On Time. And Wounds. And Healing.

Today a young woman I know found out that, yet again, her pregnancy has ended without a baby.

When she announced the pregnancy, it was with the wild abandon and hope that this one was gonna take. A baby had to come this time.

Because the first time it happened? Who knows?

And the second? Well, he was just about to leave on a yearlong deployment and so maybe it was god's way of saying this was not the right time. Right?

But he's home now. Life is beautiful and happy. Just the way you dream of life when you're a child. It should really work out when everything else is going so well, shouldn't it?

Only it doesn't always. And it doesn't so often that I find myself hoping I can somehow absorb the worries of my friends' hearts. Like that will raise the chances of a happy outcome.

Because I never want anyone to feel that kind of loss.

Do you even know how quickly an entire life can be imagined? From the realization that a pregnancy test is in order to the confirmation of life, plans are already hatching. Dreams are already forming. A future life is already being lived.

How many times have I sat in front of a monitor in a dark room and seen the still shadows on the screen?

Saw the words, "NO FETAL HEART TONE"? And why do those words have to be in all caps?

I have to say, the best part of getting my tubes tied two years ago is never having to worry that much through another pregnancy.

Okay, yes, until someone is carrying my grandchild. And then, hopefully, I will do what I do now. Cheer and celebrate and hope for the best while silently sending out little pleas that this one will make it.

Last week I was going through an old magazine that we have laying around. There's a note in the back from the editor. To the infant son he lost 36 years before.

It was one of those pieces that slammed into my head as much as my heart.

It never goes away.

I am not a freak because I look at young adults around me and think I could be their mother. I mean, not theirs, but the mother of a friend that they never got to make. A brood of young men and/or women could be filling my life, along with the son and daughters I know.

Where did they go?

And at the other end of this babyloss-marked life, I have to say that I'm grateful to the little being that never was, who gave way to Fynnie. We could not have had that baby and Fynnie since they were created less than two months apart. I cannot imagine choosing anyone else.

October is a somber time for many people. It's National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month. Did you know that? Did you know that people all over the country will be lighting a candle at 7:00 P.M. on October 15 in remembrance of the little lives lost? It's to create a wave of light.

That saying about time healing all wounds? I suppose it does. To some degree. Define healed, right?

I am heartbroken for my friend and a little sad for me. I hope she feels the light on October 15 like a blanket. Between now and the peaceful sadness and wonder I think she'll eventually come to find, I hope there is a rainbow in her arms.

Ever Do Something You Shouldn't?

You know that it's not helpful, healthy or wise, but it's hard to tear yourself away.  Pregnant women should not go around checking out blogs written by women who've lost their babies.  And it's worse if those babies were lost late in pregnancy, or even right after being born.  Note to self.


I dropped in on one because she'd posted something on the forum I'm addicted to a member of.  Then, as is pretty common for me when visiting another person's site, I checked out several of her recommended blogs.  Every single one (quite naturally) shared the theme of baby loss.  I have lost enough of my own babies... this is my eighth pregnancy.  I'm not sure I ever shared that specific information.  So reading these blogs is not only painful because, well who wouldn't find the topic painful to read about, but because it brings back my own memories.  Oddly enough, November of last year isn't the first thing that comes to mind.  That was hard and painful and sad, yes, but knowing we somehow didn't make a baby took a lot of the sting away.  Those first losses, before Corey, were... well, I don't really need to explain it.


In any case, my stated goal for the night is to stop torturing myself with things I cannot control.  The stories I read will stay with me, and the women will be in my heart.  But the rest of me has to keep moving forward.

All Over the Map

I am handling things reasonably well, I think.  Kitchen deep cleaning is nearly complete.  Next will be our bathroom.  The stupid room is the same size as either of my kids' not small bedrooms.  Who needs that much room to shower and brush teeth?


But between the non-pregnancy and the major problems with Corey... he's been staying with my mom for a week ... life's not quite the same right now.  Much more than being bummed about not being pregnant, I am incredibly sad at the situation with Corey.  I miss him, want him home, but know that this isn't really the best place for him to be right now... for any of us.  No matter how well I do once I'm up and finding something to occupy the brain, I wake up sad. 


Got any tips for getting through the tough times?  Seems like I should have the answers since (like most people), I've had my share in the past.  Clearly I need to work on that whole focusing thing.


Maybe I should just count the reasons it's better to be me than Maisy today.  For example, since I didn't spend the past week or so either making a mess with the food and water in my crate or watching as Madelyn messed with my stuff, I didn't have to spend the day outside in my newly washed crate... laying in the sun as the woman of the house scrubbed the floor on her hands and... hmm... yeah, maybe that's not where I should be looking.


This has been a pretty good weekend, overall.  Mad and I spent some time coloring yesterday. 

