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The thought has crossed my mind lately that while I love the idea of pregnancy, the practical aspects feel nightmarish right now.
At 36 weeks pregnant with my fourth baby, all the pregnancy discomforts are here in full force: the aches, extreme fatigue, pressure, acid reflux, feeling that I can’t take a real breath because baby is pushing up against my lungs, lightheadedness in the July Texas heat index of 105+, and a return of the nausea that was so severe during the first half of the pregnancy that I barely left my bed for months.
I know that I’m participating in something sacred and incredible: the creation of a new human being. That this body of mine is where my tiny daughter is being knit together, nourished, and protected until she’s ready to take her first breath. I know that this experience, unique to womankind, is a reflection of God’s power as Creator and a reflection of Our Lord’s sacrifice on the Cross: this is my Body, given up for you.
But in my mind, I often separate these abstract truths from my physical experience. “I like the IDEA of pregnancy,” I tell myself. “But the reality is rough.” I think this is an understandable reaction to months of suffering due to hyperemesis gravidarum and then 3rd trimester discomforts. But I also think it’s missing something.
I’ve been reading Southern novelist Flannery O’Connor’s collection of essays Mystery and Manners. It’s pure gold, all of it. But what has jumped out at me most has been O’Connor’s insights into fiction writing for Catholic authors. She claims that the novelist’s job is to communicate the mystery of the universe, but not through abstractions or preaching or commitment to some belief floating around. The novelist must clearly and effectively communicate mystery to the reader using all she has to work with: the material. The senses, the physical world, a particular place, specific characters. The supernatural can only be expressed through the material.
This has me thinking about our human experience of the supernatural with God as the “novelist” of our story. How does he communicate the mystery of his Love to us? Through what we can see, touch, smell, hear, and taste.
He became incarnate, infleshed, a baby born from a specific human woman in a particular town on one day in history. He comes to us again in the Eucharist using bread and wine so that we can taste him and receive him into our physical bodies. This is no disembodied, abstracted faith. It is heaven touching earth, the supernatural touching the material and making it holy, even among the mess.
What is the creation of a new human life apart from months of growing a child within a woman’s womb? Her aching back, the growing child’s pressure against her pelvic bones, the nausea, exhaustion, pain, and the holy mess of a birth: tears, sweat, and blood? Is this not where love dwells? Here in the agony and mess?
What is marriage separated from the daily sacrifices and sufferings of giving your life for another person? It does not exist in the abstractions, in the mere idea of loving, which will always fall short. It is nourished only in the life of love lived out: getting up at dawn with the kids so your pregnant wife can sleep just a few more minutes, making two cups of coffee instead of one, folding the towels, staying up when you’re tired so you can talk and reconnect, climbing into the same bed committed to doing it all over again tomorrow together. Is this not where love dwells? In the faithful sacrifice and the mess?
It’s easy for me to make motherhood abstract, “I’m building cathedrals! Helping these little souls to heaven!” while ignoring the fact that this task happens here, not just in the world of romantic ideals. It is nursing a newborn through the night when all you want to do is sleep. It is fetching snacks for toddlers, giving baths, and trying to teach children to pray while they wiggle, wander, bicker, and interrupt. It is getting tangles out of hair and washing dirty dishes. This is where love dwells. Here in the exhaustion and the mess.
The Sacrament of Reconciliation happens not just on a spiritual plane but by walking my body into the confessional, opening my mouth to tell my sins to a priest standing in persona Christi, hearing the words of absolution wash over me. This is where love dwells, how the mercy of God reaches in. Here in our mess.
There is no other way. We are body and soul. The mystery of God’s love touches both. As I groan through the final days of this pregnancy I must remember that the miracle isn’t happening somewhere else. It’s happening right here. In the suffering and the mess.
In my swollen feet. In the pressure of my growing child on my bladder. In the 3rd trimester insomnia. Right here. This is where love dwells and the grace of God reaches out for me. Behold the mystery.
