In February my sister-in-law – the same one whom had a baby 3 months after Devin was born, the one who was pregnant alongside me the first time – announced she was pregnant again. It hit me like a ton of bricks. In retrospect I suppose I should have expected it, but every time I spoke to her she would say that they weren’t sure they were going to have any more children. It wasn’t out of the question, but they were happy with how it was, too. I admit I was relieved by that. When my first trimester and most of my second passed without any news I unwound a little and stopped giving it much thought. Until that night, when I felt like I got hit over the head with a two-by-four.

I held it together in public. Denis shot me a covert, concerned glance as the happy couple announced their joyous news to the family, and I simply fell quiet and sipped my water. I made small contributions to conversation, but let others carry the bulk. Outwardly composed, inwardly in turmoil. I lasted an hour or two before deciding that we needed to leave for the night. We walked silently to the car. As we sat there in the parking lot he asked me in a quiet voice how I was. And I fell apart, sobbing. One thought eclipsed all others: last time we were pregnant together she came home with a baby… I didn’t. Suddenly I saw the past repeating itself – pregnant again, a few months apart. I felt irrationally terrified for our little girl, that this meant we were going to lose her, too.

I know I couldn’t do it again. Last time I was determined. I went to my sister-in-law’s baby shower, after Devin had died. I visited her and the baby in the hospital. I stopped by after work once a week. I was determined to forge a good relationship with my niece, and to maintain a close friendship with my sister-in-law. It was hard – beyond hard. There were many days when I cried. But 2 years later I do have a positive relationship with my niece, I do still have a good relationship with my sister-in-law. There are still moments when the sadness and grief hits me, but overall I am in a place of peace about it. It just took a long time, and a lot of effort, to get here. And I know that I do not have it in me to do it again. If anything happens this time, I know I am done, the chasm too wide to ever repair.

The other piece of the bombshell dropped that evening hit the other grieving side of me: not only are they pregnant, but they are expecting twins. Two babies. My head reeled. I’ve never even wanted twins, so it wasn’t jealousy, exactly. But it still seemed that life was making an extra exclamation point on how hard it was for us to conceive, and how easy for so many others.

And lastly I cried, looking at my husband through wet eyelashes, and said, “With two of them, chances are at least one of them is a boy.” And I really wasn’t sure I was ready for that.

::

Today was her ultrasound. They are having two boys. And I was right: I’m not ready for it.

We have come to a place where we are so happy to be having a little girl. The dresses, the pink, the whole prospect of raising a girl-child… it has become our new little world and we are happy to be here. But there is still that large shadow looming overhead that we can’t quite get away from. I still get quiet in the store when I pass by the little boys outfits. I still get choked up seeing baby boys. Girl is our new world; boy is what could have been, should have been. Boy is what slipped through our fingers, got packed away in our basement.

And now we face the prospect of dealing with the reminders not just in a peripheral way, but daily, weekly. The thought scares me. I do not feel ready to confront this grief yet. I am already exhausted, knowing that when this baby is born alive we will have to re-face all our grief again as we stare directly into the looking glass at what should have been our life the first time around.

It would be so much easier if they were girls.

::

All of this is made even harder by the fact that we are in fact very close to them. I am good friends with my sister-in-law. Den is close to his brother. We all have a good relationship and they have been so very supportive of us throughout. They absolutely deserve their own happiness, their own joy, their own celebrations. But we are stuck, unable to be fully present. We are mired down in our own grief, our own issues. It would be easier, I think, if this all happened with family that we weren’t close to – people we could just walk away from, separate ourselves from. But we can’t do that – no, we don’t want to do that. I want Katherine to grow up close to her cousins. I want to maintain our friendship with brother-in-law and sister-in-law. I want to enjoy family gatherings. But in order to do all of that we now need to work through this.

I wish everything didn’t have to be such a struggle. I wish the idea of babies could be joyful and not so wrapped up in pain and fear and sadness. Maybe someday it will be – but I have my doubts. I think there will always be a bitterness, no matter how many years pass, no matter how many healthy, living children we have.

For right now I focus on getting Kate here safely, and hope that once that happens it won’t be quite so hard to get through the arrival of her two newest cousins.