The Grieving Period

My last two pregnancies, somewhere in month 7 or 8 I'd hit this kind of melancholy patch where, as excited as I was, I would have this tiny bit of mourning that our family was never going to be just as it had been before.  With Keilana, it was that my time with just Doug was ending, and that we wouldn't have that again for 20 or 30 years (and we'd been married less than a year), that from here on out, it would be about the baby.  When I was pregnant with Dylan, it was reflecting on all that we'd been through together, just the three of us, in the previous 18 months.  We had been removed from both our families and in many ways from a normal social circle, so we relied so heavily on each other--not just Keilana on us, but we on her.  We invested every spare moment and bit of energy in her, and she was our inspiration and our joy.  While that would all still be true to some degree, I knew the dynamic was about to change rapidly.

This time I haven't had that little sense of loss.  But I have had greater apprehension.  I've had a hard time nailing down exactly why that is, and as soon as it hit me it was so painfully obvious. I'm worried about the juggling--about finding a proper balance.  We will finally be outnumbered, I will finally have more children than I do arms.  I will have one in school full time and one that needs to be nursed and will consequently probably accompany me everywhere.  And once again with a baby on the way, we are considering major life changes.  Granted, this time they are not so certain or immediate, but they are also much less clearly defined.  And if we do move in the direction we are considering, it will also mean that I have more children and less of my husband around to help--that is a bit daunting to think about.  It places the search and desire for that elusive balance at the forefront of my mind.

Each stage that I have moved forward in life, that balance has been more difficult to achieve--with the one exception being transitioning from high school to college.  That was a bit ironic, since everyone warned me about all the demands there would be on me in college, about how busy and (possibly) overwhelming it would be.  After the demands I put on myself in all arenas of my life in high school, college felt more like a vacation.  But then I got married.  We were both full-time students, both working, I was pregnant, and we'd known each other less than a year, so we were trying to figure out how to work around and with one another's schedules, personalities, needs and desires.  Among other adjustments! It was a busy first year of marriage.

Then we had Keilana.  She was such a happy baby, my one complaint was that she was just so busy.  But that was also a blessing.  Since she loved to go, she did--everywhere we went.  We adjusted to working, new academic and social environments and demands, our new little family, and the various demands and responsibilities that came with those changes.  Somewhere in the middle of it all, we did manage to find some equilibrium, enough so that we decided it was time for another baby.  As we prepared to welcome him (just before the end of that master's program), we naively believed that once we were done with school (or at least the primary breadwinner was), we would have less stress, less demand on our time that the sometimes intensive school schedule required.

But then Doug got this job and we moved to Lindsay and have had 2 1/2 years of complete insanity.  His job has been hugely rewarding, but as with most things, the demands have been proportionate to the rewards--demands not only on time, but on mental, emotional and physical energy and wellness.  We have had to balance a very busy career with two growing children, several large callings, familial and social obligations (that, admittedly, were a bit of an adjustment after being accustomed to being a bit of an island unto ourselves for a few years), and many various activities.  There has just been so much going on with us as well as around us.  I look at my friends who have 4 or 5 (or 6 or 7) children and all the work it takes just keep their homes running on a daily basis, I sometimes wonder how they ever get done any of the other things that they do.  I know that they feel unbalanced as well, but I marvel that they have achieved the levels of balance in their lives and homes that they have.  

Being a bit apprehensive about a third baby (which they all kindly assure me is in fact the most difficult transition), it has been a comfort to me to have such friends--to have kind women in my life who have been there and are reassuring without being condescending (and I realize this is a virtue in them, because it would be hard for lesser women to be such, knowing I have only glimpsed what it is that they go through on a daily basis).  One of those friends recently pointed out a small wooden plaque in her kitchen that is one of the keys to her sanity and successes.  It reads, "Select the neglect".  I loved that thought, because I tend to be so much an all-or-nothing personality.  There is never enough time in day to accomplish everything I should, let alone everything I want to.  And so the key is finding what is most needful and going from there.  This friend happens to have 7 children ranging in age from 5 to 17 and was just recently released as Relief Society president (and is now teaching seminary)--the demands on her time and attention are indeed great. But she has become remarkably adept at discerning what is simply good, and what is truly needful.

I just keep hoping, praying and working to try to become like Mary, because I think I have a tendency to be more of a Martha.  "Thou are careful and troubled about many things. . ." that sounds like me a lot of days. But how good am I at choosing "that good part"?  One thing is for certain, as we move forward in the coming months and make decisions about what path to take our family down, I will have to get better at it.  The tasks and needs competing for my attention surely aren't going to lessen any time soon, and as time goes on will indeed probably only increase, and so I must learn to more effectively channel my attention where it is most needed.  There are many good things I could do with each hour of each day, but I must have a more heightened awareness of what the best thing I could do at the moment is.  Of what is the right thing.