Fearful

So yesterday was a big day. I had another appointment with the doctor. It seems I'm catching up on the weight gain curve. I gained 8.5 pounds this month! That's right - 8.5! I've tried to tell myself that this is ok - healthy even - but it's still hard to take all at once. If you take into account the fact that I was wearing heavy shoes - 3 pounds according to the manufacturer (and yes I looked it up) - that makes the number a little easier to stomach. But what happens next month when I've gained again? Well, then my heavy shoe theory goes out the window. Total weight gain as of week 29 = 18 pounds. When you put it that way, I can live with that.

I passed my glucose tolerance test - woohoo! They also said since I've had such a healthy pregnancy (Blood pressure was still only 96/62 - so happy!) I can wait until 32 weeks to start coming in for check ups every 2 weeks. This sounds like no big deal, but I'm pretty excited about it. Especially considering I sat in the waiting room for over an hour before being seen this time. This is very out of character for my doctor's office, but for some reason it made very uneasy. It was almost like the longer I waited the more I thought something was wrong. Not necessarily with me or my child, but with someone - I just didn't like that feeling. Turns out it was due to the fact that they are switching over to electronic medical records and it was wreaking havoc with their schedule. Good to know!

I've really been meditating on several scripture passages throughout my pregnancy. One being Psalm 139:14, "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." This is a verse we have all heard, even memorized at vacation bible school. But have you ever really thought about what it says? I get that we are wonderfully made. I don't see how someone could look at the human body and the complexity with which it functions and not think it is wonderful. But I am also FEARFULLY made! After doing a little research I've learned that in the original Hebrew the word fearfully means: with great reverence and heart-felt respect. Sounds nice, right? But even that gives me more questions. Was God revering and respecting himself when he created us? Who is deserving of God's reverence and heart-felt respect? Certainly not me.

Maybe God was fearful of what we would choose for the lives he created. He gave us free will to make our own choices - right or wrong. He also gave us grace and mercy so that we would not have to suffer the eternal consequences of those wrong choices. He gave his son to die in my place so that I would not have to pay the price for my bad decisions. There are still earthly consequences to every decision we make - maybe that's why God was fearful. He knew that we would mess up, act like idiots and ultimately choose to put earthly things above eternal things. Maybe he feared that we would do more harm for his kingdom than good. I know most days I feel like I have done nothing to bring those around me closer to God. Maybe he feared that I would claim his name one minute and walk all over it the next. Whether these were HIS fears, they are mine. I long to be a person who lives what I say I believe, even if those around me think I'm insane. This is the kind of mom I want my son to have.

Maybe if God was fearful when he made my son, it's ok for me to be fearful of being his mom. I just want to raise a young man who loves God with reckless abandon. I guess that means I need to show him how. I know I've strayed and rambled long enough. Just wanted to share some of the things that have been on my mind.

God - your works are wonderful. I will never fully comprehend.

Oh - I forgot - one more thing! I've started having Braxton-Hicks contractions. Tanner and I were laying in bed a few weekends ago watching the boy squirm. Tanner's eyes got really wide and he said, "What is THAT?!?!" You could actually see my belly take on this weird, asymmetric shape. It looked really creepy. It was really hard on the right side, but rest was still squishy. After a few seconds, everything relaxed and went back to it's original - hahahaha - shape. My uterus is practicing. Just another reminder that we're getting close.