Whomever actually developed washable ink is my new hero.

The three of us went to a birthday party for Mad's friend, Scotty, yesterday.  He's two.  His mom and I talked about Christmas cards and I told her about last year's Christmas Letter.  When I got home, I sent a copy to her.  Looking through it brought back some good times.  And man, we really did have the world's smallest kitchen!


Tom and I spent a lot of time either hanging out or working on things together.  Since we both ended up with a couple of days off this week, it felt almost like we'd already had a weekend.  Stuff got done, so that's good.




Tom does want to try again for a baby... the faux pregnancy just wasn't quite as satisfying.  Yeah, bad humor.  I know.


Well, since I did waste about 10 minutes of my life tonight reading not one, but two articles about Jon Gosselin, I can aver that it has to suck a lot more to live in his shoes.  At least I'm well aware of my periodic stupidity, try to minimize it when possible and I haven't sold out my family for anything.  Okay, better life than Jon Gosselin.  Check.


Oh and here's something good (it won't sound that way at first), but completely surprising to me.  As the person who pays our bills each month... including the hefty extra amounts that Corey's been accruing through the TV and cell phone (that he can no longer access), I had determined that we would not have any money for Christmas.  Like, none.  Without a credit card, of course, but who wants to charge things these days?  That's so 2005.  We have paid off most of our credit cards.  Two are left, but neither is shrinking like we'd like.  Anyway, thank goodness Tom handles the non-bill parts of our finances, because it turns out we can buy presents and party food in the month of December after all.  Yay us.


And Friday night, instead of going to training like usual, Tom had an early appointment and then came home.  On the way, he stopped at one of our favorite Thai restaurants to pick up dinner.  Sure, it's 45 miles from here, but they pack things well and the food was just as good as ever all the way up here.  Apparently they have caller ID, because the woman said, "This is for pick up?  In Rancho?"  No really, my husband's coming.


So there are some good things.  Thanks for listening while I worked it out... again.

Focus

So... the answer is a resounding no.  I am fine.  Tom is okay.  We'll get through.  It helps immeasurably to know that a baby hadn't actually been made. 


My doctor insisted on doing a D&C.  As with many instances between us, I declined.  I did a bit of research yesterday before calling him and found that many doctors now believe it's better to let nature take its course.  And anyway, he wanted me to have it done in his office.  I can only assume that would have meant getting a local anesthetic.  Non-baby making pregnancy or no, I do NOT want to hear that!  During my first miscarriage, the doctor and his team played music as I was drifting off to sleep.  Now, every time I hear Bobby Brown singing that song, I go back to the yellow gowns and yellow lights of that room.


I took the day off today.  When I spoke with Tom yesterday, he arranged to be off, too.  I believe he was anticipating a trip down the hill to see the doctor.  If it had been necessary, we would have gone.  But the worst seemed to be over by the time I got up this morning.  I'm going back to work tomorrow.


Have I mentioned that I'm a list maker?  I am.  I am always working on a list.  Of jobs to do.  Of reasons why or why not.  Of the good side versus the bad.  So here is a partial list of the good things for now.  Don't think that because I'm not listing the bad, I don't feel it very deeply.  It's just not where I'm going to focus right now.


So... the good things are (in no particular order, normally I'd prioritize or alphabetize or something, but tonight I'm gonna wing it):


*I didn't tell Nancy last week even though I really wanted to.  Her sister-in-law's mother died this morning and Nancy's own mother finally got the diagnosis.  Pancreatic cancer.  "The cure would be worse than the cause."  Yeah, I'm happy not to have added to that burden.
*I can have chocolate and/or coffee for a little while longer.  I won't, though, because last week I was reminded of all the bad things that can happen to a developing baby person if caffeine is consumed.  Tom and I haven't discussed it, but I'm assuming he'll still want to continue trying once we're able.
*I don't have to find out if I still fit into my maternity clothes.  Okay, this is awful.  I lost all the baby weight within about five days of having Mad.  The 10 additional pounds is just me being lazy.  Guh!  I had actually wondered if Doc wasn't able to confirm the pregnancy through physical examination because I'm too fat. 
*We don't have any new extra expenses coming up right away.  Granted, the expenses would be less than when we had Mad, especially if we had another daughter, but the things we'd have to buy (crib, dresser, etc.) wouldn't be the little things.  Of course, this could change if we manage to create a mini-Mad, but for now, no.
*We didn't tell anyone else.  I didn't even give off hints that would clue people in so they'd ask.  We'd taken the test at home on Thursday evening.  Friday morning I faked coffee.  I went to the kitchen with someone, got a cup of decaf and then left it on my desk when I headed out a few minutes later.  Do I regret wasting coffee?  A little, but even decaf has caf, so it's out.  Anyway, by not blowing our cover, I now won't have to endure the stuff that would make me cry.  And we have one particular woman in our office who loves to make people cry.
*And lastly, I'm not bothered or upset by anyone else's pregnancy.  So we're keeping the drama way low-key.  I do have an acquaintence who is pregnant.  She's in my mommy group.  Her shower is about a week away.  I won't be going, but I RSVP'd two weeks ago.  It's when Tom and I are celebrating our anniversary (four years married, nine-plus together... I can't wait until the "together" number is the smaller one).  Plus, Lauren and I have nothing in common except our babies.  Nothing.  And she rarely responds to my emails or calls anyway.  Frankly, I feel the fact we're shipping a gift is more than generous.  But I'm not doing it for her so much as for Mad to have a better chance of a few lifelong friends.


