Nothing new happening around here. Still not pregnant. Still waiting for the hopefully fruitful RE consult. (Where we get to discuss Aidan and his tragic circumstances with yet a new set of doctors...oh joy!). The date for this appointment is still not set.
But, in the meantime, I'm starting to feel more beaten. More broken. More sad. More hopeless.
When I think about all that my husband and I have had to live through in the last year and a half, I cry. I cry for us. I want to pat myself and my husband on the head and whisper "oh you poor, poor dears" like some old English granny. Really, I cannot quite convey how really awful it's been.
April 2009 until now looked like this: Stressing about getting pregnant. Taking longer than anticipated to get pregnant. Dealing with abnormal test results on both our parts. Then pregnant. Then possibly miscarrying. Then seeing a heartbeat. Then blood, blood and more blood. Then reassurances that things will be okay. Then bed rest and off work, and financial stress from that. Then bad news. Then really bad news. Then trying to hold on to hope for our baby. Then just living day to day, knowing it wouldn't end well. Then Aidan dies and it's all darkness and pain and sadness for weeks and months... Then feeling like I'm stuck back at the beginning of this paragraph all over again.
I'm sad that life has not been easy for us in the last year and a half. I know we have life a thousand times better than most people. I know that. I am grateful for that. But, that does not take away from the pain of knowing we have it a thousand times worse than others.
I try to be one of those "happiness is what you make it" kind of people. I do my best to adhere to the policy of "when life hands you lemons, make lemon aid"...but honestly, I'm too tired, too broken to do it right now. I don't want to make anything good out of this devastation. I don't want to have to work hard to overcome anything. I would trade all the life lessons in the world for my son back.
I just would like something GOOD to happen, you know? Something easy and wonderful. I'm tired. I'm tired of trying to hold it together, trying to keep my focus on the future. When things will be 'better'. I want 'better' to be soon...to be right now.
Just wake me when it's over.
How do you hold on to hope? What keeps you getting out of bed each day? Is it working?
It really is amazing that you, that we, have all survived everything we have in the past year. I used to wonder how people who lost their children could carry one. Now I know.
ReplyDeleteThe waiting to get pregnant is so hard. Today I was wondering how I would be feeling now if I had never gotten pregnant with Jacob....I had just not gotten pregnant at all (I would choose getting pregnant with Jacob again in a second...I would never want to lose the time I had with him). I was just wondering how I would be feeling mentally with still trying to get pregnant a year after we started trying. It would be a whole other style of hopelessness and despair. I am in the 2ww right now and time is dragging.
I hope you get some good answers/help at your RE appointment and that it happens soon.
It is hard to reconcile being grateful for everything we have, knowing that we have it better than millions of people, but being sad and miserable for what we don't have. It's true, we have it better than so many people, but we also have it worse than so many people. I've met a few people lately who have never lost a child...they just have 3 or 4 healthy children and no problems with their pregnancies. It amazes me that people like that exist, but they are the majority.
I don't really know how I hold onto hope. Some days I have it and some days I don't. Some hours I have it and some hours I don't. I often tell myself that I have lived through something horrible...a nightmare...and I'm still standing, I'm still functioning. If I can get through that I have, if I lived through those horrible early days, today should be easier.
It isn't working that gets me out of bed (I don't love my job that much). It is probably my husband. I don't want him to worry about me anymore than he already has. Trust me, there are days when I just want to stay in bed all day, just me, Jacob's blanket, my computer and a baby loss book or two. But I can't because it will worry Ted too much.
Oh, Emily. I know exactly what you mean about feeling so hopeless. I wish there was a way to fast-forward through time. Just to get a glimpse of a better future (hopefully). If I knew I would have a baby safe in my arms, it would make this whole thing more tolerable.
ReplyDeleteI'm really hoping your RE appointment will go well. I always felt better about doing "something" instead of just waiting...
I'm praying for you that your "better" future happens quickly. I know the phrase "It could always be worse" is true... but you're been through way more than most people ever will.
I'm just so sad and so sorry you don't have Aidan with you right now. It's just not right.
((Big Hugs))
I don't think I have hope right now. Like Dana, sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. But there have been more days of hopelessness for me. When I 'backslide' and think of what-could-have-beens for us and Kai, I just lose all hope and feel so broken. Just like you, I'm trying "to make lemonaid from the lemons I got" but damn it the lemonaid is freakin' undrinkable no matter how I try to sweeten it. It doesn't change the fact that my son is dead and he's never coming back. That's what keeping me out of bed and functioning every second of the day. I'm alive and he's not. This is just about the only thing I can do for him as his mother - to live no matter how painful it is right now.
ReplyDeleteThinking of you and praying with you for good things to happen to all of us.
None of this is easy, it just isn't. =(
ReplyDeleteThe thing that seems to be helping me right now is the bible study that started a few weeks ago. Each week it gives me a new focus, and for me that's what I need right now. It is through www.anchoredbyhope.com.
I also read a daily devotional called The one year book of Hope by Nancy Guthrie. It's specifically related to grief and written by a woman who has lost two babies, so she gets where I am coming from.
I have never been one to read the Bible, although I've been going to church most of my life, and I'm really amazed at the comfort I'm receiving through learning how to give some of my worries to God and to let go of the uncontrollables in my life that frustrate me so much. I can't say I can do that all of the time, but it's getting a little easier.
Turning to God in these difficult times might not be what comforts everyone, but for me it's what I need right now.
Babyloss is so exhausting. :( <3 I am intrigued by this God fellow... ;P Maybe he can help me too..
ReplyDeleteI dunno. Maybe he can't. All I know is there isn't enough Xanax in the world for me right now and well, its hard to keep going.
ReplyDeleteYou have taken the words right out of my mouth. I feel broken too and I don't want the damn lemonade either. I am so sorry for all that you have been through, no one should have to endure so much. I know all too well the pain and dispair of struggling to get pregnant. It's a grief all it's own. And then to lose our precious babies when others have children like it's going out of style. It's not fair!
ReplyDeleteSomehow we are all here, we are standing and supporting each other. That is what gets me through. You guys, my husband and wanting to honor the life that my daughter never got to live.