Now that the lemonade has worn off...

Mental health update: I'm fine. The hard lemonade, the vent, the sobbing and the many kind words of encouragement and understanding from blogland and beyond helped immeasurably.

And here I am, two days later, still plugging along. Yeah, also still worried that I'm a little dull, but resigned to that fact because right now this is my life. Maybe in 5 years I'll have a fabulously interesting and wonderfully glamorous story to tell, but right now this is my story. And if I don't embrace it (what with it being my life and all) how on earth can I accept it and live it to the fullest?

So I'm back. And I'm okay.

Another thing that helped was having lunch with one of my oldest and, at the risk of sounding sappy which she'd hate, dearest friends yesterday. She's known me for, let's see, something like 30 years now. We were inseparable in grade two and we've stayed friends ever since.

She ran away to Halifax 10 years ago, but she comes home every so often, and when she does we have a standing date to go eat Greek food and talk until the restaurant kicks us out by way of repeated exasperated, dirty looks. Or until we suck all the oxygen out of the place and are forced to retreat to the outside world so we can breath again.

Which is exactly what we did yesterday.

There's something very soul-saving about being with friends who knew you when. She knows the old me. She knows the pre-tragedy, pre-sorrow, pre-infertility, pre-confused-about-God-and-life-and-my-place-in-the-world, Kristin. And she still gets me. Good God, after all that she still gets me.

While she hasn't lost a child, she has had more than her fair share of devastating tragedy to endure. Maybe that helps her deal with me, I don't know. Or maybe she's just one of those rare people who would be able to deal with me as beautifully and kindly as she does regardless of what she herself had been through.

We'll never know. All I know is that we can talk (and talk, and talk, and talk), and when we do it feels like coming home.

Interesting segue...

She's the one who wrote this (which you should TOTALLY buy, by the way. You can order it directly from the publisher (Invisible Publishing) easy as pie.)

Mmm. Pie. Order the book and read it with pie. There you go!

Thanks Stephanie. Thanks blogland friends. Thanks friends. Thanks Sandy. Thank you all.

Nobody told me there'd be days like these

..with my apologies to John Lennon for stealing his lyric.

Seriously. These are strange days indeed.

I feel like the only person on the planet who is destined never to be pregnant again. Ever. Period. Pardon the pun.

And you know what else? People always say that they lose their identity when they have kids. They say they become "mom" and nothing else. Well let me tell you, for four years I've been either mourning lost children or dealing with infertility - two of those four years doing both. And it's easy to lose yourself in that too. Very easy indeed.

I don't know who I am anymore. And it's not just the Mike's Hard Lemonade talking either (okay maybe it is a bit, but screw it - it was needed and deserved).

Seriously. I'm the most boring woman on the planet. These are my claims to fame: to never be pregnant again, just forever mind-numbingly boring. I live from cycle to failed cycle and the longer this goes on, the farther away from my friends with living children I feel. They're kind enough to keep me in their world, but why the flock they do is beyond me sometimes.

I have nothing to talk about except my uterus and its spectacular penchant for failing me.

BO-RING.

I've run out of things to talk about. And I've run out of things to think about.

Except that. Except what I've lost and what I can't for the life of me seem to get. Children.

Am I boring? AM I??

PMS makes me incredibly paranoid. And, evidently, so does this hard lemonade.

Strange days indeed.

It's Sunday, after all.

So just the one bit of writing for me.

:)

Uh...

I just spent the last 20 minutes fighting a furious battle with the Blogger login page until I finally had to resort to resetting my password in order to get into my dashboard.

Now I can't remember what I wanted to blog about in the first place.

This is not a good sign...

My adventures in babysitting

Despite being 37 and having borne a child of my own, I have never looked after a baby all by myself. Ever.

In fact, I changed my very first diaper just a few weeks ago when the neighbours asked us to watch their little girl after getting one of those horrible family emergency phone calls no one ever wants to get.

We did fine, My Beloved and I. But there were two of us there. Two Nervous Nellys worrying that we'd somehow break the kid in the few hours her parents were gone.

We didn't. We did fine. She survived and so did we.

But then they asked if I'd fly solo yesterday morning. Me. Alone with a baby. Can you imagine??

The thing is though, I did fine. I think I did really well, actually. There is no one to corroborate this information because Jessica can't really talk yet, but trust me, I did good. I played with her, put her down for her nap, gave her a bottle, changed a big poopy diaper and fed her lunch. Yeah, I also sat on pins and needles for an hour and a quarter while she napped because although I had the monitor on, she was out of my sight and I was panicked that something would go horribly amiss during the time I couldn't actually see her. But still, I did good.

And I walked on a cloud for the rest of the day.

When I was pregnant with Thomas I worried endlessly that I wouldn't be able to do all those kinds of things right - that I'd be a colossal disaster when it came to doing all the physical care-taking tasks required of me. I knew I'd love my boy. I had no doubt about that. But I worried that I'd do everything else wrong.