Great post Haley! This reminds me of a scene towards the end of Yours, Mine, and Ours (the Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball version) and one of my all time favorite quotes:
“It’s giving life that counts. Until you’re ready for it, all the rest is just a big fraud… Life isn’t a love in, it’s the dishes and the orthodontist and the shoe repairman and… ground round instead of roast beef. And I’ll tell you something else: it isn’t going to a bed with a man that proves you’re in love with him; it’s getting up in the morning and facing the drab, miserable, wonderful everyday world with him that counts.”
I highly recommend this movie, but not sure if it can be streamed anywhere.
Love this. I need to read this about sixteen more times! It’s absolutely the here and now that matters and I need to be more conscious of that in the day-to-day.
I’ve just read Mystery and Manners, too, and oh my goodness, it’s wonderful. I started on her letters, The Habit of Being, and I think you’d love that too.
Praying for you as you get closer to meeting your little lady!
Wiping tears away from my face right now. You nailed it, Haley. Perfectly said.
I really love this. I was talking about something along these lines in relationship to sainthood the other day. My friend was saying someone asked her if she wanted to be saint, and she was like….”Well yeah. I guess.”
And you think – of course you want to be a saint. You want to get to heaven.
And THEN you think – wow. What does thay ACTUALLY entail? It’s not quiet holy hours and attentive masses and soft words from God. It’s the cross.
It could well look like changing a diaper blow out for the third time that night – and it’s only three AM. It could look like vomiting ten times a day for five months and NOT DESPAIRING.
But the common denominator is that it’s going to look like the everyday small things that make up life, lived well, in spite of the mess and the chaos. It’s not about making life perfect. It’s about living “real life” – it’s hardships and joys and tragedies – as well as you can. There is nothing more real and grounding than trying to become a saint
33.5 weeks pregnant over here and I really needed this reflection/reminder. Thank you so much… this has given me a lot to take to prayer in these final weeks!
Hi Haley.
I had an August 25th baby, so I know that uncomfortably pregnant feeling. Someone told me once that God gives us those feelings so that we will want to go through whatever it takes to bring our babies into the world. I don’t know if that’s true, but it helped to welcome my own baby girl. I loved being pregnant until the last three weeks! Best wishes, you are in my prayers.
Oh, and, this post belongs in every single church bulletin everywhere – it needs to be published. What a wonderful post, the wider world needs this. .We all need this.
Thank you so, so much for this reflection. I needed to read this- I’m also at 36 weeks, but with my first! This has helped to put a great deal into perspective.
Terrific, Haley! The holiness is in the slog.
And Abbey and I are doing a Summer of Flannery. I just read Wise Blood and some bits of M&M for a project.
Hang in there!!
This is amazing. I can’t wait to share with my family.
Wow. Thank you.
Wow. This is so beautiful, Haley!
The moment you think you are ‘done’ with pregnancy and Hayley goes and writes this…
Truth, Haley. Mystery and Manners is the best of Flannery. The good novelist writes about true characters in true situations. She writes what she sees as faithfully as possible. They are not abstractions. Our lives are not meant to be lived out in abstract truth either. The truth of the Gospel is experienced in an embodied way — like you said: “It’s happening right here. In the suffering and the mess.” It is a mystery, and I think sanctification means learning to live in that mysterious tension.
Thank you!
Jess
Haley, long time reader here but first time commenter. This post is a lovely description of Theology of the Body (St John Paul II) through motherhood and marriage. I find TOB has been one of the most moving and relateable church teachings for my life. God first found me with it in college (good timing) but it never looses it’s potency for me. Because of your podcast, currently reading “Made for this” by Mary Haseltine where she relates TOB to pregnancy and labor- so cool! 27 weeks pregnant and excited to enrich this pregnancy with TOB. Thanks for your lovely post!!
Due at the end of July also, I feel these tangible reminders of the cross (and rather nervously await the birthing part). Only in the past few months has it really sunken in to me that the difficult moments are the ones that actually matter in the virtue department. The easy and beautiful moments are sweet graces, but they don’t grow us. Thank you for so articulately describing true reality!