Growing

I used to think I became a real grown up on the day my mother died. Seven years ago yesterday. The death of a loved one is one of those experiences that causes your whole world to shift in an instant. Nothing is as it was before. But then, after crying until you can’t breathe and you’ve ruined every pillow you own, crying until you just can’t stand crying anymore, you stop. You realize you have to adjust to this new situation. You decide to adjust even though you don’t really know how. You start to try to figure it out. You are doing this alone because no one can do it for you but at the same time everyone is helping and if they’re not you release them. And the loved one who has died is helping you. Your memories of them and their whispers in your ear when you need a little boost, saying, “C’mon Nic, think positive!” You can hear it and you listen. Sometimes you find yourself listening very carefully. Sometimes you realize you could listen a little better. And, sometimes that person’s absence gives you a chance to evaluate their words differently than when they were alive and you realize that maybe you have other ideas and that’s OK, too. This makes you feel a little sad but it’s also good because it helps you feel just a little more grown up. A little more confident because the confidence is yours not someone else’s. And, that’s when you start to figure out that those little whispers from your loved one are actually coming from inside you because they left them there for you. Little gifts. All yours. And you decide that death is kind of beautiful in a way.

The other night, in our birthing class, we watched a movie called “Giving Birth.” We watched to learn what a normal birth looks like and to hear stories about normal, natural birth from obstetricians, midwives, doulas and mothers. There were beautiful photos of a water birth that showed the father reaching for the baby as it was born, the new family in a big, round tub, outdoors, their skin glowing in the sunshine. There were images of brand new babies, all shiny and wet, in their mothers arms. Not the babies you see in movies or on TV, but real babies each with different little faces and shiny eyes and even hair.

In one scene, we saw a woman in labor at her home. She slow danced with her husband in their kitchen between contractions. Dancing swivels and opens your hips and helps the baby get in the right position. She breathed through contractions and seemed to go inside herself. She leaned on her husband’s shoulders as he held her up. I saw her listening carefully to herself, trying to adjust to this new situation, having made the decision to get through it because what other choice do you have? Then, her midwife had her sit on a birthing stool so she was in a good squatting position but most of her weight was supported. The mother started working very hard at pushing her baby out. When the baby’s head crowned, she reached down to feel it. “Baby,” she said, almost a whisper. Moments later, she got her first look at her baby as she lifted him up to her chest. At that moment, her face changed. All of the exertion melted away and was replaced not by joy but with a look of sheer astonishment. And then she said, “I did it. I can’t believe I did it.”

After the movie, I talked with some of the other women in my class about what we saw. We laughed at how everyone cries when they see a baby being born but that as pregnant women we were even more susceptible to tears. We talked about the value of seeing a real birth instead of a made-for-TV version and that watching it was powerful because it allowed each of us to really imagine ourselves in that situation. And, despite the pain and hard work, we decided it was kind of beautiful.

We are pregnant and there’s no turning back. We will go through labor. Maybe we will even slow dance with our husbands. We will work hard. We will have to decide that we can do this because we have to. There will be others there to help us but ultimately we are doing this alone. We will listen to ourselves carefully. We will listen to the helpful whispers of mothers before us, of our own mother, perhaps, using what strengthens our confidence and leaving the rest behind. And then we will give birth to a real baby. And at that moment, our whole world will shift. Nothing will be as it was. We will be astonished because we did it. Because we gave birth to a baby. But, also, because we gave birth to ourselves, and we are mothers. And, maybe that's what it really feels like to finally grow up. ~ Nicole