As in the nine months leading up to childbirth, in the blink of an eye I have become a mother to four children. Mind you, I had three in the pot already: it was just a matter of adding the capper. The punctuation. The dessert. And that is how we think of Kaikoura Grace. She is our final, sweet helping of child.
She arrived two days late, finding me just on the edge of a scream of overcooked frustration. I was huge and wildly uncomfortable. The heartburn had reached epic proportions. My sleep was repeatedly broken by creaking trips, on aching legs, to the bathroom. And wild imaginings — about what life would be like with a quartet of children, six and under — were ruling my every waking thought.
I'd had more than a week of false labour when we went out for dinner last Saturday night. I had a sense this was to be the "last supper," but I'd made that pronouncement before and, frankly, I'm not sure anyone was listening to me anymore. Still, somewhere around the time of the ice cream course, I really started to believe. And by one the next morning, Adam did too.
We called my folks just before three, and took off for the hospital at 3:15. With thoughts of a fourth child arriving en route spurring us on, we tore through the empty downtown. Ultimately, the baby wasn't born for another 12 hours. She was huge (9 lbs., 12 oz.) and lovely, with smoky eyes blinking at us from under a mess of dark hair.
And now we're home, a little more than a week after the fact, adjusting to life with this bridge table full of children. Mercifully, new babies sleep a lot, which means Kai's participation in our life, thus far, has mostly been a matter of the older kids falling over one another to hold and kiss her. Oh, and then there's the challenge of filling apple-juice containers and pushing backyard swings and overseeing piano practice with a wailing baby in my arms. And the logistics of hauling four children about are proving to be trying, whether it's getting in and out of the minivan or negotiating our loaner triple-stroller through the city streets.
But we're surviving, and each new day is an adventure. Over the course of the journey, I plan to indulge every kind offer of assistance from friends and relatives. I will make abundant use of the local food-delivery establishments in our neighbourhood. I'll turn our backyard into a haven of fun for children, since the chances of our considerable familial assemblage venturing too far from it are slim, at best. And — when I'm not sodden with despair over the impossibility of it all — I plan to savour every moment with my heap o' children.
mother's day
