Silent Night

There's not much to say. What I've been doing this fall has been very distracting (on purpose) but not meaningful (also on purpose). I can't do meaningful now, not quite yet. After the years of TTC, I can't keep forcing myself to focus on things that hurt. So there have been distractions...

And then there are nights like tonight: snow falling, making the city quiet and still. Christmas lights. Memories of a night like this two years ago.

You know how, when someone writes a brokenhearted post, and there's nothing to say because they've just said it all, people sometimes simply write "Abiding with you" or words to that effect? I've felt your presence, abiding with me these past two years, and I'm thankful.

Tonight I'll try to give myself that same gift: turn down the volume on all the junk I've been using to fill up my mind, and just abide with what's left.

Contraction / Expansion

Today I came across this post, which (like so much of Dr. Cacciatore's writing) was thought-provoking and, well, validating. She sees grief not as a state to be escaped or fixed, but as a natural—even "evolutionary"—process. I'm not at that stage of acceptance. Still, her words give me hope:

"Contraction only will leave us unmovable – paralyzed with pain for the duration of our lives, fearful of love and life and terrified of more pain. This is a kind of Death for us. Expansion only is a futile endeavor as well, mostly because it is a ruse. It is often a state of self-delusion and inauthenticity that will leave us unsatisfied with our identity, soul-less, and worn out from persistent pretense. The natural course of grief, as in nature, is contraction-expansion-contraction-expansion-contraction-expansion..."

Almost like birth.

"This is the wisdom of the Universe, the wisdom of your body, the wisdom of your heart.

Trust it, and it will save you."

The Only Way Out is Through

Numbness

The day of the PGS news, my mother asked what I was going to do that night. I answered, "Take my car to the shop. The 'Check Engine' light is on." (Oh, the glamorous child-free life!)

"You're taking this well," she said, skeptically.

Since then, I've heard several times, "I'm worried about you." How's a person supposed to respond? Don't worry, I'm fine? That's not true. I'll get by? That's true but not effective. Blunt though I'm afraid it was, I finally just told the truth: "I'm sorry that you're worrying, but those are your feelings, and I don't have control over them."

Someone else said, "How sad that this happened after you'd gotten your hopes up so high." It made me realize that, no, my hopes had not been high at all. This result was always a real possibility, not a surprise. But it was still a shock. No amount of mental preparation can ward off something that feels like a physical blow. The shock is physical too, like the temporary deafness that follows an explosion.


Anger

The anger wasn't about anything specific. It was certainly not about blame, just a wounded desire to be left alone, plus rage at any perceived trespass.

And there were plenty. Like last year, after my miscarriage, the whole world had to burst into full fucking bloom right after my awful news. Oh sure, go ahead and rub it in. Even better, let's add Easter—a holiday focused on new life, symbolized by EGGS—followed by Mother's Day.

Pretty, happy flowers!

I hate you.
(source)

Is it weird that I'm developing a special aversion to tulips? They're just so obnoxiously big and waxy, so uniformly perfect, like something assembled at the Happiness Factory.

Anyway, moving on. The anger comes and goes. The worst was this Saturday, when I was calmly driving to the grocery store and another driver did something pointlessly, casually rude. These days—being acutely aware that there's plenty of random pain to go around—I cannot stand people who purposely inflict more, however small the offense. I wanted to KILL. I suddenly, vividly wanted to ram this driver's car into a wall, reach in, wrap my hands around his neck, and squeeze until his eyeballs…

Of course, instead of ramming the car, I pulled over and called a friend who reminded me of some things that work for her when she's at wit's end. There were no real surprises, no magic. I knew all these strategies already (work it off with exercise, get outside, be around people even if you don't talk to them, watch a silly movie…). In fact, the comfort was in the familiarity.

It felt like waking up after a nightmare as a child, going to my parents' room, and hearing the litany: "Do you need to use the bathroom? Do you want a glass of water?" It was grounding. By the time we hung up, I felt fully awake.


Sadness

One night I went to an AA meeting. The speaker told a long story about how she'd abused her son while she was drinking and using. He was born addicted to methadone, and things went downhill from there (though she remembers little of it) until she got clean when he was 12. After her, other people spoke about their own parenting regrets and, in some cases, how close they and their children have become since those days.

Sitting there and listening was hard. I came close to walking out. You know: They can have kids they don't even want?! I can't deal with this right now! But yes, dealing with my own resentments—the one part of all this that I could control—was exactly what needed to happen. So I stayed put. Slowly, surrounded by these people who were facing their own difficult truths, my focus drifted inward toward something I'd been avoiding.

Underneath the armor of numbness and rage came an image of a box inside my chest. It was sturdy, with thick sides, sharp defensive corners that literally made my chest hurt sometimes, and a lid that was clenched firmly in place. But tentacles of my darkest, slimiest feelings were starting to curl out experimentally.

