Baby coming soon!

Here's the update...if Baby Swanson hasn't come on his own by Monday, we'll go in Monday night to prepare for baby to be induced on Tuesday morning. We joked that we'll give him the full 40 weeks to make his own decision, but then we have to start being the parents and laying down some boundaries for him. Hopefully this will set a good precedent. So this time next week we should be back home with baby!

Winding it up

I'm working on winding up work this week...weird to think I have only 5 days left at PV for a few months or for much longer than that. Plans for what is possible for my job position as far as part-time options are supposed to be made during the first part of the summer and I am to decide whether I want to choose that option or stay home by July 16. I don't know how I will feel about all this at that point, but I know I want to make a choice that makes baby the priority of my time, and I give you permission to keep me accountable to that decision.

I think it will become very clear to me what I want to do after baby is here, whichever way it goes, so I'm trying not to worry too much about it. For those of you who have listened to me worry about it for the past 6 months or so, you didn't miss anything, I just decided to start not worrying. :)

Welcome to Life 2.0

I've decided "Life 2.0" is a good way to describe what we are about to embark on with the birth of baby. It will definitely be a whole new version of the old program, with many upgrades and improvements, but undoubtedly some bugs and glitches that we'll have to work out. (As a matter of fact, that would have been a super-cute theme to do for baby announcements...oh well, too late! Anyone else should feel free to use that idea!)

It's just undescribably weird to me not to have any idea what life is going to be like after the baby is born. I no longer know what an average day in my own life is going to be like. I know it won't take long to figure it out, but standing on this side of the situation, it's very odd. I don't feel like I can make commitments for "A.B." (after birth) because I don't know what will be good times to do things and what will be bad times, or what I can expect as far as how much control I'll have over what I can and can't do. When I went to my dentist last and they wanted to set my next appointment for July, they asked if 10:30am was an OK time, and I thought "I have no earthly clue." Sounds great, but what if that's the middle of naptime or feeding time?

I told Craig and a few others that I think there are some things that are so big and overwhelming in life that God must just make it so our brains can't take it all in and comprehend the full magnitude of it. Otherwise, how could I be sitting here acting relatively normal and working on work stuff knowing that we'll be parents in a week and a half? When I say, "we're having a baby in a week and a half," that registers almost no emotion, like I don't even understand the words. The only explanation I can think of for this is God's gracious protection for my emotional health! Apart from that having no theological basis, I believe it! :)

Progress!

So I went to the doctor today and she said I was dilated to almost a 2 (out of 10). She said "rough guess...I'd say a week. Or your due date. Probably won't be this weekend." As excited as I've been to hear a prediction of progress, I almost wish she wouldn't have said that, because I know everything at this point is a total guess and I don't want to get my hopes up. Not to mention that "a week or my due date" is 11 days different. But she did bet us a Diet Coke that it was a boy just from examining me before we had our ultrasound, so who knows?

Waiting...

This waiting to have a baby is weird. I know I'm still 3 weeks (2 weeks and 6 days) out, but technically it could be any time. I've never had a major medical anything, so the idea that labor will happen at any moment makes me feel a lot like a ticking time bomb.

It's funny how it changes the way I look at things. I feel more compelled to pick up around the house with the thought that it might be the last time I leave the house for a couple of days and other people might be there while I'm gone. It makes me want to get loose ends tied up and over-communicate about everything at work, in case it's the last day I'm there maybe for a few months or maybe forever.

It makes me think...isn't this the way we are supposed to live as followers of Christ? Not the obsessive house-cleaning part, but the part about living as though we aren't guaranteed tomorrow to finish things up? Keeping loose ends tied up in life and in relationships, not waiting to have conversations we know we need to have, etc.? Hmmmm...interesting.