Wowzers. Another month, another adventure.

In some ways, that adventure was legit, honest-to-goodness, fill-up-the-soul experience. In others, it was a metaphorical lesson of “Yep. You are so totally human and so totally growing a human, to boot (now, chill).” You’d think by Baby No.5 that I had learned all of those lessons possible, but I’m pretty sure I could have 13 kids like my great-grandmother (bwahaha – SO. NOT. HAPPENING!) and I still wouldn’t know it all because it is no joke that every babe is different and so is every pregnancy, so the lessons just never stop (but as for me and my uterus? yeah. stopping). 

First, the soul-filling. Last week I got to road trip with one of my dearest friends to see one of my absolute music LOVES in concert not once but twice in Colorado. I pretty much blew up my IG and FB with pictures, so you probably already know all this, but Chelsie and I had an incredible time seeing Nahko and Medicine for the People in Boulder the first night and at Red Rocks the second. Nahko has been a bucket list point of mine for a few years. Red Rocks? Oh, I’d say I’ve been waiting at least 20 years on that one, so to combine the two? Ahhhh, so good! I’ve shared N&MftP’s music before in blog posts and online, but for real – if you aren’t familiar, take a stroll down Spotify or iTunes to take them in because they aren’t kidding when they call their work medicine. Their stuff is charged and conscious and speaks so much to the humanity and spirit in all of us, plus our connection to the planet and each other. I could gush on and on, but instead, take a listen for yourselves and check out these six men on stage together having the absolute best time ever playing together and interacting with the crowd and you’ll get a tiny taste of my last Thursday and Friday nights and why they made all the chaos to come totally worth it. 

Because of the dual venues and decent drive to get to CO in the first place, both Thursday and Friday turned into long days and nights. Thursday was especially rough as my excited night-before-Christmas feeling self didn’t sleep well before we got up pre-sunrise to hit the road and then were up past midnight mountain time that same day because the show ended late (um, hello – my other musical love and Nahko BFF, Trevor Hall, surprised us by showing up during the show’s encore and I may have bruised Chelsie’s arm slapping her so hard out of “OHMYGOSH! DOYOUSEETHIS! TREVORHALL! TREVORHALL!” fangirl excitement, even though, yes, she clearly had two eyes to see for herself all the awesomeness). But yeah, there was definitely more activity and adrenaline going on during our trip than actual rest and relaxation. 

And of this was totally fine, until it totally wasn’t. 

Saturday morning we again got up pre-sunrise to begin the long-ish road home and were in the car for less than an hour, chatting away and looking for a coffee stop, before all of the sudden I broke off mid-story and said, “I think I’m going to be sick.” And because I just can’t put you all through the gory details like I did poor Chels, just imagine that scene happening again every 45 minutes or less the rest of the way home from Denver. It. Was. AWFUL. I was a shitty travel companion and felt even shittier myself on many fronts. For one, I couldn’t believe this was happening again less than a month from when I would up in the hospital for an IV. It’s hard not to feel responsible for getting sick when it feels like you haven’t taken very good care of yourself/know you’ve pushed your limits and figure exhaustion is then getting the best of you. I also thought for sure I was headed back to the hospital because whoa. How is a mama supposed to get ahead?! 

As it turned out, getting home really was the best medicine for me. I crawled into my own bed where I napped and sipped on Gatoraid and got to see my sweet babes and really, with the exception of one more yuck before turning in for the night, my tummy settled and I was “just” left with a nasty, nasty headache. I was so relieved because Sunday was our first charity yoga event and I did not want to miss it even though I totally did have to take other items off the Sunday To Do list because even feeling better did not mean feeling normal after the insanity of Saturday. Also, check out my right leg. I remember it being sore while I was trying to sleep at the hotel Friday night, and then I wore pants Saturday, so it wasn’t until late that night when I had changed into shorts that I caught a glimpse of my lower leg when I saw holy moly pissed off Achilles’! Thankfully I don’t think major damage was done and the bruises are all but gone today, but wow. I don’t think I need any more signs at this point, do you? 

So. Did we ever determine the cause of said sickness craziness? Well, again – like the supposed food poisoning – we think so. After posting and hearing back from multiple friends over the course of the weekend, we think that yes, exhaustion did not help but that the real culprit was altitude sickness. Apparently it can go bonkers during pregnancy for some women (I had no issues with it in Aspen last summer and was there for four days) and it can take up to a couple days to strike. And that super sucks because I am supposed to go back later in the summer and now don’t know if I can handle it because I honestly can’t keep doing this get sick, kind of get better, get sick business. This babe and I are worn the flip out and I need to get that true reset to my system that I keep talking about here on the blog, which leads me back to this post’s title. 

Am I listening? Yes, I am. Or at least I am trying, and will try even harder after this weekend’s experience. I have loaded my summer pretty heavy and now I see that the bump and I need to just be as much as possible (with five other people in our family who still need time, attention, and love) and that means taking things off the schedule. That’s not going to be fun. In fact, it’s going to plain hurt in a couple cases, but the message I keep getting is slow down. Knock it off with the Trying to Do ALL the Things and listen. 

If every pregnancy is different (and it is), then every baby teaches us something different, and I do believe we’ve figured out that this baby’s agenda is: patience. Might seem kind of ironic for fifth kid to come with that approach but it might also be totally perfect. S/he (who is going to very much need a whole lot of Nahko on a birthing playlist) might just really be this mama’s best teacher when it comes to not rushing, not forcing the issue (Dear God, please do not let this mean that s/he is going to get super cozy in my tummy and go (way) past due date like my other Nov. baby). 

Because I’m themey and my brain has been singing 30 second shuffle sound bytes ever since Thursday night, I’ll end with this conglomeration of Nahko lyrics that echo this baby’s prescription of how to proceed: 

Nature has her signs/And they’re clear affirmations. 

It all can be done/Whatever your theory or method of one/It all can be done. 

Take your time, with every little thing/With every little thing, take time.