Last, but Not Least

Early in my pregnancy with Graham, I knew that he wasn't our last baby.  "Even if this is a girl," I told Mark before our 20-week ultrasound, "there's still another baby."

I'm grateful for that clarity.  I also think Heavenly Father knew what He was doing by making it so clear.  You see, despite the fact that I love to plan, we don't plan our babies; They come when Heavenly Father sends them (if it had been up to us, we would have had this fifth baby last April - that was my plan).

When Graham turned two, I wasn't pregnant.  I've never had a two year old and not been pregnant before, and it was glorious!  Life had gotten so much simpler - all the kids sleeping through the night, no need to carry around a diaper bag, consistent schedules and routines... I could see an alluring, close-at-hand vision of a diaper-free, nap-free household, and if I didn't know there was another baby meant for our family, it would have been very easy to say, "We're done. Time for the next phase of our life."

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I found out I was pregnant the day after Thanksgiving.  I didn't want to take the pregnancy test.  I hate taking pregnancy tests.  I'm always haunted by the fear and disappointment of that stupid negative line. Yet, I had a dentist appointment and I knew they'd want to take x-rays, so I grudgingly took the test just moments before leaving for the appointment.  The vivid positive sign took my breath away, which was just as well since I didn't have a chance to tell Mark the news before I had to leave (he was surrounded by all four kids!).

I arrived at the dentist office still flushed and surprised, and flustered at the thought of having to tell them when I'd only just figured it out myself.  All the technicians made such a fuss.  "Oh! How exciting," they trilled, "is this your first?"

"No," I countered, "it's actually my..." At which point I literally had to stop and count. Five?  Really, five kids?  "It's my fifth."

Cue the expected overwhelmed reactions.  One of the techs kept saying, "I only have two and I can't keep up with the laundry.  I can't imagine how much laundry you'd have with five kids!  Oh! The LAUNDRY!"

Seriously friend, if laundry is your biggest concern, you're doing just fine.

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While all of my pregnancies have been unique, there have been some consistencies.  For example, I'm almost always sick from about week five through week ten or eleven.  As I approached week five, I braced myself for the month plus of misery.  Nothing.  "Wow! I got a reprieve," I thought, "maybe I won't get sick this time till week six."  

Week six came, still nothing.  I started to get worried.  I'd have rare moments of nausea, and one or two evenings I felt a little off, but nothing like I'd felt with all four other pregnancies.  You'd think I'd be jumping up and down with excitement to not be sick, right?  Part of me really was, but the other part of me whispered, "this means you'll most likely miscarry."  It didn't help that I read one article that suggested that women who are sick with previous pregnancies, and then don't get sick are 8x more likely to miscarry (I ignored all the articles that said morning sickness doesn't matter).  Every day I braced myself for what I expected to be the end.

It didn't help that my biggest symptom (besides fatigue and total brain loss) was back pain.  Back pain often goes hand in hand with miscarriages.  After a month of back pain (sometimes just annoying, sometimes debilitating) and no sickness at all, I finally had my first midwives appointment.  Even though I was just 9 1/2 weeks along, they tried to listen for a heart beat with the doppler.  I had braced myself so completely for a negative outcome, that when I heard the steady, beautiful heart beat I began to weep.

Hearing the heart beat did wonders for my level of hope and excitement, but I was still wary.  I decided not to tell anyone until the next appointment, when I was 15 weeks.  Part of that was to avoid having to share a potential loss with people I'm not super close too, but by that point, more of it was just because I didn't have to tell.  It's my last baby, and it was kind of neat to have it be something that just Mark and I knew about.

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The day of my second appointment, I asked my sister, Katie, if we could borrow her easel.  When she got to our house she asked, "Why do you need the easel?"  I showed her the sign I'd made in preparation for our announcement photo shoot.

 Katie gave me a big hug, then turned to Anna, her 5-year old daughter, and said, "Aunt Erin is going to have a baby!"

Anna cocked her head to the side, studied me for a moment, then announced, "My mom is going to have a baby too!"

Turns out Katie had come down to visit with an announcement for us as well!  She's about 10 weeks behind me.  How fun is that?!

 The day before my 15-week appointment, Bryce came over and sat on my legs.  He looked at me seriously, then asked, "Is there a baby in your tummy?  There is, isn't there?" He put his ear against my belly, then announced, "Yep! There's a baby in there!"

I didn't confirm or deny, nor did he wait for a response.  The next moment he hopped down and went about his day playing.  He didn't mention it again until that afternoon when Aubree got home from school and he matter-of-factly told her, "There's a baby in Mom's tummy."  Aubree raised her eyebrows at me, but again I didn't confirm or deny and they both promptly turned to other pursuits.

The morning of my appointment, I finally did tell the kids that we were going to be having another baby.  They were giddy with excitement.  Bryce was completely shocked.  "But," I reminded him, "just yesterday you were telling me there was a baby in my belly!"

"I was just kidding," he replied, "I had no idea!"

I told the kids about the idea I had for the pregnancy announcement.  Aubree went off to school, bursting with a secret she had to keep for just one day.  She came home with a detailed picture of the outfit she wanted to wear for the photo shoot.  

Bryce and Thane totally latched on to the idea of "big brother training."  They sat down and made a list of all the things they thought Graham should know before the baby came, then set up chairs and earnestly tried to teach him.

At the midwives office, Bryce would not stop talking.  He was so excited.  The boys all got to hear the baby's heart beat, and afterwards Bryce told every single person he saw about his baby's heart beat!  It was really quite adorable.  

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On Monday we go in for our big 20-week ultrasound.  Part of me is still nervous that since this pregnancy has been SO different from my other four (much easier...so I'm not complaining!), that something might be wrong.  Most of me is just excited to find out if we're having a girl or a boy.  

I think we're having a girl.  So do all the kids.  Mark doesn't believe in guessing.  It might just be wishful thinking.  If it's a boy, that's fabulous too.  We'd be specialists at that point, wouldn't we?

The main reason I think it's a girl is that the kids have been talking about their baby sister (by name) for years.  I mean, pre-Graham, YEARS.  They don't talk about her as an "if," but rather, "When Nellie comes, she will sleep in the crib." or "Let's put this away for when Nellie comes."

At one point about a year ago, Thane asked, "How do we know our next baby is a girl?"

"We DON'T!" I responded, "You kids are the ones who always just assume so!"

So, what do you think?  Girl or boy?