This day. 18 Years Ago!
Let’s rewind 18 years, 8 months. We found out we were expecting twins! Twin pregnancies are fraught with worry since so many have complications compared with singleton births. The mantra of most twin books — keep the babies in as long as possible! This is why so many women expecting twins are put on bed rest.
Our twins’ due date was July 10th.
I remember sitting on the couch one evening early in the pregnancy, reading the preeminent twin book about the many complications from premature births. Suddenly, I “saw” the date June 30th, which was well past any danger zone.
Since I’d heard so many messages from books and people and doctors about twins being born prematurely, I worried mine would come early, too. I was even concerned about them being Gemini’s. Nothing wrong with Geminis, but Geminis are twins to begin with so twin twins would have been a lot of energy!
My mom quit her job and moved from California to Washington to help us when the babies came early.
They didn’t come.
As we finally entered June, each week my doctor would say, “you will have these babies in a few days, but make your weekly appointment just in case.”
In mid-June, he announced he was leaving on vacation and apologized for not being able to be there when the babies were born.
I saw his colleague the following week, and she said they would like to induce me since I’d made it to 38 weeks (full-term for twins), but unfortunately, the maternity ward was full.
I was enormous, in physical agony, and exhausted. Like good Swedes, we waddled through the entirety of IKEA trying to get these babies excited to be born.
Nada, zip, nothing.
Monday rolled around, and at 7 am, the phone rang. A scheduled delivery had happened over the weekend, and a bed was unexpectedly available — come on in!
It was June 30th.
However, the Universe wasn’t done showing me divine timing. My original (favorite) doctor came by during his rounds and was incredulous to see me. He said he was booked solid, playing catch-up from his vacation, but joked that if I could arrange for the babies to come during his lunch between 1–2pm, he’d be delighted to deliver them, “wink wink”.
He knew that wouldn’t happen because they’d already broken my water and started Pitocin (I know, I know, not very granola or Earth Mama. Remember the books? Doctors? The fear about complications? Yeah, I bought into all of it.)
You know where this is going. I started contractions close to 1pm, Linnea was born at 1:11pm (auspicious timing!) Mattias was born 9 minutes later.
It was as if the Universe was saying, “just to show you that you weren’t imagining the June 30th sign, we’re going to perform another little miracle and make it so they arrive during the short, 1-hour window so your favorite doctor can deliver them! And, they will be Cancers.”
Imagine if I’d listened when the Universe showed me all would be well. I’d heeded countless messages before, even marrying my glorified pen-pal based on “signs”. When it came to the babies, however, I gave my trust over to the “experts”. If I’d trusted my intuition over the doctors and books, I would have saved myself 8ish months of worry.
If you find yourself listening to the “experts” or your family or friends or the news or society or teachers or doctors or anyone outside yourself, you’re more likely to buy into their information. This just clouds your own inner knowing. Instead, use your grounding to clean out other people’s ideas, beliefs, and expectations. When your energy is clear, it’s easier to tap into your intuition and listen to the Universe.
