Saturday is my SIL’s baby shower. I have very mixed feelings about it.<\/p>\n
On one hand I really want to be there. I mentioned before how getting closer to her and the baby makes it easier on me than just standing back and staring and wondering and thinking. Being involved in my neice’s life is I think going to be very important to both Den and I.<\/p>\n
On the other hand I really don’t know if I’m going to be able to handle it emotionally. All the people talking about babies and “when the baby comes home”…. I don’t know, I just don’t know. I also worry that my being there will dampen the mood. Knowing the family, people will be gentle around me – not tip-toeing, but aware. And maybe it’s better if I just weren’t there and let everyone celebrate honestly, because she needs to be celebrated.<\/p>\n
I have let SIL know that I hope to show up and will leave when I feel overwhelmed. She understands completely. I’m kind of leaving it to the last minute, because I never know how I’ll feel until the day dawns. Some days are good, some days aren’t so much.<\/p>\n
I just hate that all of this is in the way. In the way of SIL and my relationship, in the way of happiness, in the way of moving forward. I hate that every little event now requires careful planning and emotional fortifying. I just get so pissed off that this is what life has dealt us.<\/p>\n
::<\/p>\n
Today was my 6-week post-partum appointment (though it’s been nearly 7 weeks). I checked in and the receptionist asked me how I was doing, how I was holding up. I did have to sit in the waiting room for a few brief minutes, but I was okay with it. I just steadfastly stared at the TV and the fish, avoiding looking at any of the women in the room.<\/p>\n
The nurse took me in back apologising for making me wait a few minutes. She took my blood pressure (110\/77) and weight (147.8) – though not before asking me if I was okay with getting my weight taken. I was quickly shown into a room. Then the nurse asked me if it was okay if she asked me a few questions, and told me to stop if I felt I couldn’t handle it. She asked me when the baby was born, how much he weighed, what his name was. I just smiled. I’m never upset to talk about my baby.<\/p>\n
The midwife came in right away. It was the same midwife with whom I had the appointment that day, March 6. She was there when I found out Devin had died – she’s the one who sat with me all day, who made sure I had everything I needed, who listened when I talked and hugged me when I cried. I’m glad they arranged for me to see her today.<\/p>\n
She asked me how I was doing and I talked. I talked a lot, actually. Once in a while I would stop and wonder if I should just shut up now, but she was so quiet, just nodding, and she seemed in no hurry to leave. So I kept talking. I did start crying a little bit at one point, talking about how beautiful my labor was, how thankful I was for it, how Devin gave me that. She said with a small smile, “He gave you much more than that, I’m sure.”<\/p>\n
I told her that we want to start TTC right away. She said ideally my body would heal a bit first, but in our case she “isn’t going to tell [us] to use protection.” They seem to understand that between our emotional need to be pregnant again and our previous fertility problems that waiting would not be beneficial, so we take what we get. Chances are very good that my body will have at least a couple more months of healing before anything happens… or before we head to the RE again.<\/p>\n
I asked what would happen during a subsequent pregnancy. She said that since it’s a non-recurring issue that there’s no need to talk to a genetic counselor or have any increased monitoring… nor any reason I would be unable to continue seeing them. (As a Midwife group they have to hand off any patient who is high risk.) I mentioned that I really feel that I’m going to be paranoid as hell, like in the first tri when we won’t be able to hear anything by doppler yet. She said that my feeling panicked is a good enough reason for them to give me an early ultrasound, and that if a month between appointments is too much for me then they can do them more frequently if I want. So basically it sounds like I’ll be calling the shots, and they’ll do whatever they can to get me through it, even if, scientifically speaking, there’s no risk factors that call for increased monitoring. She also mentioned in passing that they would completely understand if I decided to go to a different care provider next time because of bad memories or whatnot. I explained to her that I’ve had the opposite reaction… I felt I had such good care of me and Devin and I really feel that I need to stay with them next time (even though I had somewhat planned to go back to my old Midwife after this pregnancy was over).<\/p>\n
I have a lot of questions about what happened to him, about the amniotic bands, but that is something I’ll have to bring up with the peri when we see him on May 1 (the one who called us with the autopsy results).<\/p>\n
It was very strange walking out of there, knowing that was the last time I’ll see them until my annual pap in September… or my next pregnancy. It’s another indication of that chapter closing. No longer pregnant. It’s like I took an 8-month daydream out of my old life – a crazy, wonderful dream – and now I’m back again. I’m right back where I started, wondering if what I remember really happened. My body is healed, the pets are the same as always, I’m back to work… all I have is a tree blooming in my front yard, some boxes stored in the basement, and memories that fade a little more each day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Saturday is my SIL’s baby shower. I have very mixed feelings about it. On one hand I really want to be there. I mentioned before how getting closer to her and the baby makes it easier on me than just standing back and staring and wondering and thinking. Being involved in my neice’s life is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[76,69],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ivf-3","tag-loss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lunardreams.net\/baby\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}