Parents, Kids, and When The Bomb Drops

     Two years after I got married I finally got the itch to have children. I have come to the conclusion that I am not the norm.   Most people have the baby first, live together, and then maybe get married after the second or third one comes along.  Some don’t get married at all and continue to populate the earth with random people. 

       Since I hadn’t quite determined why I was on the planet yet,  I figured maybe motherhood was it.  Certainly I was old enough to embark on the adventure of parenting!!  My biological clock was ticking so loud it was literally vibrating the sticky goo between my ears most folks assume are brains.  So I chucked the old birth control pills and the husband and I went at it.  After a while, I figured out it was a lot harder getting pregnant than I thought.  I didn’t understand it.  Teenagers who had no business getting pregnant had no problem, then there was me.  It was devastatingly depressing.  I took pills to make me ovulate, pills to make me stop, and I was living on a calendar and thermometer timetable.  Time to take that temperature soon was followed by time to get naked!!  Finally I did manage to get knocked up.   I was over the moon and sick as a dog.  Unfortunately I lost that baby and I never looked at pregnancy as a warm and fuzzy happy condition again.

   

My Daughter's First Halloween

     When I finally got pregnant again, I was cynical.  The pain and grief that clouded my first pregnancy always made me fear that history would repeat itself.  The day my daughter was born changed my life forever.  Here was this perfect little girl screaming her head off.  The nurse brought the baby over to me and I spoke to her.  She looked into my eyes and instantly stopped crying!  She KNEW me! She recognized my voice, and I was filled with the most overwhelming sense of love that I have ever felt in my life.  In that moment, I knew I was experiencing exactly what life was all about.   It was like a bomb had been dropped on me.  After my dad died that irritating clock began it’s annoying ticking again.    I was approaching 40 and my OB/GYN was advising that if I ever wanted another baby I better get crack a lackin‘.   He advised to have one more, and then have a hysterectomy due to all the problems and surgeries I had faced in the past.  I was dragging my heels because as much as I loved my daughter, I just didn’t know if I could face 9 solid months of hugging the toilet again.  Saying I don’t do pregnancy well is an understatement.  If I could go from conception to c-section in a day, that would be another story entirely.   9 months of unmitigated hell was another thing all together.  

My Son's First Halloween

     One night, my husband looked at me and asked if we needed to worry about birth control.  I remember saying no.   In the back of my mind, I knew it was time to either $hit or get off the pot or forget about having another baby entirely.  I figured I had no worries.  After all, look how hard it had been to get pregnant before!!  I couldn't possibly get pregnant after one time, right?  Let us just say that it only took that once and nine months later I had a precious baby boy to call my own.  When my 4 year old daughter discovered mommy was expecting she wanted to go get the baby the next day.  Sorry sweetie, it takes a little longer than that!  His birth was just as overwhelming and awesome as my daughter’s had been almost 5 years before.


    

      I love my kids. They are what my life is all about.  Their births were like an earth shattering bomb in my life that instantly gave my life purpose, happiness, and hope.  Even though they are much bigger now, they will always be my precious babies, my precious miracles.  From that moment on, my life was changed for the better.  Until next time when I give you another glimpse into the life of a trucker’s wife.