Running Girl

Plans

I really hate it when plans fall through. It just irks me. If I commit to doing something, whether it’s a trip with friends or a race or a Lenten vegan diet, I’m seeing it all the way through. It’s just my personality.

So it stresses me out that this weekend I’m missing out on yet another race I signed up for: the America’s Run in Arlington. I also missed the Get Your Rear in Gear 10K in Fort Worth last month. Both plans were squashed by something bigger, something that’s been hogging all the space in my priority storage compartment lately.

Last week, I was happily eight weeks pregnant, living in hopeful-land. This week, I am not. I miscarried.

(The day of the 10K was so cold and rainy I didn’t want to risk getting sick while pregnant. This weekend, I’ll be physically incapable of running the race. I’ll be recovering from a surgical procedure, called a D&C, to take care of the miscarriage.)

Sometimes, even big plans just fall through. Babies just stop growing. And you have absolutely no control, no matter how hard you feel like you need it.

The irony is that finally accepting the idea of getting pregnant was a huge struggle for me, even as the biological urge stealthily crept up on me in the past few months.

To me, The Urge to get pregnant was a lot like the urge to throw up. When I’m ill, I sense that getting-sick-feeling start to slam me in progressive waves from deep down somewhere. I mentally stave it off for as long as possible. I tell myself I don’t feel sick, that I feel fine, better than fine. I pretend like having a strong mental will can stop the course of nature, squash a strong biological urge. Sometimes it works.

This is what I did with pregnancy. Minus a few weak moments of gazing longingly at those little pink and blue onesies at Target, I had been successful at beating back The Urge for years. I clung to my reasons for staving it off. I don’t yet feel qualified to care for an infant. I feel awkward and scared while holding other people’s babies. I’ve never changed a diaper before. Though I realize it’s happening all around me everyday, I feel like childbirth frighteningly breaks the laws of physics. Most of all, having a baby is a huge life changer, so you better be, in the words of American Idols’ oh-so-eloquent Randy Jackson, “one hundred million billion percent” ready for it. That’s a major declaration to make. How can you really be that sure of anything?

And yet.

The Urge made its first major assault on me while I was at the hair salon, of all places. My hairstylist, a few years younger than I am, was on the verge of giving birth to a baby boy. I knew this already when I came to see her. But it had been a few months, and her growing belly was suddenly huge. She bounced around happily, radiating that famous pregnant glow. For some odd reason, (perhaps just perfect timing), this is what set things off for me.

There I was, cold, wet-headed, snips of hair falling around my face, feeling The Urge punch holes in my reasoning and kick its way to the surface. As if the sight of her bulbous pregnant belly just gave The Urge the little tap of encouragement it needed to deploy its first wave of attack.

I kicked it back down as best I could. I continued my I-don’t-want-to-get-pregnant-yet mental routine. Take that, The Urge.

Months passed, and more women I knew were coming out of the woodwork to announce their pregnancies — my neighbor, several women at work, and countless acquaintances on facebook. The apparent baby boom of 2010 was taking its toll on me. I realized I was fighting an uphill battle with Mother Nature, and I finally gave in. I finally realized how much I was ready to, and actually really wanted to, embrace motherhood.

This is all unimportant: the hows, the whys, the mockery I feel Mother Nature made of me, the control I feel I lost (and never really had in the first place). It’s not worth focusing on.

Instead, I’ll focus on being irked about missing my race this weekend. That’s a whole lot easier.

And I’ll focus on what plans God has in store for me in the future. More lessons in how much control I don’t have in life, no doubt. Still, those lessons are needed, and those plans haven’t disappointed me yet. Those plans live in hopeful-land.

7 Comments so far
Leave a comment