One week later, I'm finally sitting down to write the words, which have already written themselves on my heart. And I wonder, even now, if I can do this.
By this I mean, 1) write a blog with a baby in my lap. 2) Put my emotions into words. 3) Write without crying.
He's perfect.
8 lbs 5 ounces. 21 1/2 inches long. Born at 6:05 on Thursday, September 13th 2012. After fifteen hours of labor. Six hours of throwing up. And one hour of pushing.
I arrived at the hospital with Larry on Wednesday night. Scheduled for an induction, because my OB was leaving town my 41st week of pregnancy, I drove myself to the hospital. Just like I'd been threatening all year. Induction started at 3 am, later than planned.
And by 3:30 AM I was laying in the hospital bed, TV playing quietly in the corner, Larry half sleeping in the reclining chair. The monitors were keeping track of me, keeping track of Judah. The IV had already left a bruise. The ice chips weren't cutting it. So I lay there, in this place of uncertainty, feeling like I was 13 again. But I reminded myself, quietly, I was not 13. I had a name for this. This imposing, towering barrier between me and what I needed to do.
Quietly, I began to pray. I cannot get my mind in the right place. It was this simple thought, which triggered the progress. One mighty swing to the solidness of the wall. Where I was, was not the right place. Where I'd let my mind go, wallowing in the discomfort, the pain, the non-traditionalistic nature of it all... was the wrong place.
So I needed to get to a new place.
And somewhere between 3 AM, beeping monitors, ice chips, and my water breaking... I found it.
I found my place.
A place, which looks much like the culmination of all my years. Strengthened by all my hurt, the weight of a heavy, baby boy, and the burden of both empathy and judgement. Bolstered by two stainless steel rods and a backbone, tried and tested by a lifetime of challenges... overcome.
Because that is, after all, what I do. And that is the business of the One I love.
Overcoming.
So by the time real contractions began, I had found my place. In between counts of four and fixated eyes, I began to hollow out a place within myself for what was about to occur.
Somewhere between my heart and compressed lungs and a big, baby boy whose face I hadn't yet really seen.
Sometimes, I've found, it takes pain to make us feel truly alive. Most of the time, it takes a measure of pain to carry us over into the greatest beauty we've ever known.
~
I had had every intention of doing it alone. Kicking people out of my room when the pain got to be too much. When too many body parts were starting to show. When my patience was running too thin.
But around the tenth hour, I started changing my mind.
And on this side of it, I know I didn't change my mind because I couldn't do it alone. I do most things alone. Most pain, I ride through quietly. If I had needed to, I could have finished laboring on my own. Cleaned myself up after vomiting, asked them to the monitor so I could watch my own contractions.
But I didn't have to.
And at 6:05pm, after figuring out how to push, after repeated affirmation I had chosen the right OB, after looking at my mother and telling her... she could stay...
They laid a screaming Judah on my chest.
Most of the time, it takes a measure of pain to carry us over into the greatest beauty we've ever known.
~
So I got to help my own mother check something off her bucket list. She was there to help her first born give birth to her first born.
And twenty minutes later, I got a text that said simply, "are you ready for poppy?"
I can count on my one hand how many times I've seen Larry cry. Even so, I know what the onset of his tears looks like. When the curtain pulled back and he stepped around it, the tears I had not cried at delivery starting welling. I swallowed them, not quite ready to start the flood, which I knew was brimming just below. I knew, once I let them start, a whole year's worth of tears would pour out of my body.
So Poppy met his second grandson. Potentially the only one to carry on the Vaughan name.
The sisters came next, and Abby whispered, "he looks like a little lion..." with enough awe in her voice to stir every angel in the room.
~
Now there is a big baby boy laying in my lap, hands folded on his belly, lips pursed and brow furrowed as he sleeps.
One week later, I am still absorbing every bit of what has happened. Finding my cup is not big enough, deep enough, to hold all, which is being poured in.
I understand not just a few things, much more deeply than I ever thought possible.
And I am really only one word, one yawn, one deep infant stare away from the deluge of tears.
~
Who knows what God has brought me through this child I have prayed for.
My gift of praise.
My little lion man.
My heart is too full to express any more of this, I feel.
But things have fixed themselves.
And this place I find myself, is the place where God is.
As if He'd been waiting there for me -- calling my name from there. Come, Anna, see what I have for you.
No comments:
Post a Comment