The time has come, I thought. OK, right here and now. Release the Kraken! Mentally and very deliberately, I removed the lid.

Whatever is here, let me feel it fully. The only way out is through.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

It took me two full days to cry any tears at all, and then I cried over someone else's story in a book. It was written by the woman whose husband killed five Amish girls and wounded five more, then killed himself, in a Pennsylvania schoolhouse in 2006.

She wrote about how a group of Amish people came to the funeral she and her children held for her husband—the shooter! For religious reasons, the Amish are opposed to having their photographs taken. Yet they not only came to console her for HER loss, but they quietly put themselves between her family and the hordes of reporters, giving her the gift of privacy by sacrificing their own. And they weren't just impartial neighbors. That line of people standing shoulder to shoulder included the parents of EVERY ONE of the girls her husband had killed.

It took my breath away. It still does. Although our situations have nothing in common, I know we share at least this one essential thing: like them, I still want love, not bitterness, to win.

A Blast to the Head

When the nurse called with the PGS results, I asked the questions I had written down beforehand, which were listed under two headings: "If any embryos are normal" and "If all are abnormal." Either way, I knew I'd probably be too stunned to remember my questions in the moment.

I scanned down to the second list. Deep breath. So … what were the exact abnormalities? (Combinations of fairly rare monosomies and trisomies, meaning that entire chromosomes were missing and/or duplicated.) What were the implications for the embryos? (Early first-trimester miscarriage, if they even implant at all.) What were the implications for future treatment? (My RE wasn't there to answer that last question, so we'll talk by phone on Monday.)

Future treatment. Is there any point? I don't want to make any grand pronouncements right now about being Done With TTC. But … am I done?? At some point, the relief of stopping must outweigh the pain of giving up.

I keep thinking of a song that talks about making peace with pain, because there's really no other choice. It mentions three levels of damage: a splinter in the hand, a thorn in the heart, and a shotgun to the head. My months of TI and IUIs were like splinters in the hand, constant but fairly minor aches. Miscarriage after IVF was a thorn in the heart. This latest news...

Sometimes a blast straight to the head can actually be a mercy, compared to death by a thousand splinters. You know? I'm thinking here of people I know online who've gotten such definitive diagnoses that all hope of conceiving their own genetic children was crushed in an instant.

But maybe they would still love to have even whatever small chance I still have.

It's just all so complicated.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

What's a person supposed to do after getting this kind of news?

I went outside and cleaned up the patio. It felt strangely similar to the last time I got awful news and reacted with, of all things, a crusade to pick up litter in the woods. What's going on here? Am I developing some sort of weird "grief cleaning" habit?

Then, while still cleaning, I started writing a journal / blog entry in my head, because words are how I try to process things. I watched myself doing it, trying to force meaning out of this mess, desperate to transform it into something good or at least something useful. Water and cleansing, renewal...

No. STOP. There's no meaning here, certainly not yet. There's just a person whose hands are continuing to operate automatically, while her head and heart are in fragments. Whatever may happen down the road, despite or because of the news that I just got, there is NO GOOD in the fact that these embryos will not survive.

And whatever may happen down the road, there are no shortcuts to get there, just cold water and dirt in this moment, then the next. So feel it, gritty between my fingers and splattering onto my toes. Feel it. It's a fucking mess. So feel it. That's the lesson for today.

Triggers

Pregnant women and babies don't hurt me. I'm used to them, prepared for them, and usually not too unsettled.

Most of the time, what I feel is not much at all. Defended numbness. Sometimes a passing joy. Sometimes a gentle, wistful sadness for what might have been and obviously is not, so there's no point in brooding about it. No point in focusing much on the future, for that matter, since who knows what might end up happening then. Best to conserve my energy.

Then something blindsides me and flattens the careful defenses, as this beautiful post about the difference between grief and trauma describes:

"I've learned to walk and talk and laugh around the grief and while I never let it go, it's become easier to carry, to shift to one side when necessary. I wear it like the bracelet on my arm that has Eliza's name. It no longer feels like my defining characteristic, even though I carry it every day and it's become part of who I am.

The trauma lurks, sharp and scary and real, and when it surfaces, it takes me out."

It's true: the smallest things can hurt the worst, because they're so unexpected and so visceral. They're sensory things. A certain song that was popular when I was pregnant. The smell of hand sanitizer, which I used a lot that winter in my quest for perfect pregnant health. There are visual things, too, the worst of which hit me again this past week:

They're baaaack!
(source)

February 6—a year ago—was the date of that awful, silent ultrasound. After the OB's Doppler picked up no fetal heartbeat, there were actually two ultrasounds, an abdominal (just to make sure that everything was alright), followed by a vaginal (to confirm the worst).

