One year ago today I got a positive pregnancy test and my life changed forever. It’s strange how far away we are from that day now, and yet how very similar we sit. The last year has been completely amazing and I am thankful I was able to experience it all.

::

I am feeling very anti-social (yet desperate for someone to talk to), I think I’m getting sick again, and I hurt my back on the trampoline yesterday. Today has not been a spectacular day.

I had an interview today for a job. A job that is not close and will be a bit of a pain to drive to, but comes with health insurance. And I’m going to double-check just to be sure, because at this point I’m feeling all sorts of anxiety about lots of different things, but it’s health insurance that should cover IVF. The interview went very well and I do not anticipate any problems with my references. I expect to be offered the job sometime next week.

I am, quite honestly, kind of terrified. It’s an easy job – a bank teller – but I have this pit of fear in my stomach. Starting a new job means meeting new people, learning new skills, struggling to figure it all out and hoping you’re doing a good job of it. Starting a new job [almost] always sucks. I haven’t held a real job like this for over three years. Actually, it’s been closer to 6 years for this type of formal business job – the rest were working with instructors and peers at my college (which I find a lot less stressful, since I already knew them). Den just keeps looking at me funny and saying, “It’s a job as a teller.” I know that. But I just keep thinking, what if I screw up? It’s not like they’re going to just throw me to the customers and expect me to figure it out as I go along, but gah. I’m just so nervous.

I just have so much swirling around this job. The possibility of IVF is huge and makes this job Important (thus more anxiety). If this all works out we could be looking at starting IVF in Nov/Dec.

But then I think… I’m not supposed to be doing this. I’m supposed to be raising a baby right now. And I’m just terrified about taking this step forward into accepting our current situation. I’ve been keeping my schedule completely open and flexible for three years now, anticipating the baby that will “soon” be here to look after. Filling that just seems so scary to me. And it’s not like I can’t or won’t quit the job to stay home with a child when one comes along. It’s not like I’m signing my life over here. But somehow, to me, this signifies an acceptance of something that I don’t really want to accept.

But I’m not a mommy – not to a child here on earth. I do not have responsibilities keeping me home. In fact, staying home is making me more than a little stir-crazy and this may very well be the thing that I need to get myself sorted out.

And it’s time. I’ve spent the last four and a half months grieving. Waiting. Now it’s time to start living.

I am not really very good with change. Can you tell?

During my pregnancy I started seeing a chiropractor to help with the increasing backaches, and found that it was fantastic. After giving birth, after going back to work, I’ve finally gone back to help everything back into place. Today they took x-rays – usually the first thing they do with new patients, but I was pregnant at the time so they couldn’t.

I’ve always had lower back pain. When I started working (at 18) I went to the doctor to figure out why, because it was so very bad. He looked me over and pronounced me “fine.”

Well you know what? I’m not “fine.” I’m not some mutant, but I’m not fine either. Xray showed that my L5 vertebra is fused with my sacrum, which is not typical. She said she sees about 10% of her patients with it, so it’s not this rare thing, but it’s not exactly how it’s supposed to be either. She gently pushed around the L4 vertebra and said, “You carry your weight here instead.” Ow, I said. Yeah. That’s where it always hurts. That’s where it’s always hurt. Apparently the fused vertebrae cause a more prounced curve of my lower back, just like Den has always commented on.

I feel a little irritated that my old doctor, years ago, never bothered to even check it out. I know he was an old-fashioned type where “if it aint broke, don’t fix it.” He was also the one who delivered me via c-section because my mom’s pelvis was “too small.” But mostly I’m just irritated that I’ve been living in pain for years simply because a doctor never said, “Your back really hurts? Hey, have you seen a chiropractor?” Of course it’s all a moot point now.

Oh also, she told me I need to stop sleeping on my stomach, for my neck’s sake. Ugh! You know how happy I was to be able to sleep on my stomach again after giving birth?! I firmly believe that was the biggest reason I had trouble sleeping when pregnant… not the pregnancy itself, but the fact that I was forced to sleep on my side!

All in all I’m pretty damn happy to be seeing a chiropractor. I had been having shooting pains down my left leg and a whole lot of soreness in my lower back… after one visit I felt a ton better. It’s kind of cool to not have back pain.

