One Breath at a Time.
I have been reading Anne Lamott’s ‘Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life’ (book review to follow) and I recently read a chapter about the true secret to writing is to pay attention - in your real life, to your characters, to your senses and details and then write about them.
Today is my husband’s birthday and while I won’t be doing any huge photo share and sweet post on Instagram or social media as I will write that in a card or actually say it out loud to him again and again, there is a detail of our shared live I keep re-visiting and it is time to write it.
Rewind over five years ago and Chris and I are about to bring our first child earthside. I will not share the full birth story here as I have written and shared it many times over, however I will share a part of it that took our relationship to another stratosphere.
Read on….
As some parents do, Chris and I had written a birth plan - you know, the plan of the way you would love things to go as you embark on one crazy ass adventure of the body and another body and breath and change and magic. This should always be written in pencil maybe with a few back up plans as just like vision & goals, it rarely ever goes as planned. Anne Lamott actually just quoted that in her book - something along the lines of : 'tell God your plans and watch her laugh’.
So during the birth, I am in pain and exhausted during a point in our laboring - not even close to delivery. And I am veering far left from the plan we had written. I am talking total 180 and crying and begging for a new plan. Almost hysterical and there are people everywhere as my doula is behind me and the nurse with purple hair is down in between my legs checking on crazy measurements, my doc with a shaved head and huge earrings is in and out (she was awesome), and our playlist is playing and I hate every single song now.
Chris stands up from the inch away from my nose he stayed at all times until the moment he actually caught our daughter into the World and he makes absolutely everyone leave the room. He goes ‘EVERYONE OUT, I need to talk to my wife alone’.
And to my surprise in a time like this, they actually leave and all follow his direction, shut the door and give us time.
I am doing way shallow breaths at this point and tears stream down my face and he is back to his spot, the inch away from my nose and he talks to me calmly and ever so gently. He remind me to breathe a little deeper. He speaks to the plan we had written and why we wanted to do it this way and asks if this is something I still want, just the two of us now. And I do and I say yes and he says this:
“Okay then. Here is what we are going to do: we are going to take this one breath at a time. One contraction at a time. Stop thinking about the end and let’s focus on this breath and get through this contraction. And now this one. And we will do this together.”
I said okay and probably cried some more because Chris is amazing and I love him and I could not believe he just did that. His leadership and candor and ability to be in control in conversation was beyond incredible and one of my favorite memories to date of us in communication.
He then stood up, let everyone back in the room, and we followed through on our original intention one breath at a time.
Still in awe that happened.
In this World now, in these days now with all the news and headlines and fear, I keep coming back to that offering he told me of one breath at a time. No need to rush ahead to what is out there in that next day or that next year, one breath at a time I keep saying.