Hi friend, welcome back to the podcast. My name
is Kim. I'm a mom to five kiddos ages 16 to 3
months and if you listen to part one of this
series You know that my recent pregnancy was
not the glowy Pinterest ward kind of pregnancy
that I was hoping to get It was a season of survival
and it was held together by my amazing midwife
who understood me and really pushed me through
and oh she was amazing and it was held together
by my friends who showed up and I talked about
them in my last podcast I'm so thankful for them
and honestly just some determination to keep
moving forward in today's podcast I want to pull
back the curtain in a sense on the part that
I haven't really talked about on here with you
that is the emotional landscape of our home we
weren't just a family expecting a baby There
were so many layers to our story. I was holding
this pregnancy so tenderly as it was an answer
to many years of prayer. Every person in our
home was carrying something different throughout
this pregnancy. And today is about transparency.
It's about how loss changes the way you look
at new life and how to handle the very real fears
that my kids had whenever they have seen the
worst happen. you're not going to want to miss
today's conversation. So settle in, grab your
clothes basket, we'll fold laundry together,
get your hot cup of tea or coffee, whatever it
is you're drinking right now. Matcha, if you
like matcha, you know who you are out there.
And join me in this in the next few minutes,
we're going to have a good conversation together.
Let's talk about the four letter word that doesn't
get mentioned a lot in pregnancy. Usually, whenever
you add a baby to your family, it is filled with
excitement. You cannot wait to find out what
you're having. You're excited to see the baby
on the monitor for the first time, right? Especially
if it's your first one. I mean, with all of them,
really. I've just been excited with all of them.
But excitement is something you think about when
you think about a pregnancy. And rightfully so,
adding a new person, adding a new soul to your
family and a heart is just incredible, an incredible
gift from God. And the four letter word that
doesn't usually get put together with pregnancy
is the word fear. I would like to say that there
was zero fear in this pregnancy. But friends,
that was not the case. Fear was a loud guest
and it made itself comfortable in every single
heart. Loss makes you hyper aware. I think a
lot of us know that in different ways You've
maybe lost someone close to you and you know
how aware you become after that loss It makes
you realize that things can change so quickly
For my kids this pregnancy wasn't simply adding
a baby to the mix What it came down to was they
were worried about something so simple like safety.
They were worried about my safety If you're in
a season where one or many of your kids are walking
through something so big as fear, friends, what
a tender season to be in. Everything in me as
a mama bear wanted to make it better. I wanted
to hug them and tell them that it would be okay,
that the birth was going to be beautiful and
it was all going to be good. But I could not
look them in the eyes and promise them that because
I don't hold my days in my hand. It's only God.
But I could sit with them in the fear. I could
acknowledge it with them. I could listen to them
whenever they would express their feelings. And
then I could pray with them as well. God is such
a big God. He is not turned away. He is not put
out by our emotions, by our fears, by something
that can, I mean, control us and take us over
at times and feel like it's paralyzing. He is
so much bigger than that. And that was a beautiful
part of this process was sitting with my kids,
taking their fears and walking them through what
it looked like, submitting them to the Lord,
going to Him in prayer and saying, Lord, I'm
feeling this way. I know I was not made to be
afraid. I know it was not made to sit in fear.
But I am acknowledging that that's where I'm
at. But I'm also acknowledging that you are much
bigger. And that's the truth I want to claim
in my life. The amount of times that we quoted
Joshua 1 .9. Be strong and courageous. Everyone
knows this verse. Be strong and courageous. Do
not be afraid, for the Lord your God is with
you. The long months of my pregnancy, and especially
the last few months of my pregnancy, was an active
calling out to our souls. Be strong and courageous.
What a gift we have as mamas to walk beside our
children and hold their hand and hold their hearts
and walk them to the foot of the cross. I know
sometimes parenting feels like we're doing it
alone or like we have to figure it out alone.
I've been there. I know how that feels. But honestly,
we are never parenting alone and we were never
made to figure it out on our own. We don't have
to run from big feelings and emotions like fear
from our kids and with our kids. We get to walk
through it with them. Okay, anyway, I got a little
carried away there. Let's keep going. I wanted
to answer a question that I do get, I did get
a lot. And that was, what does it look like to
bring a newborn baby into the house with a family
dynamic like ours? Now, if you've been here while
you know our story, you know what it's like,
but for those of you who are new, let me give
you a really quick rundown. Our family is not
super straightforward. Me and my four oldest
kids have walked through loss, the loss of my
late husband, their dad. And then we walk through
figuring out life after that for many, many years.