A weird, stoic numbness started enfolding me right away. The OB looked worried, as if he'd rather see me cry or rage, but I didn't even have the energy for a bitter "oh SURE" when he asked if I was going to be OK. Was there a choice?

I just wanted to go home. But it was afternoon, and on the 40-minute drive I got stuck behind what seemed to be every school bus in the county. Numb, numb. I could feel my heart closing and shrinking more with each passing mile. Then I stopped at the grocery store to pick up the diapers ultra super-size menstrual pads I'd need for going home to have a miscarriage.

And there was that wall of cheerful balloons. They were shaped like giant glossy hearts and kissy lips. I stopped in my tracks, struck twice, first by all the imagery of hearts ("I'm sorry, but your baby's heart has stopped.") and then by the whole concept of Valentine's Day. Oh yeah, I thought. Almost forgot that part. I'm going home to have a miscarriage ... alone, on what would have been our anniversary.

Time does soften the rough edges, and it will probably continue to do so, but as long as I live I'll never see Valentine's Day in the same way again.

Resolution

New Year's Eve was always one of my favorite holidays. As a child, I thought it was awesome to stay up late, of course. But it wasn't just party time. As I sat on the couch watching the Times Square events on TV, I'd earnestly write out all my goals for the coming year. What serious business was on my 12-year-old mind? It's long forgotten now.

That routine didn't change much in the next decades. As a teenager and young adult, I still saw New Year's Eve more as a chance to reflect than as a chance to party. (Fourth of July was the time for partying, duh.)

Then there were years, the last few years, when I didn't make any resolutions at all. My goal was to endure. However I managed to do that, pretty much, would be OK.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

This year I'm aiming for the middle ground: no perfectionistic lists, and also no giving up. My single resolution is to have resolution. As in:

Resolution (n.): tenacity, firmness, determination, steadfastness, perseverance, purpose, resolve.

So I got a book from the library called This Year I Will…, which has been helpful. Author M.J. Ryan says:

"Because it takes work, often a lot of work and sacrifice, you have to really want to bring something into being. Deeply, truly, honestly ... Joan Borysenko, Ph.D., encourages us to go beneath the surface to find what she calls our soul resolutions, which are 'based on saying yes to your deepest longings ... Goals rooted in what really matters are far easier to keep.'"

Ryan also recommends making the goals "SMART"—specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound—then gives many tips for sustaining motivation.

My specific goal is to get up an hour earlier each morning and walk on my elliptical machine, at least through January (and then I can recommit). Officially, I'll do it for a minimum of just 10 minutes a day. But getting out of bed is the worst part.

Once I get up, get prepared, and get on the machine, the hardest part is over and 10 minutes easily turn into 20, 30, or more. Sometimes I plod along at a steady pace with my nose in a book. Sometimes I bust out the silly dance moves. Often I turn up the music and run flat-out, like something awful is right on my heels.

Even 30 minutes a day is not a big goal. It feels big to me, though, and sometimes a grand (even foolishly so) gesture is just what I need to shake things up.

I know that I need—on the soul level that Ryan talks about—the power that will come from doing this one thing every day, not just in spite of but because of the fact that my energy has been so catastrophically low.

Yes, I really want this goal. I really need the life energy and the will.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I've felt increasingly beaten down by the TTC waiting and now—worst of all—the relentless bad news about people I dearly love and can't seem to help. It feels awful. Clinging to anything I can control and "fix," I've wondered which parts of the awfulness might be within my control, a product of clouded perceptions or mental story lines...

So much to analyze. Really, though, how much does it matter? In her book, Ryan says this:

"Over the past forty years, I have gathered dozens of theories of why I am the way I am ... But to change something in myself, to bring something new into being, I need to engage a different part of my brain—my right brain, where innovative thinking happens. The right brain is future oriented. It's where our aspirations, our dreams, our longings reside...

In preparing for the change you're about to make, allow your right brain to help you. All it takes is switching from 'why' thinking to 'what could be possible' thinking. Ask 'what' questions rather than 'why' questions: 'What can I do to have more balance in my life today?' rather than 'Why am I a workaholic?' ... Do you notice the difference in the two choices? One leads to rumination and stuckness; the other to creative possibilities and forward momentum."

