I’m 38 weeks pregnant.
At this point, I’m supposed to be nesting. I’m supposed to be washing tiny clothes, organizing bottles, packing the hospital bag, wiping down everything that doesn’t need to be wiped down, and generally preparing for the arrival of this baby.
Instead, we got the crib up today.
So, technically, I did one nesting thing.
The hospital bag? Still not packed.
And honestly, I’m sad and angry all the time right now.
I’m just tired.
Tired of everything going on. Tired of feeling like I have no control over what is happening around me. Tired of constantly having to adjust, wait, figure things out, and make peace with circumstances I didn’t exactly choose.
And the whole not cooking thing is really starting to piss me off.
I want to cook.
I want to make my soups and casseroles and all the cozy food I had planned for this season. I want to feel like I’m preparing my home and my life for this baby instead of constantly feeling like I’m in limbo.
I know I need to relax.
I know I need to focus on the fact that my daughter is almost here.
I know I should be enjoying these last few weeks and preparing for her instead of sitting around being sad about everything I can’t control.
But sometimes you can know exactly what you should be doing and still not have it in you to do it.
Part of me is just too sad.
And maybe that’s why I’ve been thinking about Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby.
There’s that moment when Daisy looks at her daughter and says she hopes she’ll be “a beautiful little fool.”
The older I get, the more I understand why she said it.
Not because I think women should be fools. Quite the opposite.
I think there’s something heartbreaking about becoming a mother and realizing that one day, your daughter is going to be a woman just like you.
She’ll love people.
She’ll trust people.
She’ll make mistakes.
She’ll make decisions she absolutely should not make.
She’ll ignore advice because she needs to learn things for herself.
And eventually, she may look back at some of the choices she made and wonder what the hell she was thinking.
Because I know I have.
I look at my own life and realize I have been an idiot woman at times. I’ve made stupid decisions. I’ve stayed too long, trusted too much, ignored things I probably shouldn’t have ignored, and allowed other people and circumstances to influence choices that ultimately belonged to me.
And now I’m going to raise a daughter.
A daughter who will hopefully learn from my mistakes.
A daughter who will hopefully have enough confidence to make better choices than I did.
A daughter who will hopefully know her worth before somebody else has the opportunity to convince her that she doesn’t have any.
But the funny thing about motherhood is that I can teach her everything I know and she is still going to make her own mistakes.
She is still going to have her own heartbreaks.
She is still going to make decisions that make absolutely no sense to me.
And I’m going to have to sit there and watch her learn the same way I had to.
I just hope her mistakes are different from mine.
And if there is one thing I really hope she takes from me, it’s this:
Never make a life-changing decision just because of a man.
Love someone. Build a life with someone. Make compromises for someone.
But don’t lose yourself for someone.
Because I want my daughter to be many things.
Beautiful, sure.
Smart.
Kind.
Funny.
A little weird.
Strong.
But most importantly, I want her to be her own person.
Maybe that’s part of what scares me about becoming a mother.
I’m not just preparing for a baby.
I’m preparing to raise a whole human being who will eventually become a woman with her own choices, mistakes, heartbreaks, opinions, and hopefully enough common sense to avoid at least some of mine.
For now, though, I’m 38 weeks pregnant.
The crib is finally up.
The hospital bag is still sitting there, unpacked.
And I’m trying to remind myself that I don’t have to have everything emotionally figured out just because the baby is almost here.
Maybe nesting doesn’t always look like perfectly organized drawers and matching newborn outfits.
Maybe sometimes nesting is just putting the crib together while you’re sad.
Maybe sometimes it’s admitting you’re angry.
Maybe sometimes it’s accepting that you don’t feel in control and doing the next small thing anyway.
Today, that thing was the crib.
Tomorrow, maybe I’ll pack the damn hospital bag.