Yesterday, when I was able to look after a one-year old child for 3.5 hours with not one single glitch, I realized for the very first time that I would have been just fine. That I have it in me. That I'm a good mother in more than just name only.

I realize a morning isn't the same as years of mothering. But to me it was huge. It was incredibly, blissfully affirming. I could see - I could feel- that I am cut out for this.

I never really knew before yesterday. I hoped it was the case, but I didn't know for sure.

And now I do.

So now I just need to get me a baby and I'm all set.

For My Beloved...

This is my favourite picture of you and Thomas. Your big finger, his tiny little hand. Both the boys I love so much touching for one precious moment a lifetime ago. It's beautiful and sweet and sad, and it makes me love you both so much I think I might die.

You are truly one of the greatest fathers I have ever known and I am blessed beyond measure to be a witness to it all.

I love you. Happy Father's Day Sandy.

Rats

Today My Beloved pointed out that since I'm not currently taking it, I can't blame Clomid on any crazy lady-esque outbursts I might have. Or might like to have. Or might plan to have.

Damn. Foiled again.

Flowers to end the week...

This is a shot of the angel garden and Thomas' tree from the end of May (so everything in the garden is smaller than it is now - and the Little Duckling Clematis vines hadn't even been purchased yet) but there, you can see the new arbor.



I can't remember what this is (it's written down in my garden log) but oh, isn't it gorgeous?



My beautiful Angel Face! It's doing SO well, save for an annoying little infestation of aphids. But so far I'm winning the war...



Angel Face bud. So purdy!!

Little of this, little of that

We watch old 80s sitcoms. They soothe us. Lately we can't get enough of The Facts of Life, even though it's a shockingly bad program (a fact I somehow failed to notice when I watched it the first time around 20+ years ago).

So anyway, the other day I noticed that my current hairstyle very closely resembles Natalie's 1987 hair style.

1987.

This is not good, is it?
_______________________________________________

I recently read this little gem in a piece of Harry Rosen Father's Day ad copy:

"Becoming a father is easy enough, but being one can be rough."

Oh really? Becoming a father is easy, is it? Says who? Seriously, Harry, says WHO????

As for being rough, well yes. I think My Beloved would agree that fatherhood, thus far, has not been what he expected it to be. But I'm also pretty sure he'd give his left arm to do it a second time.

So shut up Harry Rosen. No one likes you.

_______________________________________________

I've now forgotten to bring the coupon I snagged for a free bag of Lucy's favourite cat kibble to the store with me twice.

Clearly I'm not sunny enough yet.

_______________________________________________

I want to be pregnant again so badly.

There. Just in case God wasn't paying attention the first 9 billion times I've said this.

_______________________________________________

My New Dawn climbing rose bush is just starting to bloom for the very first time. I have been training it along the fence and trellises I bought for it, and gently pulling stray branches back onto our side of the fence.

The first blooms about to pop are running along the top of the trellis, too far above the fence for me to reach, and tipping into the yard behind us.

They have two boys. The first is 6 months older than Thomas would have been, the second is 6 months younger. They are pregnant with their third child, due in October. Exactly when she wanted to have it, just like the other two.

Two boys, a baby on the way and my first, beautiful roses too.

How nice for them.

_______________________________________________

I took a Windex shower this morning.

Yeah, so don't buy the Windex outdoor window cleaning thingy. It's a bottle that you attach to your hose to spray clean your exterior windows.

I sprayed me clean instead.

_______________________________________________

I wonder if Harry Rosen and Windex can sue me for ragging on them?

_______________________________________________

My father has diabetes. My father-in-law was just diagnosed too.

I love these men. I hate when bad things happen to good people that I love.

This needs to stop.

_______________________________________________

I'm not in a bad mood. I have no idea why I sound like I am.

_______________________________________________

My hands and arms are getting really tanned from being out in the garden and mowing the lawn. The rest of me is white as a ghost. I'm not trying to tan, but I kind of wish if I was going to end up with one, it would be an even, all over tan.

My hands look like they belong to someone else when they're resting on my bare legs or stomach.

It's creepy.
_______________________________________________

I need to post some garden pictures. Just because I have some.

_______________________________________________

Has pregnancy changed anyone else's hair?

Natalie's is so sleek and shiny and flowing. Just like mine used to be.

Sigh.

Well isn't this just kick you in the crotch, spit on your neck fantastic?

CHICAGO (Reuters) - People who are often stressed out or depressed are far more likely to develop memory problems than those with sunnier dispositions, U.S. researchers said on Monday in a finding that sheds light on early predictors of Alzheimer's disease.

Well let me just add that to my list of things to work on: be sunnier.

Oy.

A revelation, courtesy of someone else's mind

One of the things that has really bothered me since Thomas died (and during the ensuing childless-but-not-for-lack-of-trying-and-trying-and-trying years) is the way I've felt about other people's pregnancies. I have been riddled with guilt for feeling a whole host of unpleasant things upon hearing pregnancy announcements and upon seeing bulging belly after belly after belly all around me (quite literally, since my neighbourhood is now on its second baby boom since Thomas died).

