I am sure like everyone going through 2020 crazy things have been happening everywhere. We were issued a few surprises of our own. In May we discovered we were expecting another addition to our family. To say we were surprised would be an understatement. Last year I had finally accepted the possibility our family would not be growing anymore. As items in our temporary outdoor storage had begun to be damaged by the elements and nature we decided, last fall, to sell all our baby gear we had been hanging onto. We knew that we would be able to replace these items in the future rather than hang on to them so that no one would get any use out of them.
We told the girls and our close family the week after Mother’s Day. We told our girls by writing a book for our Thumper to read aloud. We recorded her reading the book and both girls reactions and sent the video to our family throughout the day. Both girls are extremely excited and wishing to add a baby brother to the mix. We have chosen not to find out what the gender of the baby is, so we affectionately have been referring to this baby as Baby-L.
Homeschooling has thankfully not been too affected by pregnancy. On the other hand, the rest of our daily routines have had its own challenges. Each trimester has brought on different things, but we have found ways to adapt around them. We are now nearing the arrival of our new addition and I wanted to reflect on this time for other homeschooling parents. Just as every different season in life brings its own challenges, homeschooling thankful has bee just as smooth as it has always been, by allowing myself Grace and allowing us time to adjust to the new season to come.
During the first trimester (and all this pregnancy so far) I have ben dealing with nausea and extreme food aversions. Fruit life savers were my friend during the first trimester and then adding cooking lessons to our homeschool allowed us to continue to function normally. I began allowing Mouse to have more responsibility in helping cook and prep meals for us as my aversion to raw meat, the smell of cooking triggered many bouts of nausea on my end. The girls both also learned some grilling skills with their dad during the first and second trimester.
The second trimester brought, in addition to the nausea, extreme tiredness. I was very thankful to my husband during this time allowing me to cut out early some (or most) nights and go to bed. He helped take over many of the evening routine allowing me to get much needed rest. I also learned to do things in small increments versus trying to do a lot all day long. I found grace in small accomplishments each day. I am also lucky to be blessed with a beautiful height of 4ft 11 inches, which causes me to show and develop a growing belly a lot sooner than most pregnant women. It was the same with the girls and this pregnancy was no exception. The only challenge this brough was having Thumper sit on my lap during our read aloud time. She could not lay down on me as my stomach expanded, as it was uncomfortable for us both. Since this trimester was spent in our camper still traveling with Daddy-O for his job, some days she would sit on the floor next to me, but most days she just had to sit up between my legs and not cuddle as much.
The third trimester added anemia, breathlessness, and sciatic pain to my daily life. The anemia has not affected homeschooling too much, in that I am still just as tired as I was in the second trimester, but at this point I have become used to it. The breathlessness so far is the only pregnancy related complication that has affected home schooling. I have found myself very winded reading aloud to the girls toward the end of our school year and this pregnancy. I have had to later some of our read aloud schedules to combat some of the worse affected days. I have found that pausing between pages and sipping water can sometimes help combat this, but not always. I have, however been making use of Audible books for our lunch time read aloud for October and November. As far as dealing with sciatic pain, I have had to begin wearing a maternity belt, starting in November. Its hard to tell how much of its pregnancy or how much of it is me trying to overdo things. I have had sciatic trouble several times over the last 4-5 years (in addition to the last month of my pregnancy with Thumper). We have also been in the middle of taking care of my Dad after a back surgery in September and then also moving into a new home base in October and November of this year. The pregnancy belt has seemed to help, but I have also learned my limits at this point in the pregnancy. Step ladders are not my friend, and neither is carrying anything heavier than a laundry basket of clothing to and from the downstairs laundry room. I have however been very thankful for the garden bathtub soaks I get every few nights when the pain gets bad.
The biggest challenges this pregnancy has been dealing with the restrictions COVID has brought to the health care system. As a home-schooling parent, I do not have the luxury of making appointments for when my children are in school. This was especially a challenge while being on the road with my husband. I also had to rely on him being able to get off work to attend appointments. I was incredibly lucky that this could happen this year, when in years past this would not have been an option for us. He works in an industry that does not really offer sick days or PTO hours. I was also alone for all of my appointments. Having had an early miscarriage before going to our conformation appointment and dating ultrasound alone was an extremely high anxiety moment for me. I cried at the joy of seeing and hearing our babies heart beating alone. I also had to be alone for our anatomy ultrasound at 20 weeks and was not allowed to facetime or video call and had very few pictures printed to share with my husband and our girls. I understand the precautions and appreciate them as affects for COVID are not fully known on most people nor are they known for pregnant women either. My appointments for both the first and second trimester were in the middle of the hot zone of Washington D.C., so believe me I got the need to be vigilant. Luckily, my husband was able to attend an appointment and finally got to hear baby-L’s heartbeat at an appointment in November, where the clinic in our home state is allowing one visitor for appointments. So far, my husband will be allowed to be with me during my c-section and while baby and I are in the hospital, but he is the only one. The girls will not get to meet the baby until we are released from the hospital and neither can we have any other visitors while we are there. This will be an adjustment when the time comes. We are planning to combat this somewhere with FaceTiming our girls once we are settled with baby and I am out of recover from my c-section.
I hope I can be some encouragement for other mother’s home schooling their children and experiencing a pregnancy at the same time. In having grace with this season, I have learned to slow down and not worry if everything on our to do list does not get done. This is a season that only comes once, and I have wanted to enjoy the blessing bestowed on us. I am looking forward to welcoming Baby-L in December.