Frankly, talk about innovation, aspiration, and longing makes me tired. I'm concerned most with today. But even in that small context, I do get what Ryan is saying about staying stuck in analysis vs. building some kind of forward momentum. My exercise resolution is all about the latter. I'll try to articulate why:

• Over time, it may lift my mood and energy.
• It trains me to face whatever is here (circumstances and my reactions to them) with mindfulness.
• It renews my commitment to live consciously in this world, despite its messiness and my own deep reluctance some days.
• It transforms my default state of defended numbness into anger and sorrow, which at least feel alive.
• It makes me breathe, sweat, and let energy flow in and out. When I let things happen, resistance melts away.
• It reminds me that weak muscles (literally and metaphorically) are strengthened by practice, not by rest.
• It builds my courage to do other difficult things.
• Doing it first thing in the morning puts priority on my mental and physical health. First responders like EMTs are taught that, before they can be most useful to others at an accident site, they need to ensure their own safety. I owe the same thing to myself and those I love.
• Doing it every single day builds consistency and discipline. If I make exceptions for a poor night's sleep or a busy day ahead, etc., every single day will end up as an exception. Instead:

Sympathy Cards Suck

Is it just me, or does anyone else have a problem with mass-market sympathy cards?

Because I had a problem last night. I was browsing (i.e., trying not to have a meltdown) in the "Sympathy / Cheer" section of the card aisle in the grocery store, with "Jingle Bell Rock" blasting on the speaker system. (By the way, why is that necessary? After two or three weeks, the nonstop Christmas carols can be an affront to anyone who's not able to have "the most wonderful time of the year"—in other words, plenty of people.)

I was looking for three cards: one for a relative who lost her husband suddenly a few months ago and is still hurting, one for my mom after her second major surgery in three weeks, and one for my best friend, who just got some horrible news yesterday.

I want to rant and rave on these people's behalf. I want to hug them very tight. But there's no card that conveys those feelings in the card aisle at Giant.

What I want to know is why sympathy messages have to be totally stiff:

With heartfelt condolences.

Because nothing says "heartfelt" like formal words that no-one uses in daily speech.

May you be surrounded by comfort and love at this difficult time.

What's up with all the passive voice ("be surrounded by")?

OK, clearly illness and death are serious. We want to honor the gravity of what's happened. But with language straight out of a legal contract, with the "I" and "you" and therefore the relationship removed, what's left feels so distant. I wonder how much of the formality comes from respect and how much comes from avoidance of anything awkward or sad.

On the giving side, these cards don't feel authentic. On the receiving side, I question how comforting they are, too. When someone wishes you to "be surrounded by comfort and love" when you're not, does it feel as presumptuous as hearing "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas" felt to me last night?

Of course, I can and will add a personal note to each card. The most formal cards are probably intended more for people who don't know the recipient well, so I guess they'll always have their place.

It would just be nice to have a few more options with less flowery wording and more real emotion involved. Maybe we could call them sympathy empathy cards. Anyone want to start an Etsy shop with me?

Empathy vs Sympathy

This little video is just right:

"Empathy is a choice, and it's a vulnerable choice, because in order to connect with you, I have to connect with something in myself that knows that feeling. Rarely, if ever, does an empathic response begin with 'At least...' The truth is, rarely can a response make something better. What makes something better is connection."

The Sadim Touch

Someone just pointed out this Slate article about a new website called Modern Loss. The article says:

"Americans love to talk about people who overcome the odds to survive serious injury or illness, but we don't cope with death very well. Enter Modern Loss, a new website dedicated to helping us stop treating death and grief like embarrassments to be hidden away, and instead have an honest conversation about what it means to mourn. 

The site was started by two women, Rebecca Soffer and Gabrielle Birkner, who lost parents at an early age and who are clearly opposed to the toxic forced optimism [emphasis mine, because I LOVE this phrase] of American culture that can make grief all the more difficult. They promise a website that will be free of people adjudicating how sad you're allowed to feel and a complete ban on the phrase, 'everything happens for a reason.'" 

Did you hear me cheering at that last line? Please, oh please, can we get rid of that platitude?

There, now it's fixed!

So I had to check out Modern Loss, and right away I found a lot to like, especially one post: The Reverse Midas Touch.

While my recent string of losses hasn't been as drastic as what author Abby Sher describes, it has made me wonder if I'm—if not cursed—maybe attracting bad stuff into my life in some subconscious way. Short answer: NO, I don't believe in hocus-pocus. But still, honestly, there are times when I have kind of felt like a freak. There are times when I've been ashamed of my own apparent Sadim (the reverse of Midas) Touch.

Right after my miscarriage, I happened to see this video about stillbirth. The parts that resonated most were the parents who talked about feeling like a bad-luck charm, and those who said that the worst thing was when people refused to talk about their child at all. That is "toxic forced optimism" at work.

I do understand the impulse; I've been guilty of it, too. But I've come to see another way: simple, loving presence. Abby Sher offers it to a sick friend at the end of her post. Others have offered it to me.

One particular time stands out: after the baby’s heartbeat stopped and before the bleeding started, a friend put his hand on my belly and just held it there, silently, head bowed. That simple act of acknowledging that he/she was real and still mattered, even after death ... of coming closer instead of running away ... it was one of the most healing things anyone has ever done for me.

