keziah elisheva turns 9!

Oct 3, 2009

Miss Keziah, this precious and powerful spirit that entered my life many years ago, is turning nine years old today. She has been a mover and a shaker since before she was born and she is full of at least five normal people’s energy levels.

I remember so clearly the night she was born. I went on a walk around 7 p.m. and told her I was ready (so incredibly ready!) for her to come and I promised her I would be a good mother to her. I promised her I would teach her the gospel of Christ and that I would do all I could to help her return to her Father in Heaven. I knew she was listening and feeling my words to her. I knew she believed me. I knew she wanted to come. But I still wasn’t in labor – not a single contraction had passed through my body.

I went home and swept and mopped the kitchen floor. I asked Richard for a blessing, then I went to bed at 9:30. Still no contractions. I figured this baby would come the next day sometime and I was grateful my mom was on her way so she could get settled in before labor started.

I was awakened out of my falling-asleep-reverie at 9:36 with a huge contraction. This was not an early labor contraction. It was not a 45 second contraction. It was a full on transition-like contraction. I could not move. I could not do anything, but lay there and try to relax. Richard came right in and started pushing on my back. He left after that one to go and heat a rice sock, but I called him right back in. They were coming right on top of each other and they were STRONG. He tried his best to fill the birth pool, keep rice socks warm, give me drinks of water, and surround me with encouragement in between contractions. But during them he had to be right there pushing on my back. He knows that is what I need to get through labor and nothing else matters except for his big, wonderful hands pushing down on my sacrum and giving me some measure of relief from “back labor.”

Thankfully he knew that I was having a fast, intense labor and he called the midwives and doula to come now. I had no idea that this was going to be fast and assumed I would be having these POWERFUL contractions for another 10 hours.

Contrary to all my training as a doula and a childbirth educator, I did not get off the bed. I did not have an active labor full of walking, lunging, and squatting. I could not move. By the time a contraction would end, I would take a breath and the next one would start leaving me no time to get in to a different position or even think about what my options were.

Finally, my mom and doula arrived. What a relief to have someone to look at, someone to hold my hand. I was so grateful they were there and that Richard and I were no longer alone.

I HAD to go to the bathroom. I told everyone, “I am getting up after the next contraction.” I rolled/slid/let gravity pull me off the bed and made it all the way to the birth ball next to the bed. I had a contraction as soon as I got there and was not going any further. Then I had a nice long break after that contraction, enough so that my mom said, “wow, this is a bit of a break for you” and I responded with much passion “DON’T talk about it! That means the next one is going to be HUGE!” Well, the next one was huge. It was such an amazing feeling to be part of this force moving through me and to yet be separate from it and to be evaluating what a contraction of that size and strength must mean. At the peak of that contraction, my waters burst from me, soaking the birth ball, the carpet, and the rice sock that was at the bottom of my uterus. Since I was the most knowledgeable person in the room, I went into caretaker mode and said “I need a flashlight. I need to know if there is meconium. Hurry! Get me a light.” I was already into the next contraction and couldn’t even move to look at the fluid, so I was trying to instruct them in what to look for. Craziness, isn’t it?

Even at that moment, I had NO idea how far along in labor I was. My mom had my second rice sock and tried to get me to put it back in its position under my uterus and I hollered, “No, I am soaking wet! Let me dry off first so that one doesn’t get ruined as well! It has to last another 8 hours!”

At the end of that contraction, I knew I had to go to the bathroom. And I knew I HAD to get into the birth pool. My mom and my doula went to the other bathroom and the kitchen to brush teeth and go potty themselves, figuring they would join me in the front room when I made it to the birth pool. I gathered all my strength and waddled as fast as I could to the bathroom, but when I got to the toilet and pulled my clothes down, my baby’s head was in my hand! I called out “I have her whole head in my hand!” Richard guided me to the floor and helped me through those last few moments before she was all the way out. Right then, my midwives arrived and caught Keziah. My mom and doula missed the birth and were shocked when they came back and I had a baby in my arms!

Keziah’s birth is a microcosm of her life. She is a great decision maker and when she decides to do something, there is no stopping her, just like the day she decided to finally come. She is strong, fast, brave, active, and determined. She was trying to roll over the night she was born and strained her little neck muscles to get her head to lift up. She walked at 8 months, ran (fast) at 10 months, and hasn’t stopped since. She climbed everything in sight as soon as she was able…like the dryer, the fridge, and the shelves at the library…all before she was one. She always knows exactly what day it is, what time it is, what direction we are going, and where every thing in our home is located (Thank goodness because the rest of us can never find anything. Now we don’t even try to find stuff, we just ask Keziah, and she will run and get it from whatever messy corner it is hiding in and give us a lecture on how weird we are that we didn’t know it was under 12 books, 3 shoes, some dirty clothes, and the train set!).

Keziah writes her papa and I love notes most days of the week. She likes to leave them on our pillows and surprise us. She likes to be packed and ready to go at least a week in advance of any trip we go on, but often is all ready a month ahead of time. She keeps the rest of us in line and knows what is going on with everyone at any given moment. She hears every conversation going on anywhere even remotely near her and is shocked that Blythe has no clue what is going on the house.

She cracks me up. She is hilarious.

She is a natural athlete and just completed her first kid’s triathlon. She outruns kids twice her size and outswims them as well. She is a great gymnast, cyclist, and is probably best known for her skill at “Capture the Flag.” I think she is pure muscles.

She just grew into size 6 clothes, but she still has to have an adjustable waist so they stay up. She really prefers to wear Fisher’s hand me downs (or is that ups?) as capris and I am constantly having to tell her to stay out of Annesley’s clothes.

She has a beautiful voice. I love to hear her sing, which isn’t a problem at all since she pretty much sings ALL DAY LONG. Sometimes I do have to ask her to stop after 10 hours straight, but most of the time it is a delight to my soul.

She loves the color blue. I think it started because Blythe loves the color pink and she didn’t want to love anything that Blythe loved. In this one area she has lost all of her good decision making ability. She cannot see that something is a piece of junk because if it is blue, she says she LOVES it. I try to convince her that the color of something doesn’t matter, it is the quality that matters, and then you can look at colors after you have determined quality, but all my pontificating falls on deaf ears because she is enamored by all shades of blue. There is simply no reasoning with her. We are hoping this phase will pass soon.

Keziah is a ball of energy. When she is gone, it feels as if ten people (and we don’t even have 10 people to start with!) are missing from our home. Every thing is so quiet. So still. So calm.

I love my Keziah-kid. She keeps me on my toes, brings a smile to my mouth, and helps me find my shoes nearly every day.

Here are some pics of her (notice how often she has a hilarious face…see I told you she was hilarious…