Fifth Pregnancy

Five years ago next month, I became pregnant with my fourth child, Miriam Joy. Despite it having been 10 years since my previous pregnancy (or maybe, because?), and despite my being almost 40 years old, being pregnant with and giving birth to her were amazing experiences. Really, it was incredible. 

I had spent the 12 months prior to getting pregnant losing 50 pounds and setting healthier habits. Even though I was 39, I was in better shape than I'd been for decades and it was by far my best pregnancy of the four. And then I had the most amazing delivery. It was spontaneous, fast, uncomplicated and with a quick recovery. 

At the time, in July 2016, I was part of a few homeschool groups and had just done a year's course with the C.S. Lewis Institute. Old friends and new friends and women I didn't even know flooded us with help and meals so that I didn't have to cook for the first 6 weeks of Miriam's life. Miriam was a happy baby who slept when held or walked outside in the stroller. She woke through the night for nursing but slept in our bed so I still got decent sleep. 

In addition to wanting a sibling for Miriam, loving being a mom and loving kids, I had such a positive experience with my fourth pregnancy and birth, that I was more than happy to do it a fifth time. February 2018 brought me the news that indeed, God had blessed us with a fifth baby -- I was ecstatic!

And then a month later, on the very day I had been to a massive children's resale and bought a few newborn items, Steve told me that he'd been granted a fellowship to go spend a school year in Israel working on his doctoral dissertation, beginning in September, and that housing and food would be provided for all of us. 

Whoa.

That meant I would be giving birth in a foreign country. Mere weeks after arriving there. Knowing nobody. Half a world away from my mom and my mother-in-law.

But this was my fifth! I knew how to have babies, knew how to nurse, knew how to parent. Most critical of all was my expectation that I would be living in community. Our accommodations in Jerusalem were to be at an "ecumenical institute" where other Christian families and singles lived, some for short times, others for longer term. We would be living next door to each other, sharing meals in the dining hall together. We would be foreigners together in a walled compound, and I thought we'd be sharing life. I thought we'd feel like family. I thought I would have support.

We moved to Israel/Palestine in September 2018, leaving Dulles on September 9 and arriving in Tel Aviv on September 10. I was due October 17.

While still in the States, I had Skyped with an American living at the institute, who had given birth to multiple babies there in Palestine. She had told me where she delivered (Holy Family Hospital in Bethlehem), what the care and cost were like (good and low respectively), and generally reassured me that all would be fine. I liked her responses and assumed that I too would give birth at Holy Family. Within days of arriving, I set off on foot for the hospital and had my first check-up. All the signs and literature were in Arabic and French, but the doctors and nurses spoke English and the facility seemed adequate. The care response I received, though, scared me. On the two visits I made in my first month there, I was told both times that I should expect to have a caesarean. I'd had a C-section with my 3rd and had no desire to repeat the experience. I'd also had a successful VBAC (vaginal birth after caesarean) with my 4th, so knew I could do another. My distrust of the doctors to let me try my very hardest for a natural delivery made me change my mind. Just a couple weeks from my due date, I switched gears and decided to birth at St. Joseph Hospital in East Jerusalem. [To be continued...]