Hubby and I got married almost 9 years ago now, and we’ve always wanted a lot of kids. We initially wanted “as many kids as we could have” haha!

A CHANGE OF PLANS

And then over the years, the number moved down to 5-7 , and as we had more children, and they showed us flames, we finally settled on 4, almost 3 years ago.

But, we had made this decision during my third pregnancy. It had been the toughest pregnancy of them all, and my husband had also seen how much I struggled, so he was actually ok with not having birthing another one but maybe adopting, but I still wanted just one more.

Our little Z, with his siblings….look all sweet and innocent haha!

HELLO BABY!

Of course, this was all before the baby arrived and showed me proper flames!  Our sweet baby Z was the most challenging baby ever! I remember pacing up and down on one of his episodes at an ungodly hour, thinking “I am never doing this again!”

But after a few months, things started getting better, but I was still a bit scarred, I wasn’t sure whether I did want to have number 4 or not anymore.

 

DECISIONS, DECISIONS

As the months progressed, and especially after he turned one, I wrestled with this decision (our kids are all 2 years apart so I was bound to fall pregnant again any time soon haha!).

I mean, anyone who has 3 kids will tell you it’s a handful! Heck, even mommies with one know what a handful these little humans are and how much energy and time and and and they need from you.

 

WRESTLING WITH FEARS

So, on the one hand, I was scared of being overwhelmed and not having enough capacity to handle any more kids; and therefore not being the best mom that I could possibly be to all of them.

Yet, on the other hand, I knew I had no real peace about not having another one. I had prepared my heart that we could just have 3 and it was ok.   However, I also knew I had a deep fear of regretting that decision years along the line when it was too late.

So, I wrestled…..over and over again.

I know it might not seem like a biggie to you because maybe having a big family is not a dream you’ve had…but to me this was a real wrestle in my heart, because it’s something that’s really valuable to me.

For a while, I think I didn’t even want to pray about it, because I wasn’t sure I was ready to hear whatever answer God had.

But eventually, I started chatting to God about it. And He basically just went straight to address the root of it: FEAR.

 

THE CONVERSATIONS

The conversations were very short and to the point. I felt like what He said to me was something along the lines “Girl, unjani mara heh? How are you?  Like, you really trust me enough to provide financially for however many kids you want to have, but you don’t trust me enough to provide you with the capacity and the grace to be able to handle the amount of kids you want? Isebenza kanjani kanti lento?”

“I’m not understanding…”

In English, haha, I basically felt like God was challenging me on my faith.  On the fact that I’ve journeyed with Him, and have gotten to have complete faith in Him when it comes to provision for the big family I want (when in fact that’s what deters most people from having more kids), but yet at the same time, I didn’t have faith that He would give me enough capacity and grace to deal with the same big family I want. So, essentially my faith was compartmentalized…..I had trusted and believed in God in one area of my life, but didn’t have believe and trust the very same God in another area of my life.

After I felt like I was dealt with, I was like “Hayi, kulungile Baba”…lol! , I mean, what other response would you have but “A’ight God”

 

 

MORE CONVERSATIONS

And then, Hubby and I started having the conversation we’d beeeen postponing for soooo long..…..

He still thought that we should probably adopt and I was for being preggies.

And guess what, by the time we actually had the conversation and decided we were having a fourth (natural or adopted), I was already a few weeks pregnant! Which means it would have been rather awks had we decided otherwise!  Like it helps to listen to God sometimes …haha! Ok, almost all the time lol!…I mean always haha!

So….here we are …..a few days before our fourth baby arrives, and we couldn’t be happier!

I’m so grateful for those conversations with God and the freedom they came with, because I realised that this is what I actually wanted deep deep in my heart, but the fear had me settling on a dream I had.

And once I was released from that fear….man, there was just so much joy, freedom and peace!