Remembrance Day

After being away for a while, I just realized recently that today is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day, a day intended "to help families live with their loss, not 'get over' their loss."

Today, I'm thinking of my Baby P, who would have been 6 weeks old now. I'm also thinking of a good friend, whose miscarriage ten years ago I virtually ignored in a clueless attempt to help her "get over" it. I said that I was sorry, then focused on her next pregnancy and never brought the first one up again.

Later, I apologized. She basically shrugged. Everyone grieves differently, and she said that my reaction hadn't felt hurtful to her at the time ... but it wasn't helpful either, I know now. Of course, she may have preferred not to talk about details. Still, I wish that I'd reached out and just asked, you know, "How are you really doing?"

Today, I still try to respect people's privacy, but I'm no longer afraid that simply talking about a loss causes grief. The grief is there anyway. For me, talking about it can feel better—more alive—than the dullness of trying to distract myself with less-important things.

So to all who've lost babies before or after birth, I'm thinking of you and them tonight.

source

It Hurts Because It Matters

As mentioned before: after some pretty spectacular trial and error, I'm no longer a fan of the "hurry-and-get-over-it" approach to difficult emotions. However well-intentioned it may be, denial simply doesn't work.

Here's what I've come to believe instead:

To put it even more simply:

It mattered.

----------

There comes a time to honor what matters in the only way I can: by offering all that's left of myself, by bowing to all that's here.

Wordless Wednesday

Grief Isn't Pretty

No, it's not. It's a wild, scary, messy, and personal ride, especially that first day after bad news. And I'd hesitate to write about the details of it here, except that I'm so afraid of the faucet drying up. So why not? Here's a play-by-play report of my Sunday:

10:30   I'm waiting for a call from the RE, but turn off my phone while at a church service. It's a small service in someone's home. I'm able to focus on it only because I don't have much hope about what the RE will say. Mostly, I'm numb. I've been through this before.

11:30   Checking voicemail. Now I'm shaking so hard that I can barely punch the keys. Wanting so badly to hear joy in the RE's voice, but instead hearing the expected, "I'm afraid I don't have good news." He asks me to call back. Why bother? I think. There's nothing more to say now, is there?

12:00   After playing phone tag, we finally talk. It's another discussion about how donor eggs are probably my only hope, followed by another discussion about how at least I don't have cancer, just infertility. He's not insensitive. He's a caring guy and he tried his best. But when the only comfort someone can offer is to remind you that at least you're not dying … well, no, there really is nothing more to say.

12:30   I sit in a rocking chair in the host's living room, frozen except for the rocking, rocking, rocking back and forth. I can't think of one single thing that I want to do, that I'm actually capable of doing. I feel like a rat who's reached a dead end in a maze and just sits down, staring blankly at the wall. One wall is as good as any other.

12:35   Everyone is in the kitchen sharing lunch, so the room is empty except for me and one friend who wants to help but can't, so just sits there staring at me in a most awkward way. It makes me feel even more like a trapped rat. "I don't want to leave you alone." Please, leave me alone, I think, but I can't work up the energy to say it in a tone of voice that I won't regret later on. Even with you staring at me, the fact is that I AM alone with this.

12:40   Since there's nothing I want to do, I just do the next logical thing: join the people in the kitchen. I'm not capable yet of putting on a mask, so when they ask what's wrong, I explain that I've gotten some bad news. They ask with alarm, "Are you alright?" I answer truthfully, "No, but I will be eventually. Thank you for asking."

12:45   I listen to their conversation and eventually join in. At my little table alone, two women are discussing the different treatments they've had for breast cancer, and a third describes an awful genetic disease that is threatening her nephew's life. I am NOT alone, I realize. Not in this moment, anyway. Pain is not what makes me unique; it's the one thing that I share with absolutely everyone.

1:30   I go to the nearest park. I want to throw rocks and beat my fists against the ground, but the part of the park that's normally quiet is now full of parents pushing strollers. And beaming grandparents. I call my parents to give them the bad news. I am so sick of having nothing but bad news to share with the people I love.

1:45   As I watch the happy families strolling by, spending a Sunday afternoon in this most ordinary way, it feels like I'm standing at a pastry counter. I'm gazing through glass at a bounty of exotic, fabulous desserts, which I can admire but never actually touch. It occurs to me that the rest of my life may be like this: the world reflecting my failures back to me, every day, everywhere. It's the worst kind of self-pity. These are just thoughts, and I know better than to believe everything I think. But in this moment, I can't help it. I'm afraid that this feeling will never end.

