by Marie Vonow (follow)

Pregnancy (8)      Perspective (4)      Self Reliance (1)     

An unexpected turn of events can change your whole world for a time. Then life returns to 'normal' but the experience is never forgotten.

Three decades ago I was pregnant with my first child. At six months pregnant I had my monthly check up with my obstetrician after a busy day at work. I was somewhat apprehensive because I had put on too much weight that month.

After checking various things the obstetrician sat me down and said I had high blood pressure. He instructed me to go home and spend the next week in bed resting. I was then to return to have my blood pressure checked and if it wasn’t down I would be put in hospital. He said forget about working the rest of my pregnancy. This all came as a shock and I burst into tears. Would you believe he didn’t have a box of tissues in his consulting room?

One day I am working five days a week, doing house work, gardening, visiting my Dad in the nursing home, catching up with other family members and living a busy life. The next day I am sitting in bed thinking I would go crazy with boredom. How on Earth would I fill in the next three months?

The first week was difficult and I was somewhat down in the dumps. However, the human mind is very adaptable. I accepted what was happening. Yes, I did spend some time in hospital but was then allowed to come home to my own bed.

I found plenty to do in bed. There were all sorts of things I didn’t usually have time for. The first thing was I really started to bond with the new life in my tummy. I had time to concentrate on my baby. I played music to him and talked to him.

I enjoyed reading the paper each day and got quite good at crosswords. Each week I read a couple of new magazines, cut out any interesting articles and entered competitions. I wrote readers letters to magazines. By the end of my pregnancy I had a collection of poems I had written. It was nice having time to write lots of letters. I finished the tapestry I had bought a few years earlier and never found time to do. I read books. In the evenings I watched some television and played cards with my husband.

I appreciated the people who came to visit with tales of the outside world. Once a week I was allowed to leave the house to visit the doctor. This became a highlight of the week. Most of the time I spent on my own and was amazed at how much there was to do to entertain myself. It made me see life from a different perspective. I realised how important it is to be self reliant in terms of not depending on other people to keep you entertained and I was so glad I enjoy my own company.

My baby arrived and there were no more days in bed for me. Life was full of a wide variety of activities and there were new skills for me to learn as I became used to being a mother. The important thing I learnt from my time in bed was the importance of enjoying your own company and that life can be full and enjoyable even if you are limited in some way.



# Perspective
# Pregnancy
# Self Reliance

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