Strong Currents

Life does not always play out the way we expect it will. We plan and dream. Hope and struggle. And yet, life has a funny way of throwing us curve balls when we least expect them. We are tested, like Job.

My sister had a dream. She dreamed of giving birth to her first child in her own bed. Long before she was even married she knew in her bones the path she would walk. In our culture, the path of a home birth is not walked by many. You need an abiding faith in your body, in the natural process of labor. You need to believe that birth is not a medical event that needs to be managed but a natural process that needs to honored. And above all else, you need a great deal of confidence. Confidence not only about your choice but in your own body. That your body was built to perform many miraculous functions, the greatest being its ability to birth a child.

When my sister's labor finally started there was cause for glorious celebration. Family near and far counted the hours. We sat by the telephone, willing it to ring. But the good news was slow in coming.

When you count a labor in days rather than hours you are describing an exhaustion that few women understand. Labor may slow down but it never stops. Resting is hard, if not impossible. A 3 day labor is a trial I would not wish on my worst enemy.

She gave up a bit of her dream when she asked to go to the hospital. A bit more when she agreed to use pitocin. When the pitocin failed because her uterus was as exhausted as she was she surrendered the whole dream. But when she gave up one dream she finally achieved the greater dream of holding her strong, healthy son in her arms. The child she had wished for and dreamed of and carried under her heart for so many months was finally in her arms. In the end, that is the only dream that matters.

So we may never know why we get caught in strong currents and are swept down a path we did not want to travel. Whether is it the dream of a long and happy marriage with the man you love or the dream of a perfect birth, giving it up can be so very hard. At the end of the day the "what ifs" and second guessing are not important. It is how we choose to live with the hand we are dealt that is the true measure of a human being.