And then we walk through adding someone to our
family and having Caleb come into our family.
him stepping into the role of dad and husband,
someone with no kid experience and yet was willing
to take on so much. So for us, adding another
baby to the mix was so much weightier than when
I was in my 20s and it was really just straightforward,
right? So the question was how are you adding
a newborn into our dynamic and how did we go
about that? From the very beginning when we started
talking about adding another child, I knew I
wanted to walk it out well. What that looked
like, I wasn't 100 % sure, but I knew I wanted
to do it well with my older kids. Now, did we
do it perfectly? Absolutely not. You can ask
them, but we wanted to do it well. One of the
ways this played out for us was involving them
in conversations and keeping the door open to
the conversation of where they were at, where
we were at, what was going on below the surface
and even conversations like the names that we
were thinking about and they could have input
in those you know if the majority didn't like
a name we would all agree and move on to something
else you know it wasn't about one big talk up
front and laying everything out and having this
long conversation with them it really was about
hundreds of small talks around the dinner table
in the car rides on walks. Well, I wasn't really
walking at that time because I really didn't
have the energy to do anything, but you get what
I'm saying. It was so many small conversations
that we would have with them over little things
and over big things. We talked about how the
house would sound once the baby was born and
how her her crying might affect us and how quiet
times might affect them and how some things would
be normal and then other things would have to
change. We allowed them to express their concerns
over some of these topics and allowed them the
space to really bring up some questions and concerns
that they would have. And instead of just shutting
it down and being like, okay, you just have to
get on board. This is what it is. And we're gonna
move on. We sat with them in their questions
and talked through them. I remember one of my
kids had a concern that, well, once the baby's
born, everything's gonna have to be quiet. We
cannot play in the house. We cannot talk. We
cannot do our music. We cannot watch movies.
This was a real concern that they had right because
babies do sleep a lot and you do have to have
some kind of quiet a little bit more quiet around
the house I remember it so vividly of this conversation
whenever I told him like Yeah, things are gonna
have to change and yeah, we're gonna have to
be a little quiet sometimes But for the most
part life can go on as normal and he spun around
and looked at me like I guess because he was
able to express that concern and I heard it and
I just encouraged him that no it doesn't have
to be this one way. He was encouraged by that.
So small conversations like those. I remember
another time when another one of my kids expressed
the concern that I would be taken up by the new
babies so much that I would have zero time for
them. Now you have to understand that the age
gap between Adeline, our newest baby, and the
older kids is quite quite a gap there. There's
a 10 -year gap between Adeline and Ellie and
then it just goes up from there. So these concerns,
I mean they have bigger concerns than it would
be like a toddler, right? But anyway they were
expressing how I would be taken away for and
I wouldn't be able to show up for them anymore
and specifically they were like mom, we're not
going to be able to go on coffee dates anymore.
I stopped him right there and I was like but
we are so gonna go on coffee dates and we have
been on coffee dates since she was born. Life
does change, but having these conversations with
them up front and letting them express, like
I said earlier, their fears and their thoughts,
their concerns really helped set the stage and
set the tone for whenever she was born. I'll
be honest with you, it didn't take them away.
It wasn't like, oh, okay, now we have those concerns.
are no more it wasn't that way it was they were
able to express them we were able to walk through
them with with them alongside them and just as
a parent being able to know where your child
is at where their heart is at is so huge and
such a vital point in which you can then speak
into where they are So we had many a conversation,
many small conversations, many big conversations
with all of our kids, one -on -one and in groups.
As I stated earlier, we wanted to show up well
and with a lot of intentionality in this season.
But because I was out of pocket for a lot of
that time, if you heard the first podcast, the
last episode, You heard me talk about this and
I wasn't able to fully show up for my kids, but
I was still able to show up in these ways and
in the conversations. And in a big one for us
was prayer. You guys don't underestimate the
power of prayer, the power that you bring to
the table whenever you sit and pray with your
child, not just over them in your quiet time,
but when you pray with your child. There was
so many times whenever they would express a concern
and I didn't have any words to give them to help
them feel better, but I could pray with them.