Remember how I said I’d finish my birth story someday? I only just now got to it. It’s a hard one… to write and read.
Part 1
Part 2

::

Immediately after they took Devin I layed back in bed, exhausted mentally and physically. The midwife was sitting there, waiting. I really wasn’t aware of much, but I know that after some minutes had passed she gave a gentle tug and I felt the placenta slither out of me. The midwife checked me and told me I had one tiny tear that she wasn’t even sure needed a stitch, but she decided to put one in just in case. I barely noticed. She quickly felt my uterus, said it was all good, and left.

Den and I cried for a good while. He kissed my forehead and told me that I was amazing. I was so happy I got through it without an epidural. I was just in awe of what my body had done, what I had just accomplished. I spent many years fearing childbirth, and now suddenly I was on the other side.

My body started shaking shortly after. I realized it must be the crash of my hormones – I hadn’t been prepared for that, as we had never made it to the class on what happened after birth. I couldn’t stop shaking for around half an hour. It was very strange feeling.

I was impatient for them to remove the IV. I asked the nurse if she could take it out, and out it came. I got up to go to the bathroom and she showed me the pads, the mesh underwear. I don’t really remember it hurting too bad… I actually felt quite good, physically. I certainly didn’t feel like I had just been through labor and given birth.

We were encouraged to order dinner before the kitchen closed for the night. So we did.

A little later I realized that I smelled really really bad. BO in the worst way. Den encouraged me to take a shower. I didn’t really want to – I think I wanted to just lay in bed and do nothing at all – but he finally convinced me. It felt wonderful. I felt clean, and in some ways released. But when I stepped out I left little watered-down droplets of blood on the floor, reminding me of my wounds.

The nurse shift changed and our new nurse introduced herself. She told us she’d be with Devin all night, taking photos and footprints, dressing him and getting him ready and that we could ask for him at any time of the night and she’d bring him. She was so very sweet. We both knew that we wanted to see Devin again, but there was the unspoken understanding between us that we didn’t really want to do it yet. We were scared. So we let her go and take care of him while we watched TV in a daze.

At 10pm she came in and said that she was done and asked if we wanted to see him. I swallowed my fear and said okay, now was as good as any time. She left to get him. I heard his cart squeaking as she wheeled it down the hallway. I don’t know why I remember that, but I do. Den and I clutched each others hands. It felt like I couldn’t breathe. How do you face meeting your dead son?

The nurse showed him to us, quietly said how beautiful he was. Den and I cried.

She handed him to me. He was swaddled in a blanket, a knit hat on his head. I took him gently, held him in my arms like I would any newborn. I cried and cried, so much I couldn’t see his face through my tears. I closed my eyes so I didn’t have to see his imperfections. I felt him in my arms, the heavy weight of a baby, MY baby. I hunched over and rocked him and bawled. I thought my heart would break in that moment, that it would literally shatter in my chest.

Someone – her? me? – set him down on the bed in front of me. Den and I just looked at him. Looked at his nose, his mouth, his little fingers. I couldn’t stop staring at his fingers. I stroked them gently with my fingers, I put my pointer finger underneath his, as if he was a newborn holding on. I asked the nurse if she could get handprints for me, I really wanted prints of his little fingers. She said yes, of course, she would do that for us.

We didn’t take long. I really have no idea how long he was with us, but it wasn’t very long in the grand scheme of things. We didn’t unwrap him to see his feet or his body… I guess in many ways I was just too scared. He’d been dead for days and it hurt so indescribably much to see his skin like that. sometimes I wonder, but most of the time I am at peace with what we did.

Den kissed his fingers and then touched Devin’s forehead with them. We said goodbye to our son and the nurse took him away. She said we could see him anytime we wanted, that he would be nearby with her, we just had to ask. But we never did.

Den crashed after that… I could see all the energy leave him, everything he had was just gone. He unfolded the chair into a bed and pushed it right up against my hospital bed. We clung to each other that night. I have never felt so close to my husband, so absolutely desperate to never ever be let go. We couldn’t physically cuddle in the bed situation, but we layed with our faces inches apart, holding hands.

He fell asleep. I layed awake for hours. The room was dark, but there was some very soft lights glowing. I stared at the octagonal recessed ceiling, memorizing the shape of the ceiling tiles. The thoughts wouldn’t leave me, the pictures in my mind… my heart beat loudly in my chest. I felt like I was in some horrible nightmare that I couldn’t get out of. I heard a baby cry down the hall. I turned on the TV to watch Law & Order.

