Mother's Day

There's a lot of stuff making the rounds 'round the net this week about moms.  Mostly, they say in different language and with different examples all the ways moms are awesome, which is absolutely true.

So, I'm not going to tell you all the ways moms are awesome, even though they are, that horse has been beat to death.  What I'm going to tell you about is pregnancy.

The funny thing about being pregnant is that there's really no metaphor for what it's like...I know, I've been trying to think of one.  The closest thing I can come up with is it's sort of like running a very long race and the finish line is coming up and you can't take a break or do anything (natural) to slow down, change your course, or stop the race.  And, right before the finish line is painful, and afterwards, is the best prize ever.  And, of course the entire time, there's the dread of the pain fighting the desire to see the prize, on top of the apprehension, excitement, fear of the unknown and what-could-go-wrong, and the fantasy about what it will be like.  All these increase the closer you get to the finish line.

No wonder not even quite halfway through this pregnancy (my third), I'm already having sleepless nights.  As much as we try not to think about it, it's impossible not to dread and hope and plan.  In fact, I think it's even normal...though, in my experience so far, the things that I fear are rarely the bad things that happen, though bad things do happen.  And the things that I think I will have a handle on I usually don't.

So, to all you expectant moms, with all the emotion and thoughts and hormones making you feel like one minute you wish you could could put the breaks on the crazy train you're on, and the next so overwhelmed with expectation that you wish you could just skip over to the love and the cuddles and the sniffing the tiny baby head (or am I the only one that stays awake thinking about that?), Happy Mother's Day.  Especially if it's your first, you may not even feel like a mother yet, but you are experiencing a unique and limited moment in motherhood, nurturing, protecting, worrying about and loving your baby as much as any mother does.