Well then

On cd 24, I finally, finally get a change on my monitor and get a High! Of course, I had to go buy more opk's for back-up, but what the hell? I haven't been using them everyday, just in the last couple of days.

The opk was dark, but not positive, so it seems like the monitor is right on. I expect I'll get a firm positive/peak tomorrow then. It's late, but I stopped caring about that. It'll happen or it won't. Because I recognize my utter lack of control here.

I think deciding to pursue treatment in August/September and not really thinking I'll be pregnant by then has been somewhat liberating. I feel a little broken, a little busted. But more free. Relieved, maybe?

Doesn't mean we are quitting, on the contrary - we're still very actively continuing. I just think I feel beaten down by the continual ups and downs that has been trying to conceive again.

But for now, it's go with the flow. Who knows where it leads?

I dreamed of him.

This morning, after the temp was taken, the cup peed in, monitor used and cat shooed away. I slept again, dreaming. So odd. It shifted and changed. At first he was girl, a daughter that was more like a plastic baby doll than alive. But I knew him. I was sad because I'd forgotten him and no one had fed him. And shift, and he was a boy I called Christopher, but I compared his face to his picture and it was him. And I knew. And he knew me. No longer a stiff doll-baby, he reached for me. I was ashamed for having thought he'd died, when he was just taken away to NICU. I dressed him again and again and laid him down for a nap and watched him sleep. I was angry I'd missed the first nine months of his life, but I pushed the anger away every time I held him. All I could think then was I'd wanted so badly to hold you again; I have to remember this, how it felt. He was squirmy sometimes, he patted my face, he reached up for me to lift him, settled his head in the crook of my neck and slept, sweetly, and just clung to him. I woke up when we were making plans to move back home so that we could spend all our time with him, jobs be hanged. I was listening to him babble baby-talk, holding him on my lap thinking, I have to remember this and how it felt. I have to remember this.

And then I was awake and remembering and it was Gabe and it wasn't, and I don't know whether to be grateful because I held him again or angry because he's gone again. So I'll just feel sad for a bit.

May 24, 2010

Nine months.

I knew it was this week. I knew it was coming.

Nevertheless, it managed to take me by surprise when I saved my weekly report and typed in the date and said, "Oh."

Maybe this is why I'm feeling contemplative. Why I'm feeling withdrawn and introspective, why I keep searching for him in the midst of a crowd and in the quiet of my heart.

Nine months. Twice as long as he existed. Time enough for a new human to have been created and born. As long as he was supposed to have been in me.

I would have thought that by nine months many things would have been different, if I could have comprehended nine months away at the beginning. I would have thought that I could breathe more easily, that I would be adapted, that the shattered feeling would have faded away.

Instead I find that while I can look back at that time and see the progress I've made, the reality sets in that I may always feel this shattered, this lost. I may always find my breath catching in my throat at inconvenient times and adaptation is a myth created to help those around you who need to believe that you can be better.

Or maybe adaptation is an apt word after all. I suppose I have adapted to this half-life of parenthood and mothering a spirit. I suppose I have adapted to the spiritual limp with which I walk, to the sharp pain that may accompany the unexpected reminder, to accepting that the most I have is a few pictures and a ring and a love that aches with longing.

I am learning to live with this constant presence of pain, and I can acknowledge now that it has not lessened so much as I have become accustomed to it. The tears are far less frequent and I rarely indulge in them when they spring up. Sometimes I am afraid that if I open myself up to that darkness again, I won't emerge. I came through it once, and that is enough.

Still, I miss him. How much I miss him still astonishes me. I would have expected the ache in my arms to lessen some, but they are as empty as ever. I wish to see his name today, to speak it aloud, to know it's not just a name pulled at random, it is the name that belongs to my son.

My Gabriel.

It's Never Fucking Over

I had anticipated that I would sit down tonight and write a cheerful post. Because up until about 10 minutes ago, I was feeling pretty cheerful. My job is safe, I am doing well, I was super-productive at work, dinner was cooked, we took our walk today, we planned to have sex, I like my monitor, and DH wasn't as down tonight as he's been for awhile.

