Testing, testing, 1, 2.
So, I’m new here. Not to the whole parenthood thing but to WordPress; although, sometimes I still feel new to parenting. There are days when I wonder why I was ever allowed to have children. Then there are days when I secretly want to have 4 more!
Before I get ahead of myself, let me give you some background. I’m a married, stay-at-home, 29-year-old mother of 4 beautiful children. I know every mother says their kids are beautiful, but my kids really are. Seriously – the most beautiful children in the whole world. 
My husband and I met in mortuary school. No joke. We both had a “passion” to work with the dead. It sounds weird, I’m sure, but we would have never met if we hadn’t decided on that career path. And now I’m sure most of you are thinking you’re glad we found each other and not one of you!
Three and a half years after meeting, we were married and buying our first home. We now feel like we jumped the gun a bit on buying a home, since we will probably be stuck in this small, crap-tastic townhouse for several more years thanks to the awesome housing market. (Sometimes I have trouble expressing my sarcasm in writing, so for those of you that might have misinterpreted that…WE HATE OUR SMALL HOUSE AND CAN’T WAIT TO GET OUT OF HERE!)
Just a month before we closed on this house, I had a miscarriage. It was very early – just 7 weeks – when it happened. I was devastated for a period of time but was so overjoyed to find out just 6 weeks later that I was pregnant again. Our oldest was born in June 2006.
I was so ready to be a mother, as I have been around kids all of my life. When I was in high school, I wanted a career and kids much later down the road (or never). After meeting my husband and falling in love, I changed a lot and knew I wanted children very much and could not wait to be called Mom. I am one of eight children, and I felt like I knew everything there was to know about having a baby and raising him/her.
WRONG!
My goal was to have my first child naturally – no epidural, no pain meds, no nothing. After my water broke, I was not having contractions and they induced me. UGH! I caved and asked for an epidural just 6 hours after being induced. I had not prepared mentally for an induction and just gave in to the pain. To me, that was a failure. I don’t think every woman who gets an epidural is a failure, but since my initial plan was different I felt like I had failed myself. I was almost embarrassed to tell people about the birth, having to include the epidural as part of it. BUT, life goes on, and I was ready to enjoy our precious baby girl.
Just six months after our very easy baby arrived, I was pregnant again. I have been blessed with easy pregnancies – no complications, no worries, nothing out of the ordinary. I did fail my in-office glucose test with all 4 kids and had to do the three-hour test (which I passed each time), but that wasn’t a huge deal.
Baby #2′s pregnancy was great. I was still working and found that to be a little more draining than the first pregnancy, but I felt good and was torn between staying home after this baby or going back to work again. We decided that I would stay home after baby #2 was born, as childcare costs would easily eat up 90% of my income and we knew we could pare down on some expenses to cover any extra I would have brought home.
For the second birth, I wanted to try again to avoid an epidural again. I did more reading about being induced and potential risks with epidurals and new ways to breath and block out the pain.
All that reading was useless, since the night I went into birth my husband and I were throwing up from a stomach bug. It was awful! I threw up in the kitchen sink before we even left for the hospital. My husband was in the bathroom for long periods of time and was so afraid he would vomit while driving, we had my father-in-law take us to the hospital for the birth! I was vomiting all through my labor pains, which only made it worse, as my stomach was contracting from throwing up and contracting from contractions! I asked for some pain medication in my IV but eventually gave in again to the epidural. This time, I didn’t feel like as much of a failure because of the extenuating circumstances, but I wasn’t thrilled with having another epidural.
Baby #2 was born in September 2007 and was just as perfect as her older sister! I was happy with my two beautiful girls and ready to start our lives as a family of 4!
Stay-At-Home-Mom. I was so excited for that title. There was no particular reason; I just felt like any woman who could stay home all day long and raise kids must be awesome. My mom did it, so it was what I found I deep down had wanted to do.
