PERSONAL TESTIMONY
Thoughts
&
Musings
Yes, I'm Pregnant. Child #4. Here's How I Found Out.
“How many children did you say you wanted?” my beautician asked abruptly.
All eyes turned to my small demeanor.
I sat silent.
“How many children did you say you wanted?” my beautician asked abruptly.
All eyes turned to my small demeanor.
I sat silent.
“Five,” I said with the utmost confidence, so as to not sound like I was still in elementary school…because I was.
5th grade to be exact.
Laughter ensued.
The most sincere smiles glanced my way.
I could tell that many wanted to pinch my cheeks, as if such gestures were still allowed at my age.
“Wait until you have one,” the other beauticians chimed in unison.
I could see that they held experience. I solely had vision.
That is… until I experienced the birth of my firstborn.
The desire for more kids never waned. A desire that I knew I hadn't conjured up. A desire placed inside me at a young age for some divine reason.
That is….until the delivery of my second child, Ada Rose.
One week after her birth, I sat on my couch with our newborn daughter, wondering how in the world other mothers around the world could even desire to have more than two children. I’d just persevered through a natural birth, then through a period of painful afterbirth contractions, and then through too many hours of breast engorgement.
At this point, I felt my hormones dipping quickly and felt a strong need for a good cry. To escape the feeling of loneliness, I chose to distract myself by watching a show on television.
As I began to sink into further despair, wondering when I’d begin to feel “normal” again or happy, I felt the Lord speak.
Interestingly, I didn’t hear words of comfort from the Holy Spirit.
Instead, the Lord led me to place my hand over my still very mushy womb and make a declaration.
I hesitated for a few minutes. I knew exactly what the Lord wanted me to say aloud, but I didn’t think I held any level of sincerity to match the coming words. The prompting continued until the words poured forth from my mouth like a dam bursting in great momentum.
“Lord, this womb is yours,” I said with tears blurring any vision I had while staring at the screen. “Have your way. Birth as many precious souls as you so desire through me. I surrender this womb in Your Hands.”
I felt my words declare something pivotal. It’s a memory forever etched in my short recourse of these last few years.
A few short months after that moment, my husband and I found out that I was pregnant with our third child, Elena Grace.
She was born in September 2021.
“When do you want to consider trying again?” I asked my husband when Elena was a few months old.
“I don’t know. But I won’t even consider having the conversations until Elena (our third child) is at least 18 months old to 2 years old.”
“Yeah, I agree. That way we can enjoy our ten year marriage anniversary,” I smiled playfully, imagining us on a beach in Aruba in the distant future.
We continued to be asked “the question” by strangers: “ Do you all want any more kids?”
“ Yeah we do. But we definitely want to wait,” I often stated, with a tone that I hoped conveyed one of a responsible adult. “There are a couple of things I’d like to have before getting pregnant again.” ( A bigger car and a bigger house, for sure- I always thought to myself.)
One morning, my husband took the kids and made their breakfasts while I got some time alone to journal and complete my morning Bible study questions. I went through my routine as normal until one question from my Bible study lesson halted my flow of thought.
The question stated, “In which ways are you like Peter, walking across the water and not trusting Jesus?”
I couldn’t think of anything and so I asked the Holy Spirit to show me.
During that time, I hadn’t really been hearing clearly from the Lord on certain things and so it surprised me when the Lord spoke to me so clearly.
“You’ve been saying that you want to wait to have your next child until you have a bigger house and a bigger car, but I tell you that when you get pregnant again IT WILL BE THE PERFECT TIMING.”
I wrote what I heard so clearly and moved on in answering my other Bible study questions.
“How was your time with the Lord?” my husband asked after I returned downstairs to the kitchen.
I turned to the sink and began washing dishes. “It was good, but I got the strangest conviction about something.” I shared with him what I felt the Lord was saying and we both shrugged our shoulders and carried on about our days.
Neither of us knew that…
I was already pregnant with our fourth child.
