It's been a quiet 12 weeks for me on the blog front. I've tried several times to make a new post but couldn't figure out how to make sense of all the ways I was feeling enough to put it into coherent sentences. I'm going to give it my best shot now.
Survivor's Guilt: Once, at the tender age of pre-k, I stood in a crowded movie theater and shouted "quit laughing, you're making my shoulder nervous" because Milo (of Milo and Otis) was stuck in a hole. It's been ever since then, and several more incidences, that the long running joke in my family revolves around my extreme sensitivity - especially to the plight of others. It comes as no surprise to me, then, that I have Infertility Survivor's Guilt.
This means that for the first few weeks of being pregnant I wanted to apologize. It's why I won't ever post pregnant belly pictures. It's the reason I still feel racked with uncertainty about the few instagram posts I have made about my pregnancy. How do you celebrate when another is mourning? How do you forget the many, many times you felt left behind and alone? I don't want, not for a single second, to add to the pain or brokenness of another.
With that said, to whomever my pregnancy might hurt: the rest of this post will be a trigger. I love you and remember you every day. You are important and wonderful and valued. Please look away now.
Celebration: Every morning I wake up I remember that I'm pregnant. Each new day is a wonderful celebration of that singular fact. It wasn't a dream. It's really, really, really real. I cannot, with any words created on this earth, express the unending, abounding, all consuming joy of knowing my daughter rests safe within me and I'll get to meet her in a few short months.
She started tapping on me at a tiny 14 weeks. Now, at 24 weeks, she gives me such an abundance of hard thumps that often I can't sleep until she settles down. Sometimes K places his hand on my belly and she kicks at him, too. Every single time he asks, in disbelief, if I did that. Every time I get to tell him that it's our daughter.
And 24 weeks, folks, that's a biggie in pregnancy land. It's viability which means that she's got a 50-50 chance of making it outside of my body should fate decide to bring her too early. It means that there shouldn't be a single doctor or hospital who wouldn't do everything to save her tiny little life. Each day from here only increases her odds. In two weeks, her chances without me go up to 90%.
We've started to get semi-serious about baby prepping. Her nursery is nearly half painted in a spectacular shade of aqua teal. The dino decor is half made. My dreams of the finished product are abundant. I'm anxious that we won't get it all done, won't have everything she needs, and at the same time calm knowing that it will all take care of itself the way this sort of stuff usually does. She has clothes galore. I would say it's too many clothes except there is no such thing when it comes to pretty little outfits. I need to wash and sort them at some point. I've not felt the urge yet so I'm waiting on that. The baby shower dates are booked and the registry is a mess. K had free reign of the scanner which means our list has at least 15 wubba nubs and some candy on it.
The things: When I gave up hope that I'd ever get, let alone stay, pregnant I'd also given up on getting to experience the things that go along with it. Warning - this will likely be very annoying to all those that dreaded the things I'm about to wax poetically thankful over.
Hyperemesis Gravidarum (HG): this isn't just the regular morning sickness. This is the 'end up in the ER from vomiting your life up' sort of sickness. I am intimately familiar with the toilets at my house, my work, my in-laws, my neighbors, and establishments spread around DFW. Some foods I fear I'll never be able to eat again and my diet currently revolves around things that I think would hold up in flavor should I need to puke them back up soon. HG, for me, came with a lovely friend called migraine. Together, they left me a curled up useless mess on the couch. Thanks to a couple of wonderful medications I've been able to go about life fairly normal but without the medicines I turn right back into a shriveled wreck. And still, I GET TO SAY I HAVE HG! What! What sort of amazing nonsense is that. I have HG because I'm pregnant. Holy crap! Hallelujah!
Glucose Test: the horror stories I've heard about having to consume the sickly-sweet punch flavored glucose drink are common fodder for a get together of child-bearing aged women. It made them shaky, gave them headaches, left them feeling terrible for hours after. They were hungry and grumpy and uncomfortable. The tech was so bad at blood draws. They passed it no problem or failed it and had to go on to the next dreadful round of testings. And still, I CAN'T FREAKING WAIT. I have the drink sitting in my fridge door and I get a thrill of excitement each time I see it. I never thought I'd get the privilege of adding my part to the horror story. Bring it on. Holy crap! Hallelujah!
Maternity Shorts: They are so ugly and don't fit right. Everything is somehow too big and too small. Plus, they're very expensive. Unless you go cheap (ahem - my middle name) in which case I think you end up with even uglier, ill fitting garments. And still, I've been waiting a long time for this. Now that I'm finally showing and uncomfortable in my regular clothes, I hopped on the maternity shorts train even while complaining about it. Maybe I wasn't listening because I was too busy talking crap but these things are so comfortable. Give me all the ugly maternity gear. Let me be a hot mess. Heck yeah. Hallelujah!
