Mommy Monday- An Unexpected Surprise

My body trembled and shook as I breathed and moaned through the intense contraction. Sweat dripped off of my skin in droves as if I had been running a marathon. My husband was dashing around trying to get everything ready for the baby’s imminent arrival. 

It was a couple days until my due date and my midwife was running late. Where the heck was she! She knew that once the contractions became almost intolerable that the baby would be here quickly. I was angry. This was my fourth pregnancy, so we knew by experience that it would be time soon. I was trying very hard not to push. 

 A primitive sound escaped my mouth. Panic was trying to creep into my mind. The pain was unrelenting. Without warning I heard an internal pop and felt the baby’s head slip into the birth canal. I yelled for my husband. This baby was coming whether we were ready or not. I let my body take over and do what it was made to do. With a gush of water and no other fanfare, my youngest daughter was born. I gently cradled her in my arms and she looked up at me with her bright innocent eyes. In that moment, I was happy.

That amazing experience, along with many others, has shown me that happiness is often found in some of the most unusual circumstances. I have also discovered that I am best able to recognize happiness after feeling an emotion that is one of the polar opposites of happiness. For instance, despite the anger, pain, and intense non-happy feelings experienced during the labor and delivery of my fourth child; an incredible sense of peace, love and happiness was mine at the end of it all. 

 I find that happiness is found within ourselves regardless of where we are geographically located. My definition or idea of happiness best coincides with a Denis Waitley quote. He sums it up perfectly, “Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.”