I'll never forget the moment that I knew everything was alright. I had a difficult labor with my first child. His heart rate and my blood pressure kept dropping. They were prepared to rush me into a the operating room for an emergency c-section. I was terrified but then, all of a sudden before the doctor even said so, I just knew. He was fine.
And, it isn't the first time I held him that sticks in my mind. It's a moment when we were alone at home and he was awake in my arms and I picked him up so that we were face to face. I looked in his eyes. I mean, really looked. I wasn't just seeing him. I was filled with a deep sense of recognition. The only way to explain it was that something inside of me remembered him. His eyes were my eyes. I knew who he was inside and out.
I'll never forget the first time he walked. It really did feel like my heart was outside of my body, completely vulnerable. I was thrilled and terrified at the same time.
I'll never forget the moment I knew I was pregnant with my second child. I woke up in the middle of the night and my whole body was tingling. I'd never felt that way before but, I knew what it meant.
I'll never forget the phone call from the doctor saying something was wrong. I was alone. Pete was in Germany. My parent's came rushing over. I couldn't stand up. I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me. There was so much emotion and I couldn't express any of it.
I'll never forget my friend Tricia saying, "You don't know what's wrong yet. Don't worry until you know what you have to worry about." It turned out to be nothing. A false positive on the test. He was fine, better than fine. That boy was 9 pounds at birth and he giggled from the moment he was born like he'd been playing a joke on us all along. By then, the fear was forgotten.
It wasn't until we got the phone call that our dear friends were in trouble that it all came rushing back. There was something wrong with their baby. Both baby and mother were in grave danger. Just after hearing the news, I sat down and wrote "Surface". I think it took less than an hour. I cried the entire time and, for a long time after, couldn't sing it without crying. I remembered the fear and knew that it had to be greater than anything I'd ever felt.
We all prayed. There was nothing else we could do. And, I remember how I felt when the doctor's declared the survival of both mom and baby a miracle. The fetus had a torn diaphragm and should not have been able to process the amniotic fluid. The mother had been swelling dangerously and the baby's lungs were underdeveloped. He needed surgery just after birth. Then, another surgery when the diaphragm tore again. But, they survived and are alive and well today. I think of them and believe in things I didn't believe in before.
Surface was and is a mother's prayer.
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