"Holding on for the ride…"

I had somewhat forgotten until I received a reminder email from Mel last night (thank you), that I had signed up for ICLW this month… I recall coming home from meeting her and other awesome bloggers in real life at our ALI lunch during BlogHer last month on an emotional high and wanting to spread the love through signing up for the next ICLW! This is only my third time participating, as though I do enjoy the experience, it takes a lot out of me and thus I tend to go many months in between before I have another go at it. One of my “problems” is that I have difficulty leaving short comments for bloggers that I don’t know well (and sometimes even for those that I do). So I spend more time than might be necessary reading your/their posts and then thinking through what I want to say to you/them when I comment. Anyway, thank you to those who have visited my blog thus far via ICLW and for your kind and thoughtful comments! Thank you also to those who will make there way here in the week to come! 🙂

As I have shared here before, I find song lyrics to be very therapeutic, especially during difficult and uncertain times in my life. Tonight as I was visiting a new blog (at least to me) via ICLW I found another woman, Nicole from All Grown Up…, who also finds comfort and inspiration in this way. I was drawn to her blog as she and her husband are three weeks into the domestic adoption matching process. My sister and her husband are about a week and a half into the same process, so I was intrigued to read about this woman’s take on her experience and the waiting game before them. I want so much for my sister and her husband (and all couples trying to adopt) to be matched with the baby that they are so ready and willing to love and care for.

Anyway, through reading one of Nicole’s posts, I was turned on to an Indigo Girls song that I wasn’t familiar with. As a fan of their music, I thought I had heard most of the Indigo Girls best/most inspiring songs, but I was wrong… Nicole shared a You Tube link (so I actually got to hear it for the first time) and the lyrics to The Wood Song by the Indigo Girls. As I listened and read a long with the lyrics she had posted, I could relate and I was moved. This particular verse of the song really spoke to me:

Sometimes I ask to sneak a closer look
Skip to the final chapter of the book
And then maybe steer us clear from some of the pain it took
To get us where we are this far yeah
But the question drowns in its futility
And even I have got to laugh at me
No one gets to miss the storm of what will be
Just holding on for the ride

It exemplifies one of my new year’s resolutions this year, that I made before I knew we were pregnant, to strive to find joy in the journey, as opposed to being so caught up in what will be, when and how. So thank you Nicole for introducing me to The Wood Song. I wish you and all those journeying to build/expand our families strength, courage and hope while “holding on for the ride.”

Tomorrow our new baby girl and I are due to reach our 36 weeks gestational milestone. As I shared in my last post, this home stretch has not been easy for me physically or emotionally. I am grateful, as always, for your kind words, support, encouragement, thoughts and prayers. Thank you especially to those who commented on my post (here on my blog or in person) and helped transform my paranoia into more peaceful feelings about the days and weeks to come in this pregnancy. I have had good days and bad days since that post, but overall I am hanging in here and continue to be cautiously optimistic that we will be bringing our baby girl home soon.

Our prenatal appointments, which will be weekly from now on, continue to be routine and uneventful. If things continue to go normally we will meet Baby Benson four weeks from yesterday, via our scheduled c-section, if she doesn’t come early. That still seems very surreal to me, however I am doing my best to believe that it will happen and to prepare my head, my heart and our home for her arrival. Thank you for reading and I hope that you and your loved ones have a wonderful weekend!