But I just got a call from a fucking collections company seeking payment for a bill that I am completely and utterly unaware of for OB/GYN services I received in June 09.

So. Is it possible? Sure. I had at least two small bills slip through the crack amidst the myriad of bills from the hospital (why they can't send you one bill, I don't know). As soon as we were made aware of them, we paid them immediately. We had at least one large mystery bill out of nowhere that I just paid to be done with the fucking mess. I should have challenged it, but I was done. I wanted it to be over.

And yet - out of nowhere, nearly a year after services were rendered, with no other notices or calls - there is suddenly another $100 bill floating out there?

What the fuck?

WHAT THE FUCK?

These bills have gone on for twice as long as I was pregnant with my dead son. It's ridiculous. It's completley and utterly ridiculous.

I'm furious and DH, after a long rant about the assholes at the hospital - because it has to be them as I can't think of anything else it could be - has just shut down. He's angry and hurt and I don't know how to begin approaching him.

It just never ends. Never.

Relief

I know I've hinted that things at work are a little . . . uncertain right now.

I haven't wanted to come out and say what exactly was happening - partially because I didn't know before today, but also partially because I've been trying not to let the worry consume my entire life (that attempt has been less than successful, btw).

But now I know what's happening. Due to budget cuts (which we knew about) there will be positions cut (which we knew about). Late last week, word came down that instead of the 100 or so company-wide (over 6,000 employees), it was going to be more like 40 from our unit alone. Cue wild speculation and rumors flying and living in total fear about what will happen next.

The reality is that we spend up to (and sometimes over, though we're getting a lot better) our budget. If DH lost his job, we'd be tight and he'd have to find a way to make some income, but we could make it work somehow, at least short-term. If I lost my job, we'd be screwed. I make 2/3 of our income. The very thought had me shaking like a leaf. We're paying down debt and trying to build up savings, but . . . that is dependent on having income.

Before I'd been worried about getting pregnant and how leave would work and time off and bedrest and all the doctor visits . . . Suddenly, I was concerned about whether or not we should even be considering having a baby. And you want to talk about conflicting emotions. We've been all over the map. The compulsion to try is so strong that the thought of not trying (though tempered as it has become over the past few weeks) makes me cry. But trying when things were so uncertain and my job may be on the line? Utterly foolish.

Today, however, I was given the details about the cuts and what happens next and told explicitly that I am NOT on the list. I have never been on the list. And even better than that, I was told that I have really stepped up and am doing exceedingly well and that my boss' boss trusts me and will NOT let me go because she knows I can do my job well and I will be needed in the new plan. She also added that the database I'm creating has piqued interest in the Big Big Super-Boss' office. When I'm done, she's turning it over to them and they are going to consider it for a company-wide mandated use. Which . . . holy shit. No pressure or anything! God knows I'm frantically trying not only to make it useful for our purposes but also trying to make sure it can be used by others easily and intuitively as well.

So, I've been fretting. Worried, anxious, dreading each day at work, each closed door meeting, and now I feel as if an enormous weight has been lifted from me. I have a job and will continue to have a job for the forseeable future. And I'm succeeding in my job and we can go ahead with trying to conceive after all. The relief is too great for words. Thank God.

Writing

Back in high school, my senior year, there was a standard project in AP English (Honors English may have done this too). It was huge. A 20 page paper, minimum number of words that I forget now, handwritten to specfic instructions (computers weren't as much in use at that point - I didn't type my first paper until college. Hell, I didn't have an email address until my second semester of college!) - it was a big deal, accounting for nearly our full grade of one entire grading period.

I remember it very well. Looking back, it was a fairly standard sort of thing. Pick a book from a list (mostly Brit lit), read it, research it, write on it. Minimum of three outside sources. Some kind of argument. I chose Pride and Prejudice, mainly because I'd already read it a million times, which I figured would save me some time. I remember researching it, spending time in the library. I remember writing it for days, and rewriting it hastily so that there were no errors on any page in my French class while my kind teacher pretended not to notice. English was directly after, it was due that day, and I kept screwing up spelling or leaving out conjunctions, meaning I probably rewrote sections eight or nine times.