2:00   I have to go someplace where I can have my impending breakdown / freakout in privacy. So I find some deeper woods and let it fly: pick up the biggest rocks I can lift and hurl them with all my strength. Pick up branches from the ground and smash them against trees, raining arrows of wood down on the forest. I rip the red thread off my wrist. (Long story short, it's symbolized healthy ways for me to seek refuge and maintain hope, and I've worn it since New Year’s Day.) Now I fling the bright thread into the dirt, grind it gleefully down with my heel, even jump up and down on it in a frenzy of destruction. I think of Stephen Crane's poem "In the Desert": "It is bitter, bitter … But I like it, because it is bitter, and because it is my heart."

2:30   It's a full-on, self-indulgent, two-year-old-style temper tantrum. Once it blows over, I sit down, panting and sweaty, on a swing. Yes, there is a deserted playground in the middle of these woods. Everything is mocking me, I'm telling you. For a while, I just swing mindlessly back and forth, and cry.

2:45   Then I start to look around. I notice how TRASHY these woods are, with litter poking through the weeds everywhere. What a bunch of pigs! Incensed, I start gathering the junk. Normally, I wouldn't pick it up with bare hands, or go charging off into brier thickets wearing sandals and white slacks. But what the hell. It's not a day to be rational. It's not a day to question anything that manages to rouse my energy, only to act wherever action is still possible. So I snatch up handfuls of discarded Coke cans, water bottles, candy wrappers. I leave behind the condom but pick up the paper that I realize, with a stab of pain through my chest, is a child's school homework. These PIGS can have children, I complain under my breath. These PIGS can have families, I rant. And me? I guess I'll just be the old busybody who devotes herself to cleaning up THEIR mess!

3:00   I am being ridiculous. I feel maniacal laughter starting to bubble up from a place so deep it hurts, from some well I'd thought was finally, totally dry. WTF, I think. Who else would turn a temper tantrum / pity party into Litter Cleanup Day? But OK. I'm not questioning why right now. I crash out of the woods, arms overflowing with trash, march up to a dumpster, and throw it all in with one final CLANG of disgust. Then I wipe my filthy hands on my pants triumphantly. Because it is bitter, and because it is my heart. Then I walk slowly back into the woods to retrieve my red thread. It's frayed and faded now, caked with dirt. Carefully, I fold it into the pocket of my ruined pants.

4:00   Back home, I still have some anger to burn off. I want to give the anger as much free rein as is safe, because I fear it less than the depression that's sure to follow. So I put on my iPod and run at top speed for three miles, with my angry playlist at top volume. Yes, I actually have an angry playlist ready to go for occasions just like this. It starts off with Hole's song "Violet," which is perfect for today. The chorus, if you can call it that, is Courtney Love screaming, "Go on, take everything! Take everything! Take everything! Take everything!"

4:30   Ouch. I am not used to running at top speed. I've been sedentary, especially just two days after egg retrieval. Now I feel like throwing up. I think about filling the Vicodin prescription I got on Friday, not so much because of physical pain but because I'd prefer not to be fully conscious now. I've never abused painkillers, but I've taken them before (during my miscarriage, most recently) and know that feeling when the buzz hits. I want it now—want it to hit me right between the eyes like a cattle prod. That's why I need to throw the prescription in the trash.

5:00   Instead of taking pills, I take a nap. I love naps.

6:00   Email the church leader to thank her for her message this morning, which was basically about keeping our hearts open despite our fear. Even with all of today's drama, her words have been percolating through my mind all day.

7:00   Dinner. This time it does not involve salmon, kale, avocado, pineapple, or other "fertility foods." It involves sugar. Sugar and a lot of chemicals I can't pronounce. Also caffeine. After weeks without my beloved coffee, I brew my third cup of the day and raise it high in a middle-fingered salute to the universe.

8:00   Start writing about today's news.

To be continued. I'm still careening from fury to despair, from the most embarrassingly immature self-pity to moments of totally unexpected grace.

You know that saying about how what doesn't kill you makes you stronger? That saying makes me gag. Here's what I believe: what doesn't kill you … doesn't kill you ... and some days that has to be enough.

Breathless

On the verge of taking what may be the biggest risk of my life so far, while catching up on blog news, I came across a quote that All My Pretty Ones posted weeks ago. It took my breath away, literally. As in, after reading the last lines, I just sat there not breathing, tears streaming down my face.

Please allow me to reprint the whole thing here:

"Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could."
― Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum LP

Two Years

As of this weekend, it's been two years since I've had any alcohol. Actually, I've gone longer than this in the past and don't want to make a fuss. But it's a big enough deal that the date has stayed in my memory, and seeing May 18 roll around again has me in a reflective mood.

