When the Rubber Hits the Road

Compared to what many women experience in the first trimesters of pregnancy, my pregnancy with Tirzah Mae was easy. No signs of danger until we started rounding the corner from trimester two to three, when I started retaining excess fluid and my blood pressure started rising.

So when people have asked me how the pregnancy is going, my response has been cautious.

This has been a very easy pregnancy. Easier than Tirzah Mae’s. I’ve had virtually no nausea, have had mostly manageable energy levels, have felt baby move from impossibly early weeks.

But early pregnancy is not necessarily a predictor of pregnancy outcome. I know that.

The odds of having preeclampsia as severely as I had the first time? They’re low.

But they were very low the first time too.

I’ve been cautiously optimistic, knowing that the real struggle would come in trimester 3.

And now, as I begin to turn the corner from trimester 2 to trimester 3, the rubber hits the road.

Do I trust God like I say I do, that whatever comes is in His control and is for both my good and His glory? Have I learned the lesson He was teaching last time around, that His grace is sufficient for what He brings, not for the anxieties I’ve been told to cast on Him? Do I really believe that whatever happens, Christ is enough?

This is when the rubber hits the road.

So far, my body is doing well. Weight gain is appropriate; blood pressure remains low; baby is active all.the.time.

My mental state? It varies. Sometimes I’m bawling with terror, other times confident that God has it all in hand. You’d think the terror would be connected to my physical state, but it doesn’t really seem to be. The day it was super hot and I gained a few pounds of water over the course of the day? I was good. It was three days later, after the weather had cooled off and my weight was stable from morning to evening, that I fell apart and spent the morning crying.

It’s an exercise in trust, here in trimester 3 as the rubber hits the road.

But while my mental state goes up and down, one thing is certain these days – I’ve got tennis shoes on my feet.

The combination of weight gain and pregnancy-induced relaxin production means my feet ache from the time I step out of bed in the morning until I fall into bed in the evening – which means I had to run out and grab a new pair of tennies to make it through trimester 3 (My previous tennies were pretty much destroyed by constant use and massive swelling during Tirzah Mae’s super-short third trimester – and I don’t wear tennis shoes unless I absolutely have to, so I didn’t bother to replace them once she was born.)

I got these pretty white and pink jobbers at the Sports Authority store that’s going out of business – at $30, they mark my most expensive pregnancy clothing purchase thus far.