When I found out privately, I didn’t know how to respond. But I felt that my response to this news was crucial, spiritually. With the pregnancy test still in my hand, I dropped to my knees and said, “Thank You Lord for this child. I trust You.”
When my husband found out, he thought he misread the results of my test at first. He laughed in disbelief.
“You for real?” he asked.
“Yeah”
“Wait….how?” he asked. We were actively avoiding a pregnancy.
“Well, praise the Lord,” he exclaimed and kept laughing.
Later on, the Lord gave me another Word from Him with the same level of clarity and distinction as His first message to me.
“You are blessed and highly favored,” I heard during my alone time the very next morning. Despite what our bank account showed. Despite the long list of “wants” I still desired. Despite what others saw, I was blessed and highly favored. I am blessed and highly favored.
We are expecting our fourth child– Spring 2023.
And we couldn’t be happier.
P.S. I’m currently 23 weeks pregnant. I’ll be sharing soon how the Lord has been crazy blessing us throughout this pregnancy!! I CANNOT keep the detailings of His specific hand of favor and sovereignty over my family’s life to myself. Will be sharing in full soon.
Psalm 127:3-5
Children are a heritage from the Lord,
offspring a reward from him.
Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are children born in one’s youth.
Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame
when they contend with their opponents in court.
Be careful to not call a burden what the Lord considers of the utmost blessing.
We got pregnant after winning a raffle ticket.
My husband was on board. Our close family members were frightened. Our friends thought we were crazy. And the last few words of most conversations with others were, “Y’all will be pregnant in a few months. Just watch,” often uttered with worry and grimace.
Evan Jr. was conceived due to the hand of God.
The miracle of pregnancy is beyond what my mind can conceive.
One sperm and one egg coming together at just the right time, implanting itself in a womb prepared for weeks prior, and somehow growing into a fully-functioning baby without a single human hand directing the show. Even more fascinating is the forever inhabitation of a soul, even before our human eyes can see.
This is without a doubt...a miracle.
But this isn’t what this blog post is about.
It’s actually about the time my husband agreed to us trying to get pregnant, after months of him wanting to wait.
But before I share the story of how that came about, I think it’s worth rewinding a bit more and sharing how the Lord allowed Evan (my husband) and I to have three years of marriage before having children...all without any conventional forms of birth control.
When we first got engaged, Evan and I decided pretty early on to refrain from using conventional forms of birth control.
This is the night Evan proposed. Read the details of my engagement story in God, Princeton, & My Pondered Thoughts.
I’d recently been healed, a few months prior, from some pretty severe food allergies and had finally begun gaining weight, healthfully exercising, and eating a diverse array of foods without issue. With that said, I had no desire to have my body experiment with conventional forms of birth control. Evan, thankfully, agreed without question.
I didn’t adopt this stance due to being well-researched. In fact, I hadn’t done any. I simply didn’t have a good feeling about going this route. So I asked some older married couples what they did, and the idea of family planning seemed appealing. I ordered Taking Charge of Your Fertility and began reading.
I felt pretty confident that if the Lord wanted us pregnant, despite our best efforts, we would get pregnant. And if He didn’t, He would allow for us to not get pregnant.
I was 22 at the time and quite naive. However, I trusted my Heavenly Father.
Evan Sr. was on board. Our close family members were frightened. Our friends thought we were crazy. And the last few words of most conversations with others were often, “Y’all will be pregnant in a few months. Just watch,” uttered with worry and grimace.
I wanted to retort in response, “And if we do...Well, Praise the Lord!” But my inner mommy-boldness hadn’t yet arrived. Instead, I’d lightly chuckle during these conversations and quietly hold Evan’s hand a bit tighter.
I had no idea what we were doing.
We married soon after and two years flew by. Evan and I experienced several lazy mornings together. A few binge-watches throughout. Several dates in different restaurants and movie theaters. A few walks alongside Lake Shore Drive overlooking Lake Michigan. And time…we experienced so much free time.
After two years of marriage, I felt a nudge from the Lord to begin discussing our timeline for kids. I shared this with Evan.
Evan said he’d take it to prayer.
