Permission

    Today it happened.  The fertilized egg found its way through the dark and scoped out a new home, where it would stay for the next nine months.    

    It did it so well.  It knew exactly what to do, and that it did.  It implanted, it multiplied.  It gave life.  But while new life took form, simultaneously something inside me died.  That day I lost something I loved so very much.

    I never wanted to be so young when I settled down.  It was in no way my idea of fun.  I didn't want a baby.  Not to mention four.  Not yet.  Not then.  I wanted growth for myself.  I wanted school.  I wanted travel.  I wanted experience far, far away.  I wanted to be single.  That's what I wanted.

    But alas, I kept hearing men say that life isn't about what I wanted.  They told me life was about what He wanted.  They told me He wanted family.  And lots and lots of babies.

    And I believed them.  And I trusted them.

    So I settled down and made lots of babies.

    And it was hard.  Excruciatingly hard.  At 20 years old, motherhood pushed me and it pulled me.  Relentlessly.  I had the most beautiful babies and it was hard.

    Determined to finish school, I got my degree and started working as a nurse.  But no one was home to take care of my babies.  Babysitters fell through, anxiety filled me at all times.  And those men kept telling me I only had one purpose here:  Not to do my will, but His.

    And His will, they said, was for me to mother.  He wanted family.  Anything else felt selfish and prideful because I believed them.  I made the decision to quit working and come home to my babies.  

    And it was hard.  Excruciatingly hard.  I remember years upon years of doing bedtime alone while Darin worked both days and nights.  As the sun descended, there was my six-year-old, my four-year-old, my two-year-old, my newborn and me.

    My fourth baby was born when I was newly 27 years old.  Somehow, among this nursing, sleep-deprived, over-worked girl, somehow among the tears from them and the tears from me, somehow among the potty training while breastfeeding while kindergarten-ing, somehow we lived.  And somehow I smiled.  When I submitted, I smiled.

    And then there came a day when the sun felt exceptionally warm.  One day I woke up and realized that time had passed.  I had passed through the impassable.  I had made it out alive.

    Life ahead looked kind.  Out of financial straights, out of diapers, out of naps and pacifiers and my body being used for everyone else's growth.  I had made it out.

    That day, I felt hope.  That time, I decided I was worthy of my own joy.  I accepted a job as a midwife assistant and browsed potential midwifery schools.  That day, the sun was brighter and bigger and lovelier than it had been in a long time.

    And as the universe turns, it was exactly at that time when our girl became She.  Somehow, deep inside the warmth of my womb, her life began.  In direct correlation to my own liberation, She was there.  I could not name what was happening, but it felt chaotic, confusing, sad.  It felt swirly, maddening, unfair.  It was a grief that I would not name for six years.

    Today I'm naming it.  I'm naming the grief and I'm mourning the spark that I lost that day.  Today, my mourning feels valid and kind and true.

    Our girl is a legitimate force of nature.  She fills me with wonder and awe like nothing else.  She is exactly as intended and I'm so grateful that she is here.

    AND, today I'm ready.  I'm finally ready to hold my girl in all her fullness while simultaneously holding my arms around Laurisa.  To tell her that she's allowed to live.  For her.  That she can be trusted to live for no one else's will but her own.  Today I am writing the long-awaited permission slip for both of the most important girls in my life:  "Dear girl, You are hereby authorized to live directly from your gigantic, wild, pulsing heart.  Trust who you are.  It is good."