Pregnancy number one started when I was 25 years old and I was 26 by the time I gave birth. It started traditionally as I took a home pregnancy test in my bathroom at home, got scary as I experienced some spotting in the fifth week, and got even scarier and more incredible, all at the same time, as I saw two beating harts on the ultrasound monitor for the first time. Looking back I am so glad that my twin pregnancy was the first because things just got easier from there on out. I feel so blessed to be chosen to carry two babies at once and to be a mother of multiples. There is nothing like it. It is something so special that is only spoken between you and God. What a gift.
By the time the girls were 6 months old I found myself laying on the exact same examining table that I first saw those two beating hearts. However, this time there was no heartbeat to be seen. Just a hollow being that had already lived and died within me. My first initial reaction was of reasoning. I had two healthy babies at home that were only 6 months old. It was ok and God knew what he was doing. However, by the time I got out to my car, much more real emotions were surfacing, as I went home to care for the two little heartbeats that were my survivors. I cried alot and for a very long lime. I remember being at work and would have to run to the bathroom in the middle of working with a client to dry my tears. I still cry for the one that I lost. Not often, but when I do, I look at the calendar through my tears to realize that it is the same time of year that we lost him or the begining of the new year when he was due to be born. Time heals all wounds but never fills the hollows in the heart that was the place reserved just for him. He will always be mine.
After I turned 27 and the girls were a year old we decided with mended hearts that we were ready to try, for the first time in our marriage to get pregnant. We had never actually tried and planned for a baby. This venture was not only incredible to have such a purpose in our love making but made it so exciting to know that we were making a baby. This was very short lived as the pregnancy test came up positive four weeks later. We held our breaths for the first ultrasound. First and for most to see the beating heart of our love child. Second, to see if there was one heartbeat or two. There was one heart beat and a little boy to add to our growing family. We felt very blessed and renewed in our new child that we had been blessed with. It was a healing time for us as a family.
By the time I was 29 I was sure of a few things, as was my husband. One, we wanted to be finished having children by the time I was around age 30. Two, we wanted our kids to be close in age, and three, Owen need a brother. As Christmas rolled around we spent many nights in front of the fire after we put the kids to bed. We just laid there taking in the warmth and discussing our family and our future as well as where we had been and how far we had come together. We decided that the time had come and that in the near future we would plan to create another child and try to help Owen out with a little brother. This was out of our hands but we felt called to have another child for our sweet little boy who's eyes lit up at the sight of another little boy to play and share his toys with. By Valentines Day we knew that we were expecting and a few months later we knew that Owen would in deed have a brother joining him and his two sisters. We were ecstatic!
It has been so fun watching the kids watching my growing belly. They talk to their brother, kiss my belly, and practice singing Happy Birthday for the day that he arrives. They are so excited.
I have taken in every moment and tried as hard as possible to not rush a moment of this pregnancy as I know that it is my last. It comes with an element of sadness as I know with every kick that it could be the last that I feel. Knowing that I will never have a part of my husband and myself, made in love, growing inside of me. It has gone by so very fast I can't believe that in the less than five years I have been pregnant four times, carried and delivered twins, suffered the loss of a child, had our first son, and am expecting our last child. What an incredible journey it has been. I am looking forward to enjoying every moment of our last "firsts" with the new baby and all of the years to come raising our family together. We have been truly blessed and have learned so much along the way. Looking back we now know that every peice of it was meant for us to live, the good and the bad, and we have the family that we are meant to have, better than we could have ever planned for our selves. What a blessing.
