My complicated pregnancy story: I felt guilt, sadness, helplessness.... all the feels!!! I was ordered to spend a month in the hospital on bed rest. I had some bleeding that the doctors couldn't explain. They determined it safer for me and my baby boy to stay monitored until he was born. I had daily monitoring (you know those round plastic pads with the pink and blue straps leaving you unable to move, for what seems like forever?!), ultra sounds several times a week, and constant vital checks. I was experiencing so many emotions. I was sad that I was away from my family and unable to enjoy the end of my pregnancy the way I imagined. I felt guilty, thinking, "did I do something wrong? was I working too hard?" I felt, oh so helpless. I've always believed my body to be very strong. I just felt like my body had become incapable.
Despite these challenges, I also had a beautiful spiritual experience. I just kept telling myself, 'I am here because I am suppose to be here.' I was so grateful to be a therapist and have my own tools (affirmations, thought challenges, therapist friends!) I also had amazing support and hour long phone calls with my friends and family. I found myself asking the nurses about the other pregnant mothers on my floor. Some were ordered to be there for several months with much more intense complications. I asked, "do they have a therapist?" They said these women did not, and some were "very depressed, sitting in the dark, and one refusing to bathe" I felt such a calling that I was suppose to help these women.