Part One: In His Hands

On Wednesday, June 19th, it all became very real.
The night before I had spent the entire night tossing and turning from nightmares about surgery.
I woke up in tears and spent most of the morning that way.
I pulled the covers over my head as Scott left for work and just let myself cry.
I tried to pray.
But all I could really do was cry.
I was afraid.
I hate csections.
And here I was, about to have my third.
When my wallowing had passed, I rolled over and reached for my phone.
At the exact moment when I had broken down a few minutes prior I had two texts come through.

One from my Closie with a simple "I love you".
And the other from my mom "how are you?"

I cried again. These people I love, God using as His hands and feet. To encourage and support me.

I had planned to take my boys to breakfast that morning. Seeing as I was going to have to go a good 24 hours without eating I had a laundry list of "last meals" planned for that day, starting with a breakfast full of yummy starchy diner carbs. My mom, knowing, hearing, understanding, even through text messages, called her boss and told him she'd be late to work and her and dad joined us for breakfast.

I got in my van to drive to breakfast, looked in the rear view mirror at my boys and began to cry.

There was a third car seat in my car.

I had asked Scott for several days to put it in and he finally had.

And the reality of what was coming smacked me in the face.

I cried the whole way to breakfast.

I thought once my parents got there I'd be ok.

I wasn't.

I cried some more.

My parents let me. They encouraged me. They just listened. And they picked up the tab.
Parents really are awesome aren't they?

As we left my mom had mentioned she was going to go by the fire station at lunch to make sure her new car seats were installed correctly. As we were fiddling with them in the parking lot, a man came out from the diner and showed his deputy badge and offered to help install and check them.

I had to drop off the last of some client discs and had some other running around to do.
It was a gorgeous morning, with a big blue sky and breezy weather. As we drove I cranked Mumford&Sons. When it got to "Below My Feet" my boys squealed from the back seat, "louder mommy! LOUDER!" And so I rolled down the windows, opened the sunroof and blasted it. And cried as I sang. There were tears of joy as my boys squealed with delight and I felt like God was pouring the words of the song into my heart. I raised my hand through my sunroof and sang at the top of my lungs.

The rest of the day continued to be better.

I laid in bed that afternoon with my boys on either side of me, and one wiggly mister dancing inside and we curled up together and slept. There was something about curling up in between my first two children that was restorative. I needed that closeness from them.

(Not the best self timer, but I tried. And I washed my sheets that day. Check and Mark)

My mother-in-law came just as I finished packing them up to take them over night.

Scott got home from work.

My mother-in-law took a few silly pictures of us, the last as just us four.
As we walked them to the car she wrapped her arms around me tight when she saw I was welling up from saying good bye to my boys.

"You are a good mom. You're going to be a great mom to all three of your boys. Don't doubt that"

I cried some more.

I put on a dress. And some make up.

(No, we honestly did NOT have a name for him going to the hospital. And yes, our names were all over the place.)
We went to dinner. We ate good food and laughed and talked.

He encouraged me in his own way.

"Don't go in thinking it's going to be terrible. Go into it with the mentality that 'I've done this. I've got this' You're stronger than you think"

I cried some more.

We came home and finished packing up.

We joked, how would we ever sleep that night? With so much anticipation coming?
It was like going to bed the night before Disneyland.

I took a break from packing and organizing to go drive thru Dewars for a last indulgent ice cream.

We went to sleep.

And I actually slept.

God was there. All. Day. Long. I had not let myself mourn over my delivery. I had not really let myself process what a third child would look like. And it all came crashing down on the same day, the day before my son was to be born. I had not wanted to spend the day mourning, but rather I had wanted to celebrate. But I learned that day, that mourning is important. Gods grace was so obviously abundant in those hours of weakness and fear and doubt. Through the people I love and random strangers, God poured out His love and mercy into me all day long. And by the time I finally fell asleep that night, my dreams were full of peace.
As is, my God.