the car would I feel an overwhelming sense of freedom and accomplishment? Would I even be a little relieved that my season of life of being a full time stay-at-home mom was now over? In my mind, I saw myself climbing into my car and instead of feeling ready to throw myself into the next season of life, I felt lonely. Unfinished. I glanced to the backseat, saw it was empty and my heart sank. As I tried to figure out what these emotions meant, I pictured once again dropping off Emmett at school for the first day and this time I left the building holding hands with another child of mine. A lively toddler who was skipping along and singing some made-up version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. I bundled this last little one into the car, wiped a booger, kissed a forehead, and took off from the parking lot with a feeling like, yes, this is what it was supposed to be. That third kid was supposed to be there with me.

Very soon after I had these revelations I retold them to Seth. I already knew that he was open to the idea of having one more child, but we hadn’t yet confirmed that this was the path we felt God leading us toward. When I finished telling him my story he kept his head down and I saw the slightest smirk begin to curl on his lips. He then slowly looked up at me and said, “You know, to be honest I really have always pictured us with three.” 

That was the moment we decided to start praying for God to bless us with another baby. We were a bit surprised that initially God’s response was, “wait”. It wasn’t a yes or no, it was wait. To greatly fast forward this next section of our lives, we had been told to wait because God led us to sell our home and purchase a different house. The entire process took nearly a year and after we took a few months to settle into our new house, God then answered our heartfelt question with a yes. We actually found out we were pregnant when we were on our anniversary vacation back in June. (see that post here ----> My Babies' Mom was on Vacation) What a fun gift that was to find out on our trip! We got to sit and relax on the paddleboat in the afternoon and suggest potential baby names. Our mornings were spent sipping coffee on the deck and talking about how our kids would adjust to this new addition. We didn't get interrupted every five seconds, we didn’t have to fight to have time alone to talk and dream. It was very special. 

So...my little girl was right. We asked God for another baby, He said yes, and we are so thankful. Obviously, it’s too early to know if she was right about the baby being a girl, but we are thinking we will probably have to find out the gender so that we can prepare her. I think the cupcake reveal where there’s pink or blue on the inside might be the best way to go. That way if it’s a boy, maybe we can salvage her broken heart with chocolate and frosting. 

Now that our secret is public, may I ask something of you? As you know, life is a gift and it is fragile. Will you please pray for us and for this new little one? Being pregnant is definitely a huge blessing and a very beautiful thing. But it can also have its moments where fear and uncertainty threaten to cloud our focus. 

Please pray for us as we begin this new journey of being a family of five. We are thrilled beyond words and feel blessed beyond measure. 

Blessings,

Shantastic