The Future Of Us: The kids grew up!

Good Luck Catie

"Oh my God this table is so uncomfortable! Why can't they use something else."

"Well, it seems like someone's in a great mood," I sit across from Catie in the exam room, "Have a bad morning?"

"I didn't sleep much at all last night, Jake was working on putting the crib together and I didn't ask much, but it didn't sound like it was going too good. I think he finally got in bed around 3."

"Yeah, your dad didn't do good with any of your cribs. Grandpa put them together after he gave up."

She Facetimes Ally and Jake as soon as the doctor walks in to gear up for the ultrasound. I hold the phone for her to get the best angle while sitting on the edge of my seat myself, hardly able to control my excitement to find out what my first grandchild will be.

"So everything is still going good since your last appointment, right? No complications so far?"

"Nothing yet, I've been having some back pain but not anything major. Everything has been great."

The doctor gets everything set up, so I move closer to record the monitor as she moves the wand around showing us the baby. Everything brings back so many memories from when this was me experiencing all of this with her for the first time.

She reaches out for my hand as the doctor slows down, finally having a good view of the baby. We watch her facial expressions intensely to make sure she doesn't look surprised about anything while Ally and Jake are leaning so far into their phones that all I can see is their eyes.

"Well, it looks like baby Adams is a boy! Congratulations!"

"I knew it!" Jake screams through the phone, practically jumping up and down in his office "I told you last week I was right!"

Catie and I laugh as she wipes her tears away, excited to be finding out she'll be the mother of a precious baby boy in a few months. Ally is just as excited, going on and on about all she plans to do with the baby once he's here.

"It seems like you have a very supportive family. This baby boy is very lucky."

"They're really amazing. I can't wait for everyone to meet him."

"Your dad is going to be so happy, honey." I lean in for a hug as the doctor cleans everything up, "Too bad he can't figure out how to do all this phone stuff yet, he'd already be buying the baby all kinds of useless crap."

"You know, maybe that isn't so bad."

"Here are some pictures for you. I'd like you to make an appointment for next month so we can do glucose testing."

"Okay, great. Thank you!"

Catie hops off the table, following me out the door. We stop for her to make the appointment before going back to her house so we can start working more on the nursery.

"I can't believe we'll actually be using this room in a few months. It's so scary, but so exciting at the same time. It feels like everything is going way too fast."

"Aw honey this is just the beginning. It might feel like the days are unbelievably long at first, but looking back on them they go so much faster than you expect. You blink and everything changes."

"Were you scared? When you were pregnant with me?"

"Of course. It's a scary time, but it was so amazing too. I was scared of all of it, pregnancy, birth, taking care of you... but I also loved all of it."

"Mom, I saw you pregnant and miserable with Kaiden. I was also there when you pushed a toddler out of you, I don't want your lies. I want the truth."

"But Catie you're already scared. I don't want you clueless, but I don't want to scare you even more. It's really not glamorous, or fun..."

"I don't expect it to be."

She sits in the rocking chair cradling her belly as she waits for me to give her a real answer. The raw, real truth.

"It's not going to be fun. Anything from now, it's going to be hard, and exhausting... your body won't feel like it's yours anymore. You're growing a person, and you obviously have been for months, but these next few are unreal. It'll still feel amazing and it's definitely one of the best things you'll ever experience, but it's also one of the hardest."

"When I had Kaiden, I was older. That made it a lot harder on me. I don't want you that scared, but it definitely wasn't easy with you either."

"Should I really be scared though? Is everything that bad? The end of the pregnancy? The birth?"

"Well honey it's not easy. You're strong, I know you can handle it, and you have Jake for help. You need to accept his help, especially as things get harder. Your dad was my rock, he was there through everything. When things got hard towards the end, he held me up. He was constantly supporting me, making sure I had everything I needed, and I know Jake will be the same with you."

"He is great with all that, he keeps asking me how I want everything to work out, with the room, and the birth, and when we come home. He says he wants to know now so he can help, but I feel pressured to know things that I haven't even really thought of yet."

"I know it's hard to think of, but it is important. When you're laying in that hospital bed in agonizing pain and can't make rational decisions, you want Jake to know whether or not you want the epidural, or if you want to try natural methods. If your dad wouldn't have known I wanted the epidural with you, I don't know how I would have made it. I was exhausted from days of working on no sleep, the pain was bad, but I could hardly keep my eyes open and I was miserable. Him telling the nurses that I wanted it saved my sanity. I got my first good sleep in weeks, and after it, we finally got you. It didn't necessarily make things easy, and we were both still terrified, but we were able to be much more relaxed."

"But you had Ben and Ally and Kaid without any epidural, how did you do that? Cause a part of me wants to experience the whole thing you know, labor and being surrounded by my family when he comes out, and on the other side I'm scared to death about the pain"

"I know...I wish I could have my friends and family around too, one thing I know is that when everybody will next to you joking and asking stupid questions cause you know your brothers and sisters, you'll just want to slap them in the face I tell you" 

I try to make her laugh knowing she's probably getting scared now that her due is getting closer

"Whether I'm in pain or not, I'll always want to slap them in the face mom. But honestly do you think I should do it?" 

"Honey that's really your decision, to me it was an amazing experience, the most painful of my life but the most beautiful of my life, I think it also gets things faster without the epidural. It's your first baby so you might want it to go fast"

"Well yeah...so I'm gonna do that...what if I need a c-section?" she glares at me realizing this also may happen

"Honey would you stop freaking out, you won't need a c-section. Unlike me you have a small baby so it'll all go amazing and it's gonna be a beautiful experience."

"You said every experience was different mom"

"Different doesn't mean bad Catie, you won't have to push an 9 pound baby out of your vagina so you're pretty lucky"

"Oh my god who weighted that much?!"

"Kaid...yep...9 pounds...I remember it was Christmas surprise for your dad, but hell the surprise was when I realize how hard it was to push an 9 pound baby out of me haha. I did it so there's no reason why you won't"

"I knowww"

"It sucks but you're gonna love the ending I promise"