The morning came slowly, and I was glad when it did. It seemed a lot easier to handle things in the light. At 6am my night nurse came in to say that she was going off shift and if it was alright that they’d take Devin now to the morgue. We said it was fine. She brought in a Certificate of Birth and Devin’s memory box, a small box covered with handmade paper, with his clothes and footprints and photos. Den’s name was spelled wrong, but she did a new one for us. I wanted everything to be just right. After she left I opened the memory box and looked at the little things that were Devin’s. We cried some more. We didn’t look at the photos. I couldn’t, yet. I touched the box softly and put it carefully aside.

We ordered and ate breakfast. The day nurse came in to check on me, make sure I had everything I needed, make sure my uterus and blood pressure were good. She said we could leave anytime. We were in the middle of watching a movie – Second Hand Lions – so we stuck around. It was a fantastic movie… we found ourselves laughing. It was so strange. It felt good to laugh, to forget for little brief moments, why we were in the hospital. It was uplifting.

As the movie ended I got dressed in my sweatpants and sweater that I had worn to my appointment the day before. I stood at the mirror and stared at myself for a while. The clothes were the same, but everything – everything – was different. We gathered up the few things we had… my purse, the memory box… and walked out of the room.

On the elevator was someone with a baby in a carseat. I didn’t look. I stared at the buttons. I squeezed Den’s hand. We walked past the gift shop and out into the sunlight, holding hands.

Two things I now like to eat that I didn’t like before pregancy: ranch dresssing and cottage cheese.

Ranch dressing I never liked… I mean, it wasn’t terrible, but it was certainly not what I wanted on my salad, I was a thousand island or honey mustard kind of girl. Then during pregnancy suddenly I liked ranch. A lot. It was what I had on all of my salads during pregnancy. And I still kind of like it (just not as much).

Cottage cheese I started eating because I was getting tired of milk and normal cheese and was looking for a healthy snack. And I liked it. And I apparently still like it. Especially this Cottage Doubles made by Breakstone… I just had the raspberry flavor. Yum yum!

Yay for healthy snacks. :)

I decided today that I should eat more protein. Really I should have been eating more protein for the past four months, but I just wasn’t in the mental space to care enough about it. Now I’m concerned that this has impacted my eggs and I haven’t given them the best chance.

I ate a lot of protein during pregnancy. I kept a diary in a spreadsheet, following the Brewer’s Diet. So I opened it up today to get some ideas of what I could make myself, since it’s been a while and my brain feels a little clueless. And I just started laughing as I read it – full out giggling at my computer screen. No wonder I was able to eat 80 grams of protein a day, and no wonder my mom was laughing so much at me when I visited over christmas… I ate a TON of food! Holy shit! I only fuzzily remember being that hungry all the time, being able to eat two meals at the same time and then go looking for desert. I never would have thought it was possible. And at the time it felt perfectly normal to be that hungry, I didn’t think it was that strange for me!

My appetite has gone way down. I’m trying to eat (because there are days when the depression gets in the way and I just don’t even feel like eating), but I’m also trying to be mindful of what and how much I eat, rather than just grabbing whatever is easiest or closest. I’m finding that I feel full a lot faster than I think I will. At a family party on sunday I filled my plate and ate only about half of it before I realized I was perfectly fine and no longer hungry – even though I had been really starving before I started.

The other thing I’ve been doing for a few weeks now is lifting weights. Freeweights. I’m not even lifting very big ones yet – just mostly the 10lb dumbells. It doesn’t take me very long to run through most of the muscle groups: I do squats for the thighs and butt, some overhead presses for the shoulders and chest, bicep curls and overhead tricep pulls for the arms, sometimes some simple calf presses, and then a bunch of crunches for the dreaded belly. It takes me 15 minutes at a leisurely pace. I do get sweaty – which is gross in this heat (makes it a little harder to get motivated). And I do make an effort to do each movement carefully and properly, pushing my muscles until I’m a bit sore the next day. But seriously, 15 minutes three times a week? That’s all I have to do?