Two years ago was a dark time. Nine months before, the bottom had dropped out, and I did what people instinctively do when they're falling: throw their arms wide to grab onto anything that might help them stay upright. One of the first things I did was give up all alcohol, because even in the chaos of those days a few things were clear:

• I had a history of using it as a tool to get through this or that difficult time. It was becoming more and more of a habit.
• If there was ever going to be a time when I could go back to drinking with happy, social moderation, this was not it.
• To drink—a depressant—on top of depression was clearly a Very Bad Idea.

Sobriety was just the start. I also volunteered, went to church, exercised, took classes, went to various support groups … threw myself into getting out, feeling better, learning and growing from the challenges…

Oh shut up.

Still, nine months out, I felt like shit. So one day I shrugged and bought a bottle of scotch. Why not? If staying sober wasn't helping, then maybe alcohol hadn't been hurting after all. Clever logic, right?

I have friends who can tell a similar story, and this is the part where they say, "Then I drank for ten more years." Apparently my level of pain tolerance (or addiction, or whatever) was nowhere near that high. I drank for two more months, and that was plenty. At least I hope it was enough, because I never want to go back there again. When I need a reminder, I tell myself, There's nothing in my life so bad that taking a drink now couldn't make it worse.

How bad was that time? Sorry, I have no exciting stories to tell about run-ins with the police. What it was instead was just the bleakest, emptiest monotony. I went to work, I did what needed to be done, but the best part of my day was the unconscious part. That's how it feels when you've given up.

The unconsciousness and numbness really were a relief. There was one evening when I wrote a letter to my ex. I'll never forget writing the word "heartbroken" … then pausing, and realizing that what I actually felt at that moment was … nothing at all. Perfectly numb. A miracle—I'll drink to that!

But the numbness didn't last. Getting and staying there meant passing through waves of raging bitterness—which were totally out of character, by the way. I'm the kind of person people describe with words like "gentle" and "so calm!" Still, two years ago, there I was sitting in a park on a lovely spring day, watching smiling families as they walked by hand in hand. And oh, how I hated them all. In my memory of that day, my vision was even shaded red by the miasma of hate.

That same weekend, I came across this paragraph in the book Alcoholics Anonymous: "It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worth while..." To put it another way, holding resentments is like taking poison and waiting for someone else to die.

The word that stuck in my mind, and echoed there for weeks, was the single word "futility." This path that I was on? It was the definition of futility. Luckily, the unexpected fall had been so abrupt and steep that I could feel the drop and catch glimpses of what lay ahead. Long story short, I was able to throw my arms out and catch my balance again.

This time I did a few things differently. I tried to stop comparing my insides to other people's outsides (those "perfect" families in the park), and spent more time around others who'd been through really painful things and were willing to talk about it. Lo and behold, we've almost ALL been through really painful things. I could let the pain harden my heart with bitterness or try to let it soften my heart with compassion.

Finally, I let myself grieve. What with one thing and another, I had pretty much tried to skip that part. Ironically, I'd been afraid that grief (rather than "I'm over it" denial) was the force that might drive me to drink. In fact, as intense as the grief felt with all the band-aids finally ripped off, I was afraid that it would KILL me.

It didn't, of course. Two years later, I'm still here, dealing with circumstances that look pretty much the same. I can feel stuck and impatient, wanting to get somewhere better faster, wanting to turn away from the realities that are here. But turning away from the pain also means turning away from the love and longing at the source of the pain. Then I think of how things might look now if I'd continued down that bitter, escapist path, instead of facing the wave with my wits mostly intact.

Motherhood would be off the table completely—I would know better than to try taking care of someone else, and wouldn't have the mental focus to navigate all those steps and decisions anyway. My health would probably be damaged. Many good people would not be here in my life.

However down I still get now and then, the main thing I'm feeling today is grateful for the people who've been with me through this time, even the ones who are still strangers, who will never know how much they've helped just by offering a map for others to follow. Wherever it leads must be better than the dead-end path that I was on. Remembering the nihilism of those days, I picture the ancient maps that showed the sea full of serpents ("Danger! This way there be Monsters!") with the edge of the world beyond.

Back in my initial hurry-and-get-over-it phase, I kept a bulletin board in my bedroom. It was full of inspirational quotes, lists of things to do, and so on—all good stuff, just way too much of it. Today, there's a single piece of paper posted in the middle of that big, blank space:

Choices

They're two lines, which start out almost parallel and slowly diverge. They're a reminder to do the right thing in this moment, and to trust that those little actions add up, even if the big picture won't become clear until much later on.

I'll end with a quote from Parker Palmer on his own struggle with depression:

I had missed the deep meaning of a biblical teaching that I had always regarded as a no-brainer: "I set before you life or death, blessing or curse. Therefore, choose life" (Deuteronomy 30:19). Why, I wondered, would God waste precious breath on saying something so obvious? I had failed to understand the perverse comfort we sometimes get from choosing death in life, exempting ourselves from the challenge of using our gifts, or living our lives in authentic relationship with others.

