A family friend just gave birth several days after her “due date” and I found this blurb I had written about my own overdue baby. I can smile about it now.
I am now one week late delivering our third child. This seems an unbelievable milestone considering I had always heard, the first delivery is the longest, most trying, most eye-opening, second will be faster but that subsequent babies would just fall out while at the grocery store or slide effortlessly onto your bathroom floor while getting ready for a sudsy, warm bath. This one is puzzling.
I am feeling guilty around my parents and my in-laws who have offered to help by watching Hanna and Ellie, staying here overnight should Greg and I have to slip away at some silly hour of the morning to race to the hospital or just being here to cook a meal, fold some laundry, pick someone up from school, swimming lessons. I know when this healthy, little bundle of joy arrives, I will feel nothing but happiness (and a little discomfort) but for now, it seems as though the weight of the world is on my shoulders and I have no control. Also, that middle of the night delivery is simply not an option. I plan to will myself to sleep if any labour pains commence between the hours of 11 pm and 5 am. I’m a bear if not well-rested.
When I picked Hanna up from school yesterday, all of the mothers were quite sympathetic. They all looked at me (trying not to) and tapped my shoulder, asking “Are you still here?” and seemed genuinely sad for my physical appearance and emotional state. I don’t want anyone’s sympathy, I don’t want to wear yoga pants out publically, I don’t want to break my scale in half having already topped myself with a 47 lbs weight gain this third time around. What I want is the unknown to hurry up and get here.
Last night, I had a dream that the group from the television show Four Square, (on Treehouse) High Four was chanting to me. One girl in particular who has dark skin and the biggest, most bulbous, white eyes that seem as though with her enthusiasm could pop out of the socket and fall out in any segment started to chant, “ I…..NEED…..A……TUMS…” while the group tapped their heads, rubbed their bellies and turned it into a round. I think I might have started singing along half asleep or at the very least humming before I turned to my night stand and started chugging down half the bottle of the chalky tablets.
A little like Bridget Jones, I can measure this pregnancy, weight-gain, stress relief in pellets of TUMS rather than alcohol, cigarettes or sex. Could they be the reason the baby can’t seem to find his/her way out? Is there a chalky residue or Jenga tower of half-chewed white discs impeding progress? The trail has been blazed, the path has been beaten, why can’t this third baby find its way home? Follow the trail of TUMS!
I’ve said this before, the cruellest thing the medical community can do is give a pregnant woman a “due date.” This date becomes all consuming. It is the date we schedule our future birthday parties around, we check astrological signs to hone up on our child’s future potential, we plan sporting events, school registration around whether we are on the cusp of missing any important dates based on when in the year our baby will be born. We pack a bag for the hospital and tuck it into the trunk. The clothes I have in there now are likely mouldy having rotted in the bag being shot with rain, hail and loads of inclement weather outside on the driveway. Fashion has changed since I packed that bag. Recalls have been made on bottles and soothers that are tucked away in the pockets. Most definitely the baby is already out of the newborn size diaper and will require toddler clothing sizes.
And not unlike this anxious mommy’s patience, so too has the bulk-sized bottle of TUMS that takes up the majority of bag space, expired.