The only issue? Evan’s “taking it to prayer” appeared more of a coy to delay, and months flew by.
I felt pretty helpless. Evan maintained his unwavering posture of hopefulness. And our discussion was nonexistent. It ended with me thinking that it was time to begin trying to conceive and with Evan sitting unphased saying again and again “Okay...lemme pray on it.”
What could you say in response to that?
Father’s Day of 2017 was when everything changed.
Evan and I were both getting dressed to go to church when Evan received a text from our Pastor.
“C’mon man-let us wish you a Happy Father’s Day. We waiting on you, bro!”
Evan laughed aloud and sent him a text back.
“Lol in due time brother. Happy Father’s Day to you!”
Our Pastor was discipling Evan at the time, and they had a close relationship.
Due to Evan running behind, I decided to go ahead to church, since it was only five minutes away. While walking up to the church door, I saw Ms. Carolyn, the best church greeter in all of Chicago, giving out raffle tickets to all incoming fathers. The raffle entry afforded fathers the opportunity to win a gift card at the end of service.
“Aw..how sweet and thoughtful,” I thought to myself. I hugged Ms. Carolyn and took my place in our usual pew that Evan and I loved sitting on.
Evan and I standing outside our church building during the summer of 2017.
Evan showed up minutes later.
Towards the end of service, our Pastor walked on stage and directed the fathers in the audience to pull out their raffle tickets. Evan began rustling inside his suit jacket for something. Instantly, he pulled out his raffle ticket.
“Evan….the tickets are for fathers,” I said while looking around, in fear of breaking an unwritten rule.
“Oh… I didn’t know. I thought they were for all men,” he said, pleasantly unphased.
“Evan, you can’t participate in the raffle,” I responded more urgently.
“Well, let’s just see,” he said with a humorous smirk.
Apparently, the prize was a gift card for a new suit. A temptation Evan seemed to not be able to resist...even in church.
But what I didn’t know was that Evan was actually talking to God. Perhaps he had been. He told the Lord that if his ticket was selected that he would take that as a sign to begin having children. Yes, a raffle ticket.
I knew none of this. I just knew that my husband was... well, being my husband: doing as he pleased, without fear of judgment.
Our Pastor announced the first set of numbers from the pulled raffle ticket.
After much silence, our Pastor asked everyone to double-check the numbers on their raffle ticket.
No one claimed it.
Our Pastor turned the wheel again and pulled out another raffle ticket.
Still nothing. No one claimed the second set of numbers either.
At this point, slight frustration ensued as our Pastor again directed church congregants to pull out their raffle tickets and read their numbers more carefully (church service was running behind and pushing into the start of Sunday school).
Our Pastor turned the wheel again and called out the third set of numbers.
Evan stood up, raffle ticket in hand.
Our church had quite a large congregation. But since we frequented the 8 AM service, everyone knew each other. And they all knew that Evan was not yet a father.
Evan went up to the stage and claimed his prize. Our Pastor laughed. “Well, we know that Evan isn’t a father...yet but we’re going to give him this gift card.” Our much older church members smiled at me upon seeing Evan on stage...as if to say, “I look forward to seeing you two younguns procreating one day.”
I was the only one who felt embarrassed.
When Evan finally returned to his seat, he looked like a deer in headlights. He went on to share with me a revelation I never anticipated him receiving.
“That’s it love. It’s confirmed. I’m going to give the gift card away. But it’s confirmed. I just prayed literally to the Lord that if my number was called that I would take that as a sign to begin trying (to have children).”
“What?” I questioned in shock.
“Yeah. I can’t deny that one. You just witnessed it.”
Evan gave the gift card to another father and we began trying that day.
I praise the Lord that my husband was not like Gideon. He knew that the Lord had spoken, as strange as it may have seemed, and he didn’t need a further sign. The likelihood of Evan getting to church late, grabbing a ticket unknowingly, and winning a raffle ticket after two people didn’t claim their prize. This was not a coincidence. The Lord had answered. I just never expected the Lord to get my husband’s attention through a raffle ticket.
