Expecting Miracles Sneak Preview: Section Three

A Time to Pray

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My most powerful experiences of prayer have coincided with the times in life when I have felt the most thankful and also the most vulnerable. When I found out I was pregnant for the first time, for example, I had to borrow a handful of tissues from the kerchiefed old lady sitting next to me at the Western Wall. By the time I found out about my second pregnancy, I knew enough to come prepared with my own package.

The women in this chapter describe the importance as well as the real benefits of prayer during pregnancy. They focus on providing spiritual nutrition for the baby they are carrying - through intensified prayer as well as putting extra effort into the performance of mitzvoth and good deeds.

Spiritual Nutrition

Leah is a twenty-five year old mother of two children who grew up in Los Angeles and moved to Israel when she married four years ago. She and her husband come from families that are of Chassidic background, but identify as Lithuanian Charedi in terms of religious outlook. As is often the case in her community, she works to support her small family while her husband learns in kollel [a yeshiva program for married men].

Leah suffers terribly during her pregnancies from varicose veins, but she has come to feel that having a baby at the end of the pregnancy makes up for her suffering. She and her husband dream of raising a large family.

Physical Difficulties

I come from Los Angeles, and grew up as the sixth child out of a family of eight, so I don't remember my mother being pregnant. I grew up what they would call in Israel "Charedi," and I went to a Bais Yaakov school. I had a typical American Orthodox upbringing.

I was ecstatic when I first found out I was pregnant. I was twenty-two, and I was already an old hand at being pregnant without ever having been myself, because all of my high school friends had already had babies. I thought I knew a lot about pregnancy, but I found out there was still a lot for me to learn. It wasn't frightening, since I'd heard so much about it.

It was very exciting, since it was my first time, and I felt like I'd been given such a gift. You never know if you can have children, and then you find out that you can. I had been afraid about that, since several of my friends had gone through periods when they were waiting to get pregnant. I was somehow bracing myself when I got married that it might take a long time, and I even thought, "Who knows? It might never happen." So I was really happy. I couldn't wait to put on maternity clothing.

That doesn't mean I wasn't a little bit nervous about becoming a mother. But I remember thinking that I had always known that motherhood and raising children could be difficult, but I never realized that pregnancy itself could be so hard. A few weeks into the pregnancy I was feeling really awful. It was a shock to me how bad I felt. I had heard about morning sickness, but I hadn't realized that so-called "morning sickness" would be something to deal with twenty-four hours a day for the next two months. It was a big adjustment for me.

Let's put it this way- three months before I was single, I was a teacher, I was living in my parents' house in America; three months later I'd moved to Israel and I was married and I was pregnant. I was in a new job trying to meet people, and learning how to run a house. I didn't know how to shop, how to cook, how to do anything.

Effect on Marriage

I had heard people say that it's tough on a relationship when the wife gets pregnant right away, since she's feeling sick, and cannot focus on the relationship with her husband. But I found the opposite holds true, because you leave your home and your family, and everyone you know, and you feel really awful, and you can't even tell anyone you're pregnant yet, so the only person you have to rely on is your husband. And he knows it and you know it, and I think it fortifies a relationship. You only have each other.

If we'd been near my parents we would have been running there every Shabbos, and here we had no choice- my husband had to rise to the occasion. My husband was very undemanding, and understanding, and supportive. He does know how to cook, and he would tell me, "I'll do cook for Shabbos," even though most of the time I managed, baruch Hashem [thank G-d], but one night I was making food for Shabbos and I was so nauseous that I made about half the cholent [Sabbath stew], and then I turned to him and said, "That's it, you take over for me," so he seasoned it, and had a good time. He also always did the dishes at night. That whole experience really made me appreciate him. It probably would never have happened if I'd been closer to my family, and in the end it was a really positive experience.

The Second Pregnancy

After having two babies I can tell you that I do not enjoy pregnancy, and I don't think I'll ever enjoy pregnancy, but I love having babies and it's worth it. I think I'm a bit lucky in that way since I married later than my friends, and I had an opportunity to teach the highest level of Jewish studies in a local high school for a few years. I loved the intellectual stimulation and the feeling of professionalism, but it made me realize that career alone left me unfulfilled. I felt that so much of my potential was left untapped.

Getting married and having children has given me a deeper sense of accomplishment and satisfaction than I had ever experienced- a real purpose for my life. So no matter how awful I feel before or after birth I know that there is not even one moment that I regret focusing on being a wife and mother and wish that I was on the other side of the fence. I feel now like a tree in bloom, like I can finally bear fruit.

So, I hope I have many more children, but that doesn't mean I enjoy pregnancy. I'm miserable during pregnancy, because of the physical aspects of it. The first trimester has its problems, and from the middle trimester on I have a lot of problems with varicose veins. I can't even stand for a few minutes to talk to someone in the street, or to cook a meal for Yom Tov [the holiday].

I trained myself to do a lot sitting down- ironing sitting down, or I use a tall kitchen stool to wash dishes or fry things sitting down. You can't run after a two-year old sitting down, but there is a lot you can do. I have to wear very good support stockings, and they're a pain in the neck. They're uncomfortable, especially in the summer, and it takes ten minutes to get them on, and then you have to hand wash them every night.

For the last trimester my muscles hurt, and I was big and uncomfortable. It's hard. And you try to keep perspective, and remember that you're happy and grateful. I know it sounds strange, but I have to keep on reminding myself that there's a human being inside of me during pregnancy- I'm not just sickness with legs. Psychologically, this second pregnancy was easier. I remember that first pregnancy looking at myself and being so depressed. I was thinking how just a year before I had been a kallah [woman engaged to be married], single and young and thin. And a year later I felt like I was deteriorating. I thought I would never get back to myself.

Once I was kvetching about how sick I felt during pregnancy, and my brother said something really beautiful to me. He said, "What a zechus [privilege] that you are able to bring a new Jewish baby into the world!" It really made an impression on me because I saw that he meant it so sincerely. I saw that he truly wished that he could be in my place.

Prayer

It's very important to pray a lot during pregnancy. You need G-d's help- it's a time when prayers can help a lot in a child's development. It's just like everything you eat- everything you daven affects the child. And it makes you feel better, knowing that Hashem's in charge, and reminds you to have bitachon [trust]. You need to remember with all of the tests and the ultrasounds that it's all in Hashem's hands. It's easier said than done, but prayer's a way to get there.

Pregnancy and birth make us realize all the nisim [miracles] that happen to us every day and we just don't make an effort to see them. Pregnancy made me realize that life itself is the greatest miracle. Nature itself is a miracle, just that it's happening all the time, so we don't think about it. A healthy baby is the greatest miracle of all.

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Also in this section The Mikveh Lady, I'm on My Feet- Thank G-d, and Interviews with Rebbetzins Chana Henkin and Tziporah Heller