On being 35 weeks pregnant with twins...

Well, I am definitely in the homestretch with this pregnancy and I felt like I needed to record something for memory sake. Some last nugget or thought to really try to capture how I am feeling as we sit on the brink of a very big life change for all of us. Some tangible memory to get down in print of how it feels to have these TWO little babies flipping and flopping inside me, pushing and stretching and jockeying for room in my very over-stretched belly.

But I suppose this is the fault I find in words, or at least in my ability to spin them. I simply don't know what to say. I sit here and try to ponder the miracle that there really are two whole different lives being formed in my belly; I stare off into space and try to fathom all that is about to change for our family of four and just how few precious days I have left to live in this beautiful mystery of the unknown, the indescribable experience of pregnancy. And a twin pregnancy at that. I vow to soak it in, I force myself to summon the reality of it all and sit waiting for it to fall on me like a gallon of bricks so that I can feel like I 'finished' this experience well, I digested it and am actually ready now for the next phase. But I sit, and I wait, and nothing hits me. I feel incapable of processing the wildness of the past 9 months and completely paralyzed to envision, emotionally prepare or even get too excited for the arrival of two whole new people into our MacDiarmid family. Two completely individual boys that I will soon know as well as my precious Macy and Carter. Two new faces I will memorize; two new names I will say over and over for the rest of my life; two new bodies I will hold, bathe, change, rock, sing to and later chase, tickle, spank, snuggle and teach all sorts of fun tricks and skills to.

For comfort sake, I am ready to have these babies. (Soooo ready!) In every other way, if I am being honest; I could let them cook in there another month, 6 months, heck another year. It's not that I don't love these babies and want to meet them as much as I wanted to meet Macy and Carter by the end, but I am also fairly terrified of this next phase and unable to figure out what last things I could or should do to be rid of that pesky little emotion so that I can head into the delivery room excited, confident and FEELING ready. I didn't deal with this with my other two, although I know now that I certainly WASN'T ready for all that would change in our lives, I atleast THOUGHT I was, and that made all the difference. But this time that feeling, deceptive as it may have been, refuses to come.

And I suppose I am resolving that it simply won't be coming this time around, and so I liken my emotions to that of my younger days when I spent so many nights on stages performing in plays and dance shows etc. Regardless of how well prepared I was, how much we'd rehearsed or even how many times we'd already run the show before an audience, as I'd stand in the dark wings awaiting my entrance, inevitably a twisted ball of nerves, excitement and sudden panic would plant itself in the pit of my stomach. My opening line or dance move would blank completely from my mind and there would not be enough time to try to go back over it in my head before I was forced to head out onto stage. I got used to this phenomenon and so each and every night I would go through the same routine of panicking that I couldn't remember my role, and then promptly shutting my brain off as I somewhat blindly stepped onto the stage, trusting my well trained brain and body to pick up the reigns and perform my part. I am proud to say I never stood dumbfounded before an audience unable to remember what I was supposed to do; everything always kicked into gear and although I couldn't cognitively think through each line or movement in the moment, I found myself doing it all just fine.

This moment in my life feels very similar. I'm standing in the wings and I am not sure I remember anything at all about how I cared for Macy and Carter as babies almost 5 and 3 years ago. I actually have no idea if I have all the 'baby' or 'hospital' stuff I need packed and ready to go. I simply can't think through it all. My mind feels blank and without the time to process, plan or re-prepare for things like delivery, nursing, sleep training and schedules (not to mention this time for twins!). But I feel myself getting ready to simply 'shut off my brain and step out onto the stage' trusting it will all just fall into place. I have no idea if this is faulty reasoning or not; but I'm going with it.

And so as I sit here in a very literal state of 'ready or not...here they come.', I continue to go through my days somewhat in denial of the fact that I could find myself actually holding two babies tomorrow. I don't know their names and I can't even begin to guess what they will look like or whether they will look similar or very different. I don't know what little personalities are bundled up in there and I don't know what being a family of six will entail. But I guess I'll know soon enough and so in my typical fashion of writing a lot while saying very little; I just thought I'd try to verbalize this state of unknown while it's still that. Unknown. Thanks for listening.

PS- I ate an entire over-sized bar of chocolate from Austria while writing this post, and it was sooo yummy. How's that for a documentation of this pregnancy?