I am tired because I haven’t been sleeping very well. I haven’t been sleeping well because one morning last week my alarm didn’t go off and I and was late for work, so now when it starts getting light out I wake up every 15 minutes and check the time. This is exhausting. I really should let it go, because work just laughed, I didn’t get in trouble, but now my subconcious is paranoid. It needs to go to friggin sleep.

Today I had a tweaked nerve in my back that kept sending pains shooting up when I twisted the wrong way.

And finally my allergies are in full force, makes me feel like I have a sock stuffed up into my nasal cavity. I was confused about it until I realized I’d been leaning heavy on the milk and ice cream lately. So I’m going off dairy completely to see if that gets this back under control. Zyrtek might be helping to take an edge off in the meantime. Maybe. When I remember to take it.

All in all I feel like a major whiner at work, which I really try not to do. I don’t want to be that person.

But other than all that, I actually feel pretty good. It’s a nice relief to not be on any hormones, to let my body just chill out. I feel like it’s wound tight, waiting, like it can’t quite accept that I’m not throwing something at it this month. (While I am am on cycle day 12, I am nowhere near ovulating yet. And, yes, I had to actually open up a calendar and count.)

It’s nice to be able to do things, plan things. One of the most frustrating things with cycles is the way it makes you feel like your entire future is balanced on a teeter-totter. Will you be coming to that party next month? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe I’ll be holed up in my room crying, maybe I’ll be out celebrating. Maybe I’ll be able to drink, maybe I’ll be sitting in the corner, enviously eyeing everyone (because while I’d gladly give up drinking were I actually pregnant, of course it’s “just in case” and I know I’ll test negative in a few days time).

It just feels good to let go… knowing I will return, but just to allow myself to step out of it for a little while. I have no choice, no decisions… just time to put aside.

I didn’t expect to feel this way.

::

We went to the movies tonight, to Star Trek. I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone, though I’m only mentioning the very beginning of the movie. But at the beginning of the movie when James was born, it was in the middle of an attack. His father stayed behind to fight, to hold off the attackers while the others – including his wife and newborn son – were able to escape.

It made my breath stop. The birth and death tied together, the saying goodbye and never getting to see his son, a son never knowing his father… it all hit me like a ton of bricks. I could feel the tension envelop Den and I… he didn’t say a word, but I could feel it, could hear his breath get short. That grief sitting on our chests.

For the other people in the theater it was probably just a sad part to the movie. But to us it was memories and grief bubbling to the surface at a time when we least expected it.