blythe’s gift to me

My oldest child recently turned 14 years old. I am still bewildered that I have a child this age. How can that be even remotely possible?

I thought I had written about her gift to me before, but I can’t find what I thought I said, so I am going to write about it some more.

Pre-BMW (Blythe Moriah Ward), I had far different priorities than I did post-BMW. In fact, I was a different person. I did not want to be a mother. I wanted to spend my life doing important things – like traveling the world, studying the Torah, and teaching people God’s ancient words. I wanted to be known for doing important things. I wanted to fill my time with scholarly research and the subsequent presentations of my findings. I wanted to stretch my mind and challenge myself with doing really hard things.

I had absolutely no desire to have a child need me. I had no desire to ever change a diaper again. And if by some chance, I was given a child, he or she was not going to interfere with my life, my plans, my needs.

Throughout the first three years of our marriage, all of this started changing. I decided I wanted to have children. I started researching the role and value of motherhood. I started arguing with my feminist professors who advocated a position of “daycare is best for children.” I began to feel disgust for the mothers I saw dropping off their six-week old babies at a daycare at seven in the morning and picking them up at seven at night. I began to desire to be a mother who would be with her children…someday.

But, I was still ambivalent about actually being a mother. I had been told by two different doctors that I would die if I tried to have a baby and we believed them. We decided we would not have biological children and would look into adopting when I was done with my college education.

And then, in spite of doing everything we could to prevent pregnancy, I became pregnant. I was not happy. I was, in fact, pretty much terrified that I was going to die. Not only that, it felt like a huge interruption to my life. I was in the middle of my Speech Pathology program and I wanted to complete it. I couldn’t see how it would all work out. I worried about my education and my job and my life and a million other things that seem so trivial now.

We decided to let the pregnancy continue…to just see what would happen. Our OB sent for the reports from the previous two doctors and he disagreed with their findings. He felt like I was not in danger of death and could safely be a pregnant and birthing woman. We were comforted, but not convinced. As the months of pregnancy continued, all seemed to be well, and I began to believe that the first two doctors were completely wrong.

At 36 weeks pregnant, when my uterus had stretched as far as it was going to stretch, our OB pronounced that my abdominal wall was sound, that it was not going to rupture as had been declared by the prior physicians. He said, “See, I was right, everything is going to be just fine.” At that moment, I knew he was correct and I also knew I could not give birth with him. I informed him I would be birthing at home. He flipped out and quickly informed me how dangerous and insane that would be (he later called me at home and apologized for his outlandish behavior). I stood my ground because I knew in my heart that birthing at home was what I needed to do.

We found a midwife and started preparing for a home birth. It was so wonderful to finally be excited about our baby and not to be full of fear about dying. We gathered supplies and Tami came around 38 weeks for the birth that was sure to be right around the corner and we walked and walked and walked. And no baby came.

And then, in her 43rd week of gestation, Blythe was born. After ten months of throwing up every single day and hours of throwing up every 15 minutes throughout her labor, she was born! As I held her that first day, I fell completely in love with her, with motherhood, with homeschooling her, with devoting my life to her. All of a sudden, I knew what motherhood meant and it was not drudgery, it was not a waste of time. It was the most important work I could ever do. It was exactly the work God wanted me to do. It was exactly the work my soul needed to do to grow and learn and develop into the woman I was created to be.

It saddens me to think how backward my thinking used to be and I am filled with gratitude for my brave Blythe who came into my life before I even knew I wanted her, before I valued motherhood, before I knew how absolutely essential motherhood is to the foundation of each family, community, nation, and world.

She taught me that I am doing the most important work. I am spending my days teaching the next generation what it means to be good. I am teaching them about freedom, government, history, God, math, cooking, serving, patience, and family.

I am so grateful for this 14-year-old girl. Thankful for her courage to follow her own path. Thankful she chose me as her mother. Thankful she forgives me and gives me another chance. Thankful she was born at what I thought was an inconvenient time. Thankful for her deep, inner knowing and her absolute devotion to what is right. I am humbled to think of the love God has for me to have sent me a child I didn’t know I needed, but He knew I needed. He knew what motherhood would come to mean to me and how it would change my life forever.

Here are some pics of this beautiful girl:

Blessing Day

Blythe and Grandpa Ward

Blythe and Grandma Smith

Blythe taking a bath

Blythe and her papa

Blythe and her mama

Blythe with Andie and Grandma Dorothy

Blythe and Marcus at Bear Lake

Blythe and Stephen at Bear Lake

Two years old at GRL

Third Birthday at GRL

Crazy dress-up with her first cat, Spike

Four-years-old

5th Birthday

Another Birthday party…with Becca and Mikelle

Blythe and Andie’s birthday at Bear Lake

Somewhere around the age of six

Sevenish?

Baptism…and me at 38 weeks pregnant with Fisher

Eight-years-old with Keziah and Great-Grandma

With Grandpa’s horses

Pioneer Days rodeo…almost nine-years-old

Christmas at nine-and-a-half

Eleven-years-old

Twelve-years-old…beautiful, isn’t she!

Thirteen-years-old

Fourteen!

Isn’t she adorable!

I am so blessed to have her in my life and to have the privilege of being her mother. She has taught me much about love, patience, sacrifice, acceptance, putting people first, doing hard things, and so much more.

Most importantly, she was willing to come as my first child. Willing to let me learn how to mother on her. Willing to teach me the power of motherhood before I knew I was ready to learn that lesson.

Happy Birthday, my girl.

I love you.

keziah elisheva turns 9!

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!”

Finally, 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 like 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…