Stream of Consciousness

I admit it. I'm at work, and technically I should be working, except that I cannot concentrate, I'm uncomfortable, and I feel like I could fall asleep at any moment. My sinuses hurt, which is causing a nearly unbearable headache, and to make matters worse, all I want is a big, tall, icy cold Coke. The one thing that I should NOT have. Caffeine + unneccessary amounts of sugar = not the best choice for my pregnant self. What I should do is get up and get a tall glass of water, but there's a helium tank blocking the water fountain, and I don't feel up to finding another one.

Up until this point I've felt like my classes have been somewhat of an inconvenience to me. An unwanted interruption in the middle of my day that makes everything so much more stressful and busy than I'd like. Now that it's over, I feel a little sense of loss, like I'm losing something that I've invested a lot of myself in, and now I'm not sure what to do with myself. I've experienced this before--it's not new. Graduations, job changes, moves--they all bring this sense of "What now?" with them. And somehow, I always figure out what to do with myself when the next step comes.

Transitioning to part time here is a beautiful blessing that is scary and unsure. The cut in pay isn't that much, but what makes it seem more significant is the loss of medical coverage. Trying to figure out how to get coverage when you're 4 months pregnant doesn't seem smart, if you ask me. Seems like folks could deny me. Suddenly I'm worried that this decision was flippant, that I made it out of my own selfishness instead of making a logical, sound decision. But when I think about grading piles of essays, tests and homework; planning lessons; reading and lecturing on novels; and all of the administrative stuff that comes along with teaching, I know that this is a blessing. Not having to work more than 6 hours a day when our little baby arrives will be something I am utterly grateful for. Today, I'm trying to keep my eye on that truth, instead of the obstacle of needing health insurance and having to revise our budget.

Being pregnant comes with such a strange mix of emotions. One day, I'm perfectly fine, happy to be alive and secure in the knowledge that this is God's grace to my fearful heart that actually believed (however irrationally) that children would be an impossibility for me. With nothing more than my own anxiety to base that idea on, I realize now how crazy I must have sounded when I would talk about my fears. But still, being so irrational about it, and wanting it desperately, made acceptance more difficult than I ever imagined it would be. I thought I'd jump for joy, cry my eyes out, and relish the idea of being a mom-to-be. Instead, I cried a little, but mostly I shook. And I approached this pregnancy thing with an attitude of disbelief. I thought the doctors were wrong, and that I was right. That their instruments were flawed, and that my finite mind was more intuitive than they were. Even when we finally heard the heart beat, I doubted. Now that my tummy is starting to protrude and my pants don't fit without one of those belly band things, I'm starting to reconsider. And yet, I have a new fear that when they finally do the ultrasound, the baby will be a tumor that secretes hormones that make it SEEM like I'm pregnant, or that something will be wrong and the baby will be sick or disfigured. Talk about hope, eh?

Joey tells me that I can be crazy and irrational because he'll be the rational one for both of us. His belief is inspiring, comforting, and reassuring most of the time. But there are still those dark moments when I put on a smile and act like I'm secure about all this, when in reality I'm doubting something. If it's not the idea of the baby itself, then it's the idea of myself as a mother. And I know, in my rational mind, that all of it is a load of crap. But I also know that it feels very real to me, and I feel almost like I've got a split personality about all of it.

I told Christy early on that it felt like everyone was more excited about this baby than I was, and that was such a hard thing to admit because it felt like I was saying that I wasn't excited for this child, or that I didn't love it or wasn't happy about it. The good news? She absolutely understood. She had felt the same way when she was first pregnant with Brennan. After talking to her about it, I think the truth is that I feel this way because I'm the one who's carrying it all--the baby, the anxiety, the pressure, the fear...I'm the one who deals with the reality of it every single second of every single day.

But then there are those glittering moments where I see that everything is just as it should be, that this is the time I've been waiting for, praying for, yearning for. This is a dream come true. A prayer answered. And I guess in the end, that's the real truth to hold on to.