Giving birth to my fourth child just a few weeks ago felt momentous.
It wasn’t just about finally (sort of) regaining control of my body or getting to actually see the son I’d been carrying for months. It felt like the end of something, in a way, coupled with the beginning of something entirely different. My husband and I had already agreed this would be our last child, so experiencing the joys and tribulations of pregnancy and childbirth one final time felt electric.
It was special in the same way finishing a beautiful book feels, or returning home after a memorable vacation: bittersweet, but made all the more meaningful because of its finality.
Deciding on the size of our family
I never had a fixed idea of how many children I wanted. When dating, my now-husband and I talked about wanting a family, but we never really discussed a specific number of kids. In hindsight, it’s kind of strange that we assumed we were aligned. He’s the youngest of eight and I’m the oldest of four. But, somehow, we were in sync. We knew we wanted a child right after getting married, and we were lucky to conceive our firstborn daughter almost immediately. She was followed by a sister and a brother, all about two years apart.
It was actually during those pregnancies that we started seriously talking about how many kids we wanted. We realized we shared the same perspective: having only one felt incomplete, two felt like a small unit, but three felt like a family.
Still, after our first son was born, I found myself wondering if we had room in our lives for a fourth. Physically, I didn’t feel finished. When I brought it up with my husband, he admitted he felt similarly.
Getting the timing right was tricky
We were admittedly overwhelmed with three kids, though we had finally found some sort of rhythm. Everyone was in school, and life felt a little more structured.
I was 35 and my husband was 45. After three back-to-back pregnancies, I knew I didn’t want to close this chapter, reclaim my body, dive back into my career, and then have to start all over again. If we were going to move forward into the next phase of life, actually raising these kids, I didn’t want to go backward later. So we went for it.
Things felt differently this time around
Despite the excitement, the pregnancy felt entirely different from others. It immediately occurred to me that it was going to be the last time that I would feel the joy and wonder that come along with a positive pregnancy test. It was also going to be the last time I’d take a pregnancy test hoping it would turn out positive. I would never again experience the quiet elation involved in knowing that my body and mind are working together to deliver something I’ve wished for.
This fourth and last time, though, I tried to slow down and savor it all. I tried to memorize the sensation of the kicks, those surreal moments of private communication from the flesh of your flesh, happening inside your own body. Nothing I’ve felt in my 36 years quite compares. I’ve always felt a connection to my unborn children, but knowing this would be the last time I’d experience that bond made it feel even more sacred.
Even the hard parts felt different. This time, I focused on the medical miracle of it all. My mantra became: “It’s the last time. Be grateful you can even do this.”
There’s a unique sense of accomplishment that comes with knowing you’re at your last pregnancy — not because having kids is a task to check off, but because the physical burden of carrying them has come to a close. That finality brought clarity and, in a way, relief.
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