I was finally able to say yes to life, a choice for which I am grateful beyond measure, though how I found that yes remains a mystery to me.

It remains mostly a mystery to me, too, with the path becoming clear only one step at a time. So I'd better keep walking.

Love is a Mystery

Yes. I miss him, too.

Nostalgia

I mentioned that I was out of town for work, visiting a place where I used to live. Here's the rest of that story.

When I moved to this place, I knew no-one within hundreds of miles. I was there to finish college. They had made an offer I couldn't refuse, so I packed up everything I owned (topped off, literally, by one reluctant cat) and drove four days across the country.

The day I arrived, it was pissing rain. This was a city—not a huge one, but still, I was someone who loved living in small towns and hiking in the desert. My first impression of this place was all puddle-filled potholes, red lights, and bus exhaust. I felt only a little less dubious than my cat. TWO YEARS. I would stay here the two years it would take to finish school, and not a moment more.

Then I met my ex. (Insert quote about how life is what happens while you're making other plans.) He had a child from his previous marriage, which kept him anchored there, even though, like me, he really longed to be somewhere else. I supported his decision—How could I not? His commitment to being a good, involved dad just made me love him more. But I wasn't sure I could stay with him in a place I had detested on first sight. Surely not for the decade it would take for his son to grow up. The sacrifice was too much; it felt like my heart would be crushed under the weight of all those years.

And yet I couldn't leave. The two things I wanted most were diametrically opposed. So my two college years passed in this state of uncertainty … then three years, then four … and then, finally, somehow, ten, plus one more for good measure.

Luckily, I didn't detest my new hometown that entire time. At some point, I accepted that it was indeed my new hometown. I even grew to love many things about it, like the climate in summer, the affordable prices, the parks and campgrounds not too far away … and, most of all, the people I met there. I made commitments at work and in the community.

Part of what I grew to love was just the comfort of putting down roots in one place, of knowing all the shortcuts around town and not only what business was on what corner but what used to be on that corner a decade ago. Layers of history and context enveloped me. Even so, I spent the whole time feeling like I was in some sort of purgatory, waiting, just waiting for the time when my real life would begin.

Eventually, my ex's son moved away and so did I, not back to the small town I had loved but to somewhere else that still doesn't really feel like home. Those are stories for another day. Until this most recent trip, I hadn't been back to the old town in three years, and the level of nostalgia and longing I felt on returning there was an absolute shock. It peaked when I met up with my ex at the apartment that we shared during my last and probably best years in town.

Oh my God, the nostalgia. It wasn't all about seeing him, since I've actually seen and talked to him many times since the bomb dropped. No, this was nostalgia about the place and time. I drank in every detail of our old home with reverence, starting with the utterly bland light fixture in the living room. This was not a fancy apartment. But I knew the history of every thing in it.

There was the coffee table my ex had gotten from his mother's old place, where we’d enjoyed many Sunday dinners before her dementia got so bad that she needed a nursing home. There was the couch he'd gotten from a cousin. Over the years, I'd met every relative who was a part of his life, however small, even the ones who lived farthest away.

Throughout the apartment were some things I'd left behind, from a desk to a single dish towel, which was threadbare now but still surprisingly familiar. Even more than the big things, like the pieces of furniture, these smallest details were the ones that threatened to drown me in waves of memory: the claw marks left on the cat's favorite windowsill. The smell of the kitchen cupboard, the wonky buttons on the remote control, the jet-engine sound of the heat, the crease in the bedroom carpet by the door…

The bedroom. I just stood in the doorway for a few minutes, my eyes filling with tears and my heart feeling like it would burst. I thought of all the years, all the joys and sorrows lived out in this single room. We had actually built this room right after his friend bought the place, adding a wall to split this smaller space off from the large living room. We had made love in this bed. We had argued and turned away in frustration, then reached out again. There was the mirror I had used to get ready for work each day. My cat had died in this room (an awful night). Eventually, another kitten had come along to hide under the covers and pounce on our feet. By the time I left, we had already outlasted four long-term tenants downstairs.

I opened the closet doors to inhale the wooly but clean scent of his clothes, then closed them again.

Such small things. I love them because they're his, and because they used to be ours.

And I miss them because, despite my impatience to get on with my "real life" all the time I lived here, it was as real as it's ever been. What I wouldn't give to be back there now, just to wind the clock back five years.

Five years ago, I was with the man I loved and, although it was not always smooth sailing, assumed I would be with for life. We were planning to have a child someday soon. We knew of no reason why we could not. I often felt stuck and tired of waiting (which, from my current level of stuckness and waiting, now seems quaint). But however far away my goals might have seemed at