Past Due

Sometimes it is hard to wait.
Well, I've never found waiting easy, ever, though sometimes it is harder than others!!


As of this Monday, I am officially feeling impatient!
My midwife assures me that this baby WILL be born at some point :), but with EIGHT SETS of contractions that have started, only to stop, I am beginning to have. my. doubts. ;).


Truth be told, even though I AM very very very restless these days (and somewhat irritable too!), I am so glad the baby was not born before now. Last week was rough, and I am thankful for the extra time to sort through a few things before wee one's arrival. 
Colds revisited and we were getting 2-3 hours of sleep per night (not enough to appreciate labor AND the following major-life-transition time!).
I needed wanted a new rocker, which I have sat in and enjoyed many many times!
I had a few parenting questions that needed to be addressed. Not that I have all the solutions (yet - ha ha ha) but I think we're onto something and it is encouraging and very very good.


However, I am also thankful I have come to this point. I enjoy being pregnant very much, and was not too concerned about going over due. Yes it is mildly uncomfortable, and I'm not running anywhere fast, and I make funny sounds when I have to bend down or stand up :), but I enjoy being pregnant and am willing to take these things in stride (with a little bit of whining to keep it real!). When Kezia was born a week early, I actually grieved, because I was not "ready" to be "not pregnant" yet. I was at 39 weeks.


Now, I think I am ready. Ready to be done. I've gotten to that point just shy of desperation, and yet in the midst of it all, I don't want my impatience to cloud my desire for God's best timing in this all. Throughout this journey, that has been a recurring theme, and I anticipate that there's more for me to learn about that. Good things, necessary things, beautiful things.


A dear friend sent me an excerpt from Romans 8 (The Message, vv. 22-30) - which I've read almost every morning since I received it:


^22-25All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

 ^26-28Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

 ^29-30God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun. (emphasis mine).

Now is the timing for waiting. And soon, in the blink of an eye from the perspective of hindsight, we will begin the next chapter of this journey. Can't wait to see if it's a boy or a girl!!!

And now, it is also time for a snack, a favorite tv show, and some quiet time before I find myself sharing my nights once again!!!