I remember turning it quite nervously; because you see, I had no fucking clue what I was doing. No idea what I was writing about. I totally made it up. I read those outside sources and I used quotes and I wrote 20+ pages on P&P without a single fucking idea of what it was supposed to be about. I knew the story backwards and forwards. I'd seen the play, owned the BBC movie version, and I guess that was evident, because I had no thesis that I found comprehensible. I just wrote and wrote and prayed it would get a passing grade.

I got a 98. One point deducted for a bibliography citation error and one point deducted for having more than two spelling errors in the paper. I got a comment that it was lovely, flowed beautifully and supported the arguments well. To this day, I have no idea how that happened.

Much of my college career was like that too. I floated through, rarely understanding the assignments without help, but somehow pulling enough out of my ass that people often assumed I could write and that I understood the material. Perhaps that was why I was drawn to History - there were facts I could grasp there and interpretations were for fun. RML was perhaps the one professor who saw through the facade and pulled me out of it. I was and am quite intelligent, and he insisted I live up to it, and use my brain. He was often considered a bit mad; his assignments often took the form of "In what manner and to what extent was Thomas Jefferson influenced by John Locke in the writing of the Declaration of Independence?" or "Who is 'the Prince' of Machiavelli's The Prince?" Ridiculously difficult questions pondered by scholars for centuries - and we were expected to distill that into a maximum paper of 3 pages (but as many endnotes as you like) and cogent arguments supported by the text.

I'll tell you this much - if there was any time in my life I learned to be brief, that was it. As you see, the lessons rarely carried through. Crystallization of thought processes, careful language choices, and really worthwhile textual analysis - that is what you needed. RML often said, and it was true enough for me, that the essence of the paper was the introduction. If the introduction laid out your argument, the rest was merely window-dressing. I learned how to break down the questions to see what he was really asking, and the day I got an A on a paper remains one of the proudest in my life. It was one of the few times I felt as if I knew how to write and what I was doing. Ross often told me in my early papers that I overthought things and made them far more complicated than they were; he was right, as he most often was.

I often sit down here to write, and that still plagues me. I don't know what to say. I have not determined who my audience is, and who I am writing for many times. Am I just sharing bits of my life? Am I skimming off the excess thoughts to relieve myself of their burden? Am I trying to enlighten or entertain? Am I seeking to clarify my thoughts for myself or help others understand what it is like to live in this unique situation? I think the answer is Yes, to all.

I think that I do best, that I give most, and get most when I stop overthinking it here. When I just let it go and write. I may not know what I'm doing, but something else comes through. Perhaps an instinctual understanding of a goal my conscious mind is still trying to work out, perhaps it's merely the truth of me unadorned and therefore more easy to relate to (even for me). I don't know.

I don't know why I am writing this even as I type. I think perhaps I am realizing how little control I exert over my own life, and how often the attempts to exert control leave me feeling frustrated and unfulfilled. Perhaps I simply need to let go and let life flow, as the words are flowing right now, as love flows. Without conscious thought, without dissection, without overthinking.

I have so little idea what I'm doing in this life, and I find myself constantly seeking answers, trying to understand. Maybe there isn't anything to understand, maybe it's all just doing it, living it, and seeing how it comes out in the end. I don't know.

Holding steady.

Not much is different, not much to add.

Used the first stick with the CBEFM. I'm pleased with the purchase thus far. If my cycle is readable, then I can see this being really helpful in terms of helping narrow the fertile time down a bit and maybe reduce the stress.

I'm been trying to be more healthy, including going walking. Tonight was the third time this week. One mile for now. Averaging just over 4 mph pace. I'm surprised by how good I feel afterwards. But since I pulled a muscle in my chest somehow doing this, I can't say it's my favorite thing ever.

Eating more healthfully overall, and that's good I suppose. I'm drinking green tea like there is no tomorrow. It's incredible the number of ways in which it can benefit you. Cutting back on the excess food and sweets. But man, I would love a good trip to Taco Cabana.

Things at work are ok. Things at home are ok (if messy and unorganized). I continue to write, approaching 50,000 words now. I'm sleeping ok. Just don't have much to say right now.