As I settled into the reality that I would soon become a mother, I realized I needed a mental break from soccer and realized that was as good a time as any to step away from the field for a little while. I still didn’t know that I’d go back to work after giving birth, but continued to workout on my own as my belly grew. I got a set of prenatal workouts from US Soccer that I was happy to follow; as much as I missed my teammates, it was nice to still have a routine.
It wound up taking me sitting in the stands and cheering on my own club team in the bone-chilling Chicago cold, taking in the atmosphere from a different vantage point as a fan, that I realized it wasn’t just that I wanted to come back to soccer after I had my baby — I had to. I missed it. This game has a funny way of reeling you back in just when you think you might be ready to hang up your boots and say goodbye. I realized there was no real reason for me to choose between being a mom and being a professional soccer player. I’d seen enough examples of others who’d done it. Why not me?
Once I made my decision, something switched on in me. I was really about to become a mother and a professional soccer player! I had no idea how my pregnancy journey, let alone giving birth, would change the way I saw myself, but I was eager to find out. That mental switch also rang another important alarm: it was time to plan!
I read as many books as I could get my hands on about pregnancy and parenthood. I signed up for online seminars, wracking up PowerPoint slides chock full of information. I took copious notes on everything I learned. With my husband accompanying me, I took pelvic floor physical therapy classes, which I genuinely believe everyone should have access to when they’re pregnant, and I treated them as seriously as any soccer training or game. I came up with a detailed birth plan that, based on the advice I’d received and my own determination to get back to soccer after having my baby, was based on the hope that I would have a natural delivery. I didn’t even want an epidural. For all the uncertainties that awaited me on my pregnancy journey, I once again found immense comfort in preparing as best I could.
Looking back on it now, I suppose there were signs of foreshadowing about how things might go on the big day. Once, I met with my doctor to do an anatomy scan, and I learned that my baby, Caleb, was positioned inside my belly in such a way that his feet were closer to the birth canal instead of his head — in other words, he was breech, flipped around from where he needed to be.
Then, last July, I went into labor. My husband and I made the trip to the hospital when my contractions got closer and closer together, but I still wasn’t dilating properly. We were almost sent home, but then my son’s heart rate began to drop, or decelerate, in medical terms. That’s when I started to get scared. The medical staff instructed us to stay at the hospital and wait it out.
My body continued to work. The pain increased; it was unlike anything I’d ever experienced. As much as the contractions hurt, I couldn’t help but to fix my eyes on the fetal monitor, which not only measures your contractions, but gives you a heads up for when the next one is due to hit. And, like the elite athlete that I am, I found myself tapping into that gritty, competitive mentality while I was in labor, watching the monitor the same way I’d watch a timer letting me know when it was time to do another sprint in an anaerobic workout. I gave myself the same pep-talks, too: Come on, you can do anything for 60 seconds. You got this. Here we go: five, four, three, two… (See what I mean about soccer finding its way to you at the most unexpected times?) That little exercise was a welcome distraction, but each time a nurse came in to check if I’d dilated and saw that I hadn’t, I grew increasingly worried.
I was given a medication called pitocin to speed up my contractions. The nurses broke my water. Nothing helped — in fact, my son’s heart rate decelerated a few more times throughout that harrowing process. Eventually, my obstetrician-gynecologist came to see me and did an ultrasound, which showed us that Caleb was still breech. I would need to undergo an emergency c-section.
That was when I broke down into tears. I was terrified. This was, in my mind, the worst case scenario, the one thing I had not planned for, despite all my efforts to channel my focus on what I wanted to happen. I’d controlled the controllables. I’d put in the work. I’d prepared so thoroughly. Handling my contractions like an athlete may have stemmed off some of the pain, but at that moment, I couldn’t think of a single soccer parallel to explain or ease what was happening to me.
My husband and I said a quick prayer before I was taken into the operating room. In the midst of all the chaos, what more could we do but let God handle the rest? Later, when the anesthesia wore off, I blinked my eyes open. A nurse came and placed Caleb, my sweet baby boy, onto my chest, and I broke into tears again, this time for a totally different reason than before. If I thought things had gotten real before, none of that compared to the feeling of staring into the eyes of a tiny human I helped create and had brought into the world. It’s hard to put into words the love I have for my son. It’s the biggest, deepest love I’ve ever known, and even saying that doesn’t fully capture it. Leading up to Caleb’s birth, I wasn’t sure how my identity as a soccer player would mesh with my much newer identity as a mom, but once it happened, it felt like the most natural alchemy, and I immediately fell in love with that, too. I didn’t realize how much I would love being a mother until the moment I became one.

Match Highlights

Match Highlights