My level of exhaustion right now is unreal, and it’s not at all helped by the raging end ‘o pregnancy insomnia I’m experiencing. I thought I knew insomnia before, but this is far worse than anything I’ve ever known. The other night I got up at 1:00 a.m. (to pee, of course) and was awake until 7:30 a.m. Are you f@#%ing kidding me?!!! I keep hearing that it’s nature’s way of preparing me for the sleepless nights that are literally just days away from beginning. And the number of times I pee in a day? Also ridiculous. There’s nothing more baby girl enjoys playing with than my bladder, especially if there’s some liquid in it…..yay, it’s squishy, fun! I will pee and not 5 minutes later she will turn her head side to side (getting cozy on her pillow?) and I’m running for the bathroom again. The other fun thing she likes to play with is my hip bone—so weird. She pushes on the edge of her womb until she finds it and then pokes it, over and over. I feel her little fingers sort of pawing it like a cat….creepiest feeling. Lastly, baby girl has not gotten the memo that her movements are supposed to be more lax in these final days, given her cramped quarters. I’ve got to try to videotape her crazy fits, but it’s hard to predict. It literally looks like she’s trying to break my belly open so she can free herself, and given the fact that she’s a full-sized baby now, it’s quite the show.

This waiting is a crazy experience. It’s such an intense mode of living. I feel like I’m constantly operating at an animal level—all instinct and filled with an intense sort of “knowing” at all times. Yet, I’m no longer feeling like I want it to be over with….it’s a calm sense of waiting. The waiting has made it increasingly difficult for me to leave my house over the past month or so, and this week it’s reached the level of feeling tears well up when I step out the front door. I feel like I should not leave until the baby arrives. I feel her coming and feel like I need someone to put an empty cardboard box in a dark closet so I can crawl inside and shut the door. My days float by so quickly while I hang in some foreign kind of dreamlike haze, totally incapable of keeping my thoughts straight, my days straight. My sense of time is totally warped right now, as if it no longer exists or it’s rushing past me and I’m standing still. Wow, I think I need a nap…I can feel myself not making sense.

Meanwhile, I’ve never seen my husband so anxious. He’s fidgety and it looks as if he’s preparing for the apocalypse. He rushes about, tying up loose ends and desperately trying to finish everything that will need finishing for about the next 3 years. My favorite thing is that he’s started putting in requests with me. “Can I just ask you to not go into labor in the next two days? I have some really important copies to make at work.” Or, “it would really be ideal if you could go into labor next Thursday, because then my work schedule for the next month would work out perfectly.” I know it’s just his silly way of pretending he has some sort of control over this entirely unpredictable event, for which we will never feel prepared enough for. Regardless, it makes me laugh because it sounds like part of him believes I can oblige him.

I think one of the most amazing parts of this experience right now is all the love that already exists for this little baby. It’s really incredible how we anticipate the arrival of a new human being—the excitement, the joy, the impatience to shower this being with affection, though none of us have met her before. Watching my family and friends, and most especially our parents, join us in all those emotions has been a beautiful thing. My father, for one, is about to explode on account of his overwhelming emotions and anticipation. The man is two steps away from moving in with me tomorrow so he doesn’t miss a second of the waiting or the arrival. I never expected that type of reaction from him (or anyone really), but it has made all of this all the more meaningful.