And so we would sit at the table, we would sit
in our living room, we would sit in the car,
whatever we were doing, and we would stop and
pray and turn those fears into requests before
the Father. I have to share this small thing
with you. Well, it's not really small. It was
huge at the time and it still is. It's still
precious and it is still so vivid in my mind.
The day I went into labor with Adeline, I'd been
in labor all day and I had just been going about
my business. I'd actually met up for coffee with
a friend and I was working through contractions
and then went to the grocery store, came home,
started cooking dinner with my mom. It was just
a normal, beautiful kind of day. It was honestly
the way I had prayed for it to happen. to just
be a normal day and go into labor just um progressively
as the day went on and that's how it played out
anyway not the part of the story i wanted to
tell you but as the day went on i could see um
some of the fears come up stronger and stronger
and some of my kids we were getting ready and
i was going to send the kids off with my parents
and we had about 10 minutes of whirlwind where
some of my kids had started changing the sheets
on the bed my husband was inflating the pool
it was just kind of chaotic and once everything
got done in this like 10 minute span we all somehow
ended up gathered in in my bedroom and i looked
around the room and i could see so much fear
on their faces and i didn't know how this was
going to play out you you never really know we
were having a home birth there was so much up
in the air i mean it's just it is a natural thing
childbirth but it's also like a big thing it's
I feel like every time a child is born and they
are healthy that is a miracle and when the mom
has survived that is a miracle and that is to
be celebrated so I was looking around and I could
feel the weight of of their hearts right there
so I was working through contractions and you
know what we did we stopped and we prayed and
I have a portion of this on video and it is absolutely
beautiful There were all kind of fears playing
into this moment for everyone. It looked a little
different and yet we all sat before the Lord,
gave him our fears, and then moved on to the
next thing. That moment to me was sacred. That
moment to me was precious and one that I will
hang on to for the rest of my life. And I guess
I share that because a lesson I learned in this
pregnancy was you do not have to be perfect.
to be present. Like, I knew that in the back
of my head, but to live in a season where you
cannot show up, where getting off of the couch
or getting out of bed is really, really hard,
it becomes more tangible, this thought of, you
do not have to be perfect to be present. Intense
contractions every three minutes is not a moment
where you can fully show up fully fully present
And yet the Lord sustained and he helped me show
up present in that moment for my kids I think
sometimes as moms we feel like we have to have
all of the answers to be a good mom But walking
with your kids through the hard stuff like grief
or a really hard pregnancy isn't about having
the answers, it's about intentionality and showing
up even when you are not a hundred percent. It's
about teamwork with your spouse and full dependency
on the Lord as should be every season of motherhood
for us. If you're in a hard season right now,
please hear me. You are doing better than you
think. I mean that. Your kids don't need a mom
who has it all figured out or who has all of
the answers or who doesn't crack under pressure
They need a mom who is willing to be honest and
to say I Need as just as much help as you do
right now They need a mom who is willing to sit
and listen to the hard and the not pretty and
the Chaos the messy they need you Before I let
you go today, I just want to take a second to
talk directly to the mom who is listening to
this while she is maybe hiding in the bathroom,
hiding in the closet, eating a snack or sitting
in the carpool lane or nursing your baby in the
dark. If your heart feels heavy today because
you're trying to hold space for your kids grief
while carrying your own, I want you to know you
are doing a brave thing. It is not easy to be
the anchor when the water around us is choppy.
I know this firsthand. But you are staying steady
for them and that matters more than you know.
But also hear this. You do not have to hold it
all together all the time. Take it to the Lord.
He cares. My hope is that by being transparent
with you on this podcast about my fears and how
we've walked through them as a family that you
feel less alone in yours. So mama, if this episode
hit home for you, if it felt like a breath of
fresh air that you needed to hear today, Would
you then this to one friend, one friend? We all
know one mom who is carrying a lot right now
and sometimes just knowing that someone else
gets it is enough to help us get through the
next hour. Thank you so much for being a part
of this community and for letting me share my
story with you. I'll talk to you in the next
episode.