The intensity has lessened. The shock isn't quite the same. And there is now real joy that I think - or at least I hope - actually comes across when a friend tells me she's pregnant. Because I feel that now. I really do.

But yeah, I still feel some of the bad stuff too. And it still makes me feel guilty as sin every single time.

I've tried to rationalize it, and that usually works like a too small band-aid for a little while. I tell myself that I held my dying child in my arms and kissed him goodbye in a cluttered hospital office, and so it's okay for someone else's happy news about their own live, growing child to reduce me to tears in the privacy of my own quiet little bedroom. I tell myself that, but I don't always believe it.

It seems wrong to feel like I've been drop-kicked in the gut when someone else tells me news that I know (in a way thousands upon thousands of women never will) is such a blessing.

And I wonder each time when the hell that kick will stop coming. Or at the very least when the guilt that follows will ever go away and leave me alone.

I wonder if it'll be when menopause sets in - when I'm no longer physically able to bear my own children. Or if we have another child. Or if we adopt.

I just wonder if this particular hurt and guilt will ever go away.

I came across another blogger's musings on this subject last week. She had an epiphany about the whole thing after hearing the news of a 43-year old friend's pregnancy after just three months of trying. Unassisted.

She said that she did feel true joy at her friend's news, but at the same time she had the unsettling notion that the gods were laughing at her (she's had several losses and undergone every fertility treatment under the sun).

And then (and this is the good part) she realized that it was okay. Okay. Because the way she was feeling wasn't about any ill will she felt towards her friend. It was, as she said, all about her.

WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THIS??? It's so simple. And it makes such perfect sense.

I don't begrudge my friends their children - their shot at parenthood - nor do I want anyone I know to suffer the loss of a child. I don't. I want them to be happy and to have as many children as their little hearts desire. I do. I really do.

It just happens that the flip side of all that good stuff happening to other people is a whole bunch of not-so-nice emotions for me. Happy news reminds me of my sadness. But it's about me. It's about my sorrow. It's the flood of memories that wash over me, the "what ifs", the "I wishes"...

They're about me. They're about Thomas, my other two angels and the babies I just can't seem to make.

The feelings have nothing to do with anyone else but us, and therefore I can have all of them, theoretically, guilt-free.

And so I'm going to work on that. I have enough guilt crawling the walls of my brain without holding on to any more.

Let's see if this works, shall we?

Butterfly kisses

My Beloved and I went to the Perinatal Bereavement Services of Ontario's annual butterfly release ceremony this morning, along with Sherry and her Beloved.

Upon his release from his little cardboard envelope, this is where Thomas' butterfly decided to sit. And sit. And sit. And sit. And sit some more.



I knew he'd have been a merry little prankster, my Thomas. I just knew it.

A long, busy, happy week...

...and so not much time to blog.

But I did write. Really, I did.

The oops-it's-one-day-late Friday Blog Roundup totally counts.

Woo hooooooo!!!!

I'm meeting Sherry any minute now!!!!!!!!

Whew...

Yeah, so enough with the Clomid. It's dastardly, that shit. They say it works (although I have plenty of evidence to the contrary) but in the meantime it makes living hell and me hell to live with. So we're taking at least a once cycle break from the stuff.

There are times when I think that if God wants this to happen, it will happen no matter what we do or don't do.

Well, we have to have sex. That I realize.

There's that story about the old man going to church day after day begging God to let him win the lottery until finally after several months he hears God's great booming voice pleading with him to buy a ticket. I know God helps those who help themselves. I know that. I know we can't sit around willing a baby into existence and doing nothing to help the process along.

But sometimes you have to know when enough is enough. At least for now.

I can feel all the tense little fibers of my body slowly relaxing as the drug works its way out of my system. I can feel the sanity returning. I can feel me again.

The fall is so much harder when it's a drug/IUI cycle, and not just because of the drugs. The hopes and the expectation of success, I think, are so much higher for me - and in everyone else's mind too. Because yeah, everyone knows. And my God, It's hard to fail so publicly. It makes it a rather spectacular exercise in agony, having to make the awkward, "Uh, yeah, so I got my period..." calls.

And doing it when you're so disappointed and so hormonal you're barely functioning adds that extra little dash of torture.

And I mean that seriously. Addled doesn't even begin to describe it. Fog is closer. But that horror movie style fog - the kind that strangles everything in its path and drags gouls and goblins along with it as it seeps into sleepy New England towns.

But it's better now. After a few days of angry tears, agonized longing for the boy I lost, and self-indulgent wallowing in the "should have beens", " could have beens", and "why, why why's", I'm finally feeling something akin to even keeled.

You know, for now anyway.

Sigh. I truly don't understand why this is so hard. I will never understand why all of this has been so hard.

Zzzzzzzzzz

Too worn out to blog. Just fried.

Be back soon.