Oh, and in some weird karmic way, I have further evidence that Celine Salon (Dion) and I are linked.  She is also no longer pregnant.  I don't know how far along she was, but I'd be willing to bet the full extent of my extra cash (right now I believe that's the eleven cents sitting in the cup holder in my car) that she's having a much harder time than we are.  That sucks... what is it The Rambler says?... oh yeah, sweaty donkey balls.  I say that lovingly even though I have always, always denigrated her singing (ahem... when I wasn't secretly singing along... shh).  The fact that her version of "At Last" was our song is only because Etta James' was too scratchy and Cyndi Lauper's was just.too.freaking.weird (no matter how much we wanted to love it)... and *sigh* yes, because Celine Salon's version rocked.  Until it became the soundtrack for Fancy Feast commercials.  Whatever.

Under Pressure

When I was pregnant with Corey my mom told me that people would be falling all over themselves to open doors and take packages out of my arms. It just wasn't true. The only person who ever did help me, came to my rescue when I was trying to go to the laundry room with a newborn placed on top of a pile of his dirty clothes. But she didn't stay to help, she just got me to the room and that was it. So I didn't expect much when I was pregnant with Mad. However, I have a job that can involve some pretty heavy lifting at times, and that had to be cut back. My doc recommended, but didn't insist on, a 10 pound limit. I mentioned that to Nance and my days of lifting anything were over.


My office consists of a group of women, all but three of whom are mothers and/or grandmothers,(oh, and one happy-to-be-the-lone-male guy). Women declared themselves surrogate grandmas. One person said it really was the *place of business* baby, not just mine. All of this was said in good humor and with love. I was extremely well cared for during my pregnancy.


In the beginning I was exceptionally concerned that I could lose the baby or that the baby might at that very moment not be doing well. So I was at the Ob/Gyn more frequently than the average mama bear in the beginning. It's sort of strange, because I'd taken exactly the opposite stance with Corey... I figured that if "this one took" after so many miscarriages, then it was meant to be and if not, I was done trying for a while. I didn't even rush off to the doctor as soon as I suspected I might be pregnant. Once I heard his heartbeat at the doctor's office, I don't recall ever worrying again that he would be anything other than perfect. And he wasn't.


But I put so much pressure on myself regarding having a healthy baby with Tom and avoiding anything that would cause heartbreak and disappointment for him and his parents, especially his mom. Not to mention that my own father had been plotting and scheming to convince somebody... anybody... to give him another grandchild. Nobody else put this pressure on me; it was an overactive congeniality gene or something. I just wanted to please them and let them be pleased for themselves. And since Mad wasn't planned, I especially wanted her to be as beautiful as Corey had been. Of course, she was, as evidenced by this, her best photo EVER:

But back then, I didn't know that this was the glorious girl who was waiting to meet us. So I fretted a bit. Okay, Nance would say a lot. But she got to "meet" Madelyn via ultrasound because I just had to confirm one last time that everything was okay before we told the fam, so I don't think she'd complain too much about it.
Pregnancy and I get on very well. I had raging morning sickness for the first and last three months of my pregnancy with Corey, but I still loved every minute of it (well, I didn't especially love puking my guts out in the mall shopping center between expensive cars every time I couldn't make it to McDonald's from the bus stop... and heck, making it there wasn't so great because it always seemed to be filled with moms and kids listening to my insides hit the bowl... but aside from that, it was pretty great).
With Mad I was nauseated most of the time for just over half the pregnancy. One time the nausea was so bad that I went into the bathroom absolutely sure that this was it. I couldn't bring myself to look at the toilet because I knew the sight of it would bring me down faster than anything. So I stood in front of the toilet, facing the wall and talking to myself about how I needed to tighten the towel bar and how I was not going to turn around. Thoughts of the watery bowl behind me kept trying to creep in, but I shot them down with, "what a lovely shade of lavender the wall is despite how shockingingly bright it'd seemed at first, lalala."
It worked. I didn't throw up once during my pregnancy.