I’m under 140lbs now. Just barely under, but under. But much more significant than that is the fact that all of my pants are falling off of me. I had to ditch my uber-comfy maternity sweatpants a couple of weeks ago because they just weren’t staying up, even with the elastic. My pre-pregnancy jeans are sagging around my ass and I find myself tugging at them all day at work. I think – now gasp with me here – I have to go out and buy a smaller size. WTF? I have been in size 12 jeans since… since… ummm…. a long time. Since I got married, I think… 3 years ago. At least that long, probably longer. So for me to be fitting into size 10s at 4 and a half months post-partum? Holy SHIT. That’s crazy.

I am wicked pleased with myself about all of this. This is something I have control over. Very obvious cause-and-effect. I make changes, I see the result. And it’s more than that… I feel like I want to show everyone my progress. And I know it’s connected to my loss and coping, I’m just not exactly sure how. Maybe just making myself feel better. “I don’t have the baby, but look! I have this!”

I’m also pleased that I’ve lost this weight/size without restricting what I eat. How much, yes – but I haven’t excluded anything from my day. If I want chocolate, I eat some chocolate. If we go out for dinner (which we don’t do often), I order what I want. I still eat a portion-sized bag of chips at work. I just don’t let myself eat only those, and I don’t let myself eat a ton of it (I normally have bad self-control, so this is kind of new for me). I think this is why it’s working… I really really can’t cut the things I love out of my diet. Just can’t do it. I’ve also discovered that a lot of fast food really sucks. Since I’m not eating as much as I used to I’m loathe to waste an entire meal on something that tastes like it’s been sitting under a warmer for an hour. You can keep it. (But I’ll take the fries. Nom nom nom.)

As an aside, all those fad diets just piss me off. It makes me grouchy when I see “Lose 10lbs in one month!” splashed across a magazine cover while I’m waiting in line at the grocery store. (Though it’s easier to look at than the large pictures of celebrity babies. Because I really want to stare at THAT. Go. The fuck. Away.) It’s like the magazines and industry is constantly trying to “invent” new diets. How come they rarely promote the best diet of all: eat more healthy stuff, less crap, and less overall. And exercise. And then I saw a commercial on TV for a “calzone” that seriously was like at least 4 meals. Yeah, our society has issues.

You know I haven’t bought a magazine since about halfway through my pregnancy, as I’m just tired of the bullshit. I can’t help but wonder, as I’m reading magazine articles, how long it took someone to whip it up. Not just weight loss articles, but anything in magazines nowadays. Perky little articles on how to get good big things with very little effort. Maybe I’m just jaded. And I’m fucking tired of seeing spreads about the cutest new fashions where they recommend shirts for just $150! And purses that are colorful and spunky and fucking ugly. Yes… yes I do believe I am just getting jaded. I’m not even old yet. Shit, what am I going to sound like in 20 years?

::

Despite the magazine-ranting I am actually feeling better today. Yesterday was an okay day tending to the “good” side of things, and today was even more so. I got up early, ran a lot of errands, went to work, came home and took the dogs out, made myself an actual meal, filled out some paperwork for our upcoming RE appointment, and even got to spend some time with Den at the end of the day. Somewhere in all of that I felt like the cloud had lifted just a little bit. I am not good, I am far from good, but I am not bad. I’m starting to feel a little less heavy, a little less chained to the ground. I am thankful.

I guess these moods are just going to come and go. I’m always mindful of my underlaying depression (beyond the loss and grief) and medication and am open to adjusting things and seeking help if need be, but at the same time I know that there are going to be shitty days, weeks and sometimes I’m just going to have to slog through them. As long as I don’t get stuck in them.

One of the things I am currently struggling with is the fact that, in terms of TTCing, I don’t really fit in either camp.

The TTC forums – even the TTC after loss forums – are full of people excitedly charting and having sex and getting pregnant. I find it hard to read forums like that. I’m sure many of the infertiles reading this remember those forums. It makes my head hurt sometimes. I do not always feel hopeful and excited. Most of the TTC after loss people are dealing with issues regarding loss only… not infertility. I am out of place.

The infertility threads and forums, however, also don’t seem to suit me right now. I am charting, I am having sex. I am a long ways away from doing an IVF cycle. I’m not on any meds. If that were the only issue then I’d still feel okay with it, but it’s not. The thing that goes through my head is what if I DO get pregnant normally? I can’t help thinking about what a blow it would be to those women who are still cycling and doing everything they can for me to join up and get pregnant while having sex.

