More important than my beating heart

Our daughter Meredith.



This was her birthday. July 23rd, 2012. What an intense day! She arrived at 4:58 am. Her tiny little frame laid on my chest and it hit me. That love that other mommies tell you that you won't understand until you are a mother yourself. My whole existence meant something different in that instance. She IS the air in my lungs. And birth? Well... I felt prepared yet really it wasn't until I was smack dab in the middle that I could see exactly what that journey was all about. And I guarantee, thinking of getting her here safely is the place I had to dwell to focus and find the strength. There is no doubt that I knew right then and there, I was made for her, and that guided me. Along with the patience and presence of my loving husband, mid-wife, mother and sister.

I heard Brandi Carlile "The Story" during my hospital stay (in the midst of one of her many many nursing sessions) and connected immediately. Probably a few hormones at fault but I just wept, and those tears were the most happy tears I have ever shed. "I climbed across the mountain tops. Swam all across the ocean blue. I crossed all the lines and I broke all the rules, but baby I broke them all for you." That's how I felt. Strong. Like I had purpose. And yet that it was not about me. That strength, that purpose... I was now a person who wasn't living for me, I am living and doing and breathing for her.

There is nothing I love more than to listen to other women tell me about their experiences with pregnancy (like fingerprints I tell you). I sometimes wonder if I would have made a good Doula. I feel passion deep in my soul about the importance of every woman being in control, calm and comfortable while she's giving birth. In a perfect world everyone would have the support I was blessed with. That day was the best day of my life.