Its like finding out you only have one week to live...

     "Wait, what?" was my response yesterday in the DCH parking deck when TJ said it.

"Its like finding out you only have one week to live..."

     Yesterday was our third and most likely, final, weekly checkup with Dr. Ray. We found out I'm 2cm dilated and 50% effaced. So, Kim said its a good idea to go ahead and get induced next Thursday, April 5. Something about a deadline makes it seem so real. Ok, Duh, Im going to have a baby. Real soon. But the fact that we actually know WHEN is flooring. I felt like I did when we first found out we were pregnant! Like...wow... ok we are going to have a baby...Thursday. I'm surprised at how stunned I feel.  I really was not into the idea of being induced. I don't like the concept of having some chemical pumped into my body that is going to force it to do something it wasn't trying to do. Now the concept of epidurals, I love. Yes, please give me a nerve block so I can't feel things and please give me a button I can push any time I want more. But being induced? Don't like that idea quite as much. And yet, here I am, completely ready to be induced. The problem is I am hopelessly and completely in TRUST with Kim Ray. Anything she says I do. If she told me having Madelyn on my head would be best, I would probably do it. Me and TJ just both really trust her decisions and she always makes me feel very comfortable and at ease about everything. And what more could a girl ask for from her baby doctor??

     So I'm feeling a little overwhelmed and emotional at the prospect of finally meeting my daughter. I am maybe a little quiet, perhaps fighting back a single glistening tear...and TJ spits out those prophetic words.

Its like finding out you only have one week to live...

     I couldn't help but giggle. "What?" But he is absolutely right (besides the comparison between the birth of our first child and death). Having a deadline set and knowing you only have 'so much time left' puts things in perspective a bit. Like, for instance, tomorrow is the last Thursday of my life it'll just be me and TJ. Its weird. Our last week of this part of our lives as we know it. It makes me wish I complained less about pregnancy, since I know this is the last week I'll ever be pregnant with her again. My niece Adri just moved into a toddler "big girl bed" and I remember the day she was born...just like Madi will be...on Thursday. And I feel sad and almost want to cry because one day very soon Madi will be in the big ole world with us and all the germs and danger, and then in just a little while longer she will be...in a big girl bed. And it makes me realize how fast we can wish away parts of our lives because we look forward to another part, and then next thing you know your daughter is in a toddler bed and lost all her baby teeth and getting married and buying toddler beds for her babies. While the minutes seem to drag by right now, I know they will all too soon speed up. This "deadline" is really making me savor the the 'time we have left' in a very sweet way. I woke to a letter this morning from my husband (after he set off the alarm leaving for work and the police came to our door. Thanks TJ) asking me on a date to Olive Garden. It was our first date. Haha, and now our last date, PRE-Madelyn.