The problem is simply that I don’t know. I don’t know if this is going to work or if we’re in it for the long haul again. And until I do know I don’t feel right joining either group. In a year I’ll be able to look back and see clearly…. but until I actually get pregnant I’m afraid I’m just… in limbo.

I just don’t see any groups for women dealing with infertility (or possible infertility) after late-term loss. I guess there’s just not enough of us on any one forum. I feel alone. :(

::

I discovered something last night that made me freak out briefly: my boobs still leak. They don’t leak on their own, which is why I never noticed anything out of the ordinary… but when I squeeze my nipples I sure as heck see milk. So I spazzed for a while wondering what the hell was up with this.

I looked it up and apparently it’s quite normal. That’s a relief.

::

I have more I could say but I’m getting a nice headache, so I think I’m going to lay down.

I feel in some ways that I’ve reverted. I remember a time after Devin’s death that I felt alive, that I discovered a new hobby (gardening) and was sketching out a new life for myself. And I knew a lot of that was thanks to the numbness and it would wear off one day, but I said I would deal with it as it comes.

Well it came. The last few weeks I have felt absolutely motionless. I am lost, I am heartbroken. I am not despondent like I was at first… it is not the choking grief I cried. This is softer, quieter. This just is, like an anchor in my heart, holding me to the ground.

I feel very little. I do not cry much, if at all. I do not get excited, I do not feel thankful. I just… am. Every morning I wake up, look at the ceiling and the wall, roll over, and go back to sleep. I repeat this multiple times. And it’s not my usual “I’m tired,” either. This is me opening my eyes and thinking, why bother? Why the hell should I get out of bed? So I close my eyes and escape from the thoughts for another hour or two. I usually get out of bed when I feel I really ought to… sometime around 2pm.

I just don’t care. My garden has been ignored. My video game hasn’t been opened. I haven’t read any books or designed any websites or done anything at all because I simply don’t care. It means nothing to me.

If this continues I may have to go to my doctor and request my medication level be increased. Maybe 20mg just isn’t doing it anymore. Maybe this is just temporary, something to work through. I don’t know.

::

I have always been an introvert. Which is to say, after a period of time around other people I need some alone time to recharge my batteries. All my life I have been like that… had an unspoken timer in my head that flips off after a while. Being social exhausts me, and I can only take so much.

Especially after losing Devin, I could only handle certain people in small doses – certainly no parties or crowds. It left me feeling alone and alienated, even though nothing happened to make me feel that way. I just felt so far apart from everyone.

But lately it feels that something has changed. Den has been encouraging me to go out with him, be around people, even though I don’t particularly want to. But I find that being around others perks me up just a little bit. A day at work, or with SIL and BabyH watching baseball, or poolside with friends… the time spent with others leaves me feeling a little more alive. These connections help me feel that there is more out there, that there is something worth getting up for. Even if I just hang around and listen.

I wish I knew more people locally, so I had more to do.

::

Yesterday Den and I had a nice dinner out to celebrate our third anniversary (which was actually on the 16th). After dinner we were bored (and broke) so we stopped by BIL and SIL’s house to visit for a little while. Denis holding the baby made me giggle… he looked so unsure of himself, moving slowly in a way that bespoke his fear of breaking the little girl. It doesn’t feel that way for me. Even though I really haven’t been around newborns at all in my life, it just seems right to me. Innate. Like labor, my body knows what to do.

I settled back on the couch for a while with BabyH resting on my chest. I rubbed her back as she stared at things with her developing eyes. There was peace for those moments. There was healing in my heart. I know, without a doubt, that that is what I am meant for, that is why I am here. Even though she’s not mine, to hold her in my arms felt right.

That is why I hold on. That is why I get up in the morning. One day, I have to believe, I will hold my own child in my arms. One day I won’t feel as empty as I do today.

I cry.

I need to get up and get moving, get stuff done and get to work. Instead I’m laying here fighting a battle against the very strong desire to just lay down and go back to sleep. I’m not even really sleepy… it’s not like I’m falling asleep where I sit. I just… don’t want to get up and leave the bedroom. I don’t want to get up and have to deal with anything at all. I even like my job. But I simply just don’t want to move.

This whole week has been like this. I want to sleep all day and night and pretend that nothing else in the world exists. I wish I could.