The yoga practice of making peace with the moment I’m in and rolling with unexpected circumstances as they arise in pregnancy has been way harder than any asana ever could be!
Every day, being pregnant is teaching me the true meaning of releasing control and finding acceptance with what is. Having a body that is no longer solely my own has been a true lesson in humility and releasing ego. Years of dedicated, consistent physical activity have trained me to have a mind with a high tolerance for physical discomfort and a body willing to push through intensity. Being pregnant has taught me a much different, softer strength: the strength it takes to do less when I want to do more; the strength it takes to NOT push through intensity even though I want to; the strength it takes to be still and make peace with my “new” body as it is. For someone like me who relies heavily on physical activity to calm my neurotic mind, this is a true challenge!
This pregnancy has also taught me how to hold my plans loosely. As a detail-oriented planner, being given an “estimated due date” but knowing full well that it’s really a big window including 2 weeks before and 2 weeks after that date (and possibly more!) makes creating a life plan a little crazy. It’s difficult to figure out when my last day of work should be, how soon I need to start organizing all my baby stuff, when I need to take down-time just to relax and sleep more in preparation for what’s coming, etc.
Most importantly, being pregnant has really taught me about letting go of control. I have spent so many hours (and dollars!) reading, studying, visualizing, and taking natural birth classes in preparation for the calm, smooth, unmedicated, natural birth experience that I want. I thought labor and delivery would be the hard part and I have been looking forward to that ultimate challenge and intense experience. Instead what I’m finding is that the hardest part of this whole process might be letting go of the plans I have and being okay with something completely different happening. See, Baby Boy is still in breech position at 35 weeks. He might still flip and I hope he does, but maybe there’s a reason that he’s staying as he is and I need to honor that. This isn’t all about me, after all. And just like my incredible wedding day that was filled with so much love and power that it created a hurricane, this birth is going to happen the way that it’s meant to, even if it’s not the way I visualized it or thought it should be. My beautiful boy is already teaching his mama so many important lessons. He is his own free, independent spirit, and I can’t control him or his birthing.
And so I take a deep breath in, I let it go, and I leave it up to the universe to decide. I remind myself how hard it was to get pregnant and how worried I was that it wouldn’t happen for me and I remember just to be grateful that I’m here at 35 weeks with a healthy little guy growing strong inside me. I remember how fortunate I am to have a life-partner who wants this as much as I do, who loves as fiercely as I do, and who will undoubtedly be the best dad this world has ever seen. I look at our beautiful life and know that everything is already okay and is unfolding at its own time, exactly as it’s meant to.