Ok, so I've heard of baby blues. And quite frankly, I've stressed about my probable susceptibility to post-partum depression. But honestly? Right now I can only imagine euphoria. Here are the things that I'm waiting for like a kid on Christmas Eve:
1. The baby here, safe and sound.
2. Sleeping on my stomach.
3. Maternity leave.
4. Summer.
5. Sleeping on my side without pulling ligaments in my belly.
6. No swelling in my feet and ankles.
7. NO NAUSEA!!!!!
8. Eating and cooking like a regular person.
9. My mom and aunt coming to visit us.
10. Baby's baptism. Seriously. Can't wait to put him in a christening gown and have cake. Oh, and remission of sins for the little guy, too.
11. No backache.
12. Wearing regular people clothes.
13. The beach. (Not related to the baby, but still, I am craving it like you can't believe.)
14. Watching Ross be a dad.
15. Singing lullabies.
16. His first smile.
17. His first laugh.
18. Hearing from everyone how adorable he is. (Because he will be.)
19. Seeing everything through his eyes.
20. Getting my body back.
Yeah. Not seeing anything about post-partum not to love.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
A New Song
We are pregnant! Today is the day I announce to the world (well, the internet world, anyway) that we are expecting a baby.
I am already 26 weeks and 5 days along. The baby is due July 3rd or July 5th, depending on whether you talk to me or my OB.
This baby is healthy. Doing just fine. Kicking me and punching me and doing sommersaults and raking his heel along my belly. He's already extremely active and quite adorable.
It's nice to be singing in major again.
I am already 26 weeks and 5 days along. The baby is due July 3rd or July 5th, depending on whether you talk to me or my OB.
This baby is healthy. Doing just fine. Kicking me and punching me and doing sommersaults and raking his heel along my belly. He's already extremely active and quite adorable.
It's nice to be singing in major again.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
One Year Ago
One year ago today we said goodbye to our child, our daughter Rebecca. We didn't get a funeral, but this is the day she left us. She passed away on March 27, 2008, and was taken from us at the doctor's office on March 31, 2008. It is a day that neither Ross nor I will ever or could ever forget.
What a year.
Rebecca, my dear dear daughter, Mommy and Daddy love you so much. We miss you so much. We can't wait to meet you one day and finally get the chance to hold you in our arms and see your beautiful eyes and lovely smile.
Until then, we will hold you in our hearts.
What a year.
Rebecca, my dear dear daughter, Mommy and Daddy love you so much. We miss you so much. We can't wait to meet you one day and finally get the chance to hold you in our arms and see your beautiful eyes and lovely smile.
Until then, we will hold you in our hearts.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Light a Candle
October 15th is National Pregnancy & Infant Loss Remembrance Day, a day set aside by Congress to remember all of the children lost to miscarriage, stillbirth and early infant death.
If you are home tonight, light a candle at 7pm, place it in a window, and let it burn for one hour. It will create a memorial wave of light that will travel across the world.
Also, there are many Pregnancy & Infancy Loss Awareness Walks this month that raise money for non-profit groups to support research to prevent miscarriage, stillbirth and early infant death.
You can find information about some of them here.
If you are home tonight, light a candle at 7pm, place it in a window, and let it burn for one hour. It will create a memorial wave of light that will travel across the world.
Also, there are many Pregnancy & Infancy Loss Awareness Walks this month that raise money for non-profit groups to support research to prevent miscarriage, stillbirth and early infant death.
You can find information about some of them here.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
How Dancing with the Stars Reduced Me to a Sobbing Heap
Did anyone see Dancing With the Stars last night? I don't watch TV that much, and when I do it is usually either a presidential debate or House. But Ross and I were so tired last night, that we sat there watching it.
Did you see it? Did you see that tall woman with the long brown hair dancing at the end of the show before they brought Misty out with her torn Achilles tendon? So, I don't know the name of the woman with the long brown hair (is it Brooke?), but I think she might be a model. Anyway, she and her partner danced the Viennese waltz (my favorite dance!) to a song about fathers and mothers and children (don't know the name of the song - I'm not too up on my popular music). The song had a line in it about fathers be good to your daughters because daughters grow up to be lovers who grow up to be mothers so mothers be good to your daughters, too. And she danced right over to her daughter who looked to be about 8 years old or so and was sitting in the front row. She danced right over to this beautiful young daughter of hers and kissed her right when the song said mothers be good to your daughters, and then she waltzed right back on stage and finished her dance.
I. LOST. IT. I sat there and sobbed for fifteen minutes. I'm crying while I'm sitting here thinking of it. It was the epitome of my ideal of motherhood. This beautiful, gracious woman moving perfectly to sublime music and offering it all as a gift to her beautiful daughter who sat there enraptured with her mother, returning her mother's love. It was one of the most beautiful moments I've seen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d79JmyN8Dyo
Rebecca would have been born at the end of this month. This will be a hard month for me, I think. I feel like my emotions are very hair-trigger. And the thing is, I don't want to get to the end of the month. I feel so connected to our child right now, and I feel like the end of October will be another saying goodbye.
Did you see it? Did you see that tall woman with the long brown hair dancing at the end of the show before they brought Misty out with her torn Achilles tendon? So, I don't know the name of the woman with the long brown hair (is it Brooke?), but I think she might be a model. Anyway, she and her partner danced the Viennese waltz (my favorite dance!) to a song about fathers and mothers and children (don't know the name of the song - I'm not too up on my popular music). The song had a line in it about fathers be good to your daughters because daughters grow up to be lovers who grow up to be mothers so mothers be good to your daughters, too. And she danced right over to her daughter who looked to be about 8 years old or so and was sitting in the front row. She danced right over to this beautiful young daughter of hers and kissed her right when the song said mothers be good to your daughters, and then she waltzed right back on stage and finished her dance.
I. LOST. IT. I sat there and sobbed for fifteen minutes. I'm crying while I'm sitting here thinking of it. It was the epitome of my ideal of motherhood. This beautiful, gracious woman moving perfectly to sublime music and offering it all as a gift to her beautiful daughter who sat there enraptured with her mother, returning her mother's love. It was one of the most beautiful moments I've seen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d79JmyN8Dyo
Rebecca would have been born at the end of this month. This will be a hard month for me, I think. I feel like my emotions are very hair-trigger. And the thing is, I don't want to get to the end of the month. I feel so connected to our child right now, and I feel like the end of October will be another saying goodbye.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
A little bit of good news
We got the first of our test results back. My FSH and estradiol levels are normal. I don't know what the exact numbers are, but that may be for the best, since I tend to obsess and over-analyze. But the nurse said that they are completely normal. Hurrah!
I was more worried about this test than about any other because this is the one thing they cannot fix. There is no surgery, no drug, no therapy that can make your ovaries work again when they have stopped. I'm 36. It's young for people in the "advanced maternal age" category, but not really young. So getting a normal test result is a massive relief.
We did go out for wine and cheese last night. We got dressed up and had a lovely date at our favorite restaurant. (Even the waiter told me I looked pretty!! And Ross said it was good to see me happy and bubbly and sparkly again!!) We had glass after glass of champagne. Four kinds of cheese - Ross even actually liked the goat cheese and cow's milk cheese!! - and hazlenuts and some kind of jam. And gorgeous salads with pistacchios and arugula and endive. And pork chops in a peach and white wine reduction. And cheesecake with marinated cherries and banana nut bread pudding in a buttered rum sauce with vanilla gelato. So, so good.
Ross gave me a massage when we got home. And I fell right asleep. Even Hobbs was in a good mood last night. He licked my hand - a very rare sign of lapine love!!
I was more worried about this test than about any other because this is the one thing they cannot fix. There is no surgery, no drug, no therapy that can make your ovaries work again when they have stopped. I'm 36. It's young for people in the "advanced maternal age" category, but not really young. So getting a normal test result is a massive relief.
We did go out for wine and cheese last night. We got dressed up and had a lovely date at our favorite restaurant. (Even the waiter told me I looked pretty!! And Ross said it was good to see me happy and bubbly and sparkly again!!) We had glass after glass of champagne. Four kinds of cheese - Ross even actually liked the goat cheese and cow's milk cheese!! - and hazlenuts and some kind of jam. And gorgeous salads with pistacchios and arugula and endive. And pork chops in a peach and white wine reduction. And cheesecake with marinated cherries and banana nut bread pudding in a buttered rum sauce with vanilla gelato. So, so good.
Ross gave me a massage when we got home. And I fell right asleep. Even Hobbs was in a good mood last night. He licked my hand - a very rare sign of lapine love!!
God is good. Then why?
I have been struggling with my faith since we lost Rebecca. Actually, I don't think that last statement accurately captures what exactly the struggle is. I do not doubt God's existence. I do not doubt Christ's life and sacrifice. I do not doubt my salvation. I do not doubt God's goodness - at least, not in my mind. My heart is another matter. Because of the disconnect between my reason and the pain I feel, I cannot pray. And I am frustrated and angry at all of the platitudes, well-meaning though they may be, by the faithful. They offer no clarity, no electrifying of my faith. They make things more gray, more muddy, more confusing, more sad. They make God seem less God. Less good.
The pain is so deep that it shoots through every cell of my body and every synapse of my brain and every sacred corner of my soul. When someone tells me, "It was God's will," I want to scream. How could it be God's will that my little girl was torn from my body while I lie there in physical agony? I'm sorry, but that is a wholly inadequate explanation. I have heard things like, "Perhaps you have some unconfessed sin," and (this was to another woman suffering the same thing) "God told me to tell you that you need to forgive someone in your life before you will carry to term." WHAT??!! Or, "God spared you from having to raise a deformed child." How is it sparing to save me from what I would have gladly done and in place give me the worst nightmare I could imagine? Or, said by other people whose scares turn out to be just scares, "God was watching over us." Meaning, God was not watching over me and my husband and our child. Or, "It's all part of God's plan." Well, from my perspective, it's a pretty shitty plan.
My mind insists that God is good, merciful and just. What happened to me and my husband doesn't make sense to me, doesn't square with my sense of goodness, mercy and justice. Not when we see women on the subway punching and slapping their children, showering four letter words down on their innocent and trusting ears. Not when young girls sleep around, get knocked up and kill their children through abortion. Not when prostitutes with AIDS or crack addictions give birth to children who, if they are lucky enough to survive their diseases, will be whelmed in destitution for life. Are we such bad parents that we don't deserve a chance, that Rebecca didn't deserve a chance?
Why, why, why, why, why?
Why, when most couples I talk to get pregnant shortly after a miscarriage, are we still sitting here weeping with empty arms? Why, when I saved myself for marriage, am I subjected to tests for sexually tramsitted diseases that I could never have? Why must I give up either the privacy of my marriage bed or all thought of bearing my husband's child?
I will not accept any of the answers I have heard so far. They smack to me too much of pharisaism. I cannot reconcile a God of justice, mercy and goodness with these answers. And the only prayer I can pray until I receive an answer that makes sense to me is, "Why?"
God is good, I know, or all of existence is senseless Hell. God is my Father because I have asked him to be. I strive to be a good child. If He then refused me and refused help to me, He would not be good. So I will sit and await an answer from my Father.
The pain is so deep that it shoots through every cell of my body and every synapse of my brain and every sacred corner of my soul. When someone tells me, "It was God's will," I want to scream. How could it be God's will that my little girl was torn from my body while I lie there in physical agony? I'm sorry, but that is a wholly inadequate explanation. I have heard things like, "Perhaps you have some unconfessed sin," and (this was to another woman suffering the same thing) "God told me to tell you that you need to forgive someone in your life before you will carry to term." WHAT??!! Or, "God spared you from having to raise a deformed child." How is it sparing to save me from what I would have gladly done and in place give me the worst nightmare I could imagine? Or, said by other people whose scares turn out to be just scares, "God was watching over us." Meaning, God was not watching over me and my husband and our child. Or, "It's all part of God's plan." Well, from my perspective, it's a pretty shitty plan.
My mind insists that God is good, merciful and just. What happened to me and my husband doesn't make sense to me, doesn't square with my sense of goodness, mercy and justice. Not when we see women on the subway punching and slapping their children, showering four letter words down on their innocent and trusting ears. Not when young girls sleep around, get knocked up and kill their children through abortion. Not when prostitutes with AIDS or crack addictions give birth to children who, if they are lucky enough to survive their diseases, will be whelmed in destitution for life. Are we such bad parents that we don't deserve a chance, that Rebecca didn't deserve a chance?
Why, why, why, why, why?
Why, when most couples I talk to get pregnant shortly after a miscarriage, are we still sitting here weeping with empty arms? Why, when I saved myself for marriage, am I subjected to tests for sexually tramsitted diseases that I could never have? Why must I give up either the privacy of my marriage bed or all thought of bearing my husband's child?
I will not accept any of the answers I have heard so far. They smack to me too much of pharisaism. I cannot reconcile a God of justice, mercy and goodness with these answers. And the only prayer I can pray until I receive an answer that makes sense to me is, "Why?"
God is good, I know, or all of existence is senseless Hell. God is my Father because I have asked him to be. I strive to be a good child. If He then refused me and refused help to me, He would not be good. So I will sit and await an answer from my Father.
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