A Crowded Lap...A Crowded Heart

Waiting is hard.
No one likes to wait.
Waiting tries one's patience.

All of these statements are true even if one is simply waiting for a doctor's appointment. The intensity of the wait increases exponentially when you're pregnant and your due date seems like nothing more than a foggy memory. Anna is now a full eight days late. She has had contractions off and on, sometimes even for a few hours at a time. However, each time the contractions simply fizzle out. Hope rises with each episode and then deflates like a balloon. Anna has so many questions right now:

When?

When??

When???

How fast will this third little girl come?

Will my midwife, doula and birth photographer be able to get here in time?

Will I have the strength to do what I must do for the poetry of my daughter's life to begin?

Will there be complications?

Will our much-dreamed of baby girl be healthy?

When...how???

What is she doing with these questions and many more rummaging around in her soul trying to disquiet her spirit? She's tells us she fighting as she waits. She is fighting uncertainty with Truth. She is preaching to herself:

God is good and He does good. God loves me. In fact, He loves me so much that He sacrificed His son on the cross in order to pay the penalty for my sins. Through this act, God forever demonstrated that He is for me. This baby is His creation and her little life is in His hands. The timing of her birth is in His hands. He alone is in control -- just as it should be. I know her life is in God's hands. The safety of both of me and this baby I love so much is up to Him. He is ever-faithful. His is worthy of our trust, even when I don't understand His ways...especially when I don't understand His ways. That is, after all, is the very essence of faith. O, Lord, please increase my faith.

I will update you, dear readers, as this story continues to unfold. We would be grateful for your prayers. Although this has been a wonderfully "routine" pregnancy, there really is no such thing. Each pregnancy is its own journey...and the stakes are high every time.