normalcy and not

I have a dear friend here in town that is newly pregnant. She recently ended that torturous wait time between finding out you're pregnant and your first appointment sometime between 8 to 10 weeks. As we were talking, I remembered my countdown app where I plugged in my first appointment date and obsessively watched the numbers tick away. It was one of the gazillion pregnancy apps that I neatly organized in a "Baby!" app folder on the first page of my iPhone. Later that week, I was filling out my weekly desk calendar [that I've decided I would not want to go on living without] and realized that I had almost forgotten that my 24 week appointment was the next morning, and, all of a sudden, I was super proud of myself. Not for the almost forgetting about my appointment part but because it seemed like a small representation of a pregnant lady who could have potentially chilled out a little.

But even with what seemed like a little chilling out [which, I'd like to think, was some growth in trust that pushed out some of that fear], I could sense a new rhythm of life slowly encroaching. A rhythm of being very much consumed in all things pregnancy which, I would imagine, could easily translate into being consumed in all things Lottie after she arrives. Now I totally expect for her first few weeks or months to be survival mode: all Lottie all the time. As I've heard it is and as it should be. But there have been a few instances lately that made me realize how all-consumed I've been. You know, like that time I forgot my best friend's birthday. Me. The birthday-lover. The best friend whose birthday I've been celebrating since we were thirteen. I pretty much hated myself for a solid 24-hours even though she was wonderfully gracious and understanding.

I expect for life with Lottie to be our new normal. For there to be less time for other things seeing as how I'm responsible for physically sustaining her to a certain extent [which, I couldn't be more excited for, by the way]. But I'm telling myself now that it'll just take a little more effort on my part to walk closely with this God-given community: family and friends, local and distant. To physically remember birthdays and prayer requests and important appointments. Because baby brain is a real thing, y'all. With each checklist made and each appointment attended all the while everyone else's lives also speed along, I'm reminded that community is a beautiful, messy, breathing thing. Something I'm passionate about, something I pray will be instilled in Lottie, something I'll have to work a little harder at in the coming months. And, when I forget someone else's birthday, I will give myself grace and remember that we're learning our new [and precious] normal.