Cold feet

I'm a sprinter.  I always have been.  I like the adrenaline, the push, the drive, the acceleration, the speed, and the quick finish.  I loved the 100 metre dash in track, I always choose short-term, intense projects, and I have been told, often more than once a week, that I move remarkably fast.  Silas even says to me, "Mommy, why are you so fast?"  I don't know why, son.  I just do everything fast, and I don't know how to slow down.  Of course, at a cost to speed is meticulousness and in my rush to do things fast, I often make more work for myself.  I am not gonna lie, most of the time I end up walking ahead of the rest of my family.  My need to 'get there' often makes me lose the joy of 'the journey.'

As I was pushing my poor, plump, pregnant body to the max (again) today: shopping, laundry, pre-school, chores, cooking, etc... I realize that my brain and personality just simply does not understand that my body can no longer keep my usual pace.  Like, at all.  I grocery shop and need a 2 hour recovery window, which I don't have, to get my tired and aching body to function.  

35 weeks pregnant?  I am done.  

I am a sprinter.  My body is over-burdened, over-whelmed, and cumbersome.  To push myself to the end of the couch requires an enormous amount of energy and positional gymnastics.  And then there's managing my ridiculously energetic and busy boys.  I barely have the energy to feed and clothe them, let alone answer the 100th "mommy' plea that comes from Toby in a 2 minute period.  "Come here, right now!" he's started yelling at me.  Perfect.  Oh yeah, and in 3 weeks we're having a third child.  I'm sorry, what?!  I thought this whole pregnancy thing was just, for kicks.  I kid you not, I actually wrote on my calendar on March 20th (date of schedule c-section) "have a baby."  Like, as if it's an afternoon activity.  And the calendar continues as though my world hasn't completely fallen off its axis.  Just out of curiosity, who exactly is going to manage her needs?!

I'm starting to get cold feet, "Oh my gosh, what have we gotten ourselves into."  P.s. it's too late.  Baby is coming.  How in the world am I going to keep up, for the long haul, with three little ones?  Most days, if I'm honest, I am barely keeping things together.  There is yelling, there is shushing, there is cleaning, there is groaning, there is whining, there are tears, and that's just me.  

I read this today and I was not encouraged.

I'm a sprinter, and I'm rounding the bend in the track, heading towards the finish and I'm done.  I'm no stinkin' marathoner.  We've just completed potty training with Toby, we've just got him settled in the same room as Silas, and we can hope for, usually, at least 4 nights a week when no one is up in the night or up too early. That is all over.  Done.  Back to the beginning. All independence we have struggled to gain back over these past 2 years is about to be immediately and irretrievably removed from us, again.

What?

Someone tell me the transition from 2 to 3 kids wasn't that hard?  Someone tell me that it's just cause I'm pregnant and hormonal and overwhelmed because my smart car brain is trapped in my freighter truck body? Someone tell me that we weren't crazy and that somehow I will, overnight, increase in capacity?  Or be able to tune more out?  Or get used to a messy, chaotic house, or maybe just won't care as much about those things? 

Someone tell me how to prepare for this life-altering event when we go from a family of 4 to a family of 5?!

I have exactly 3 weeks to completely lower my expectations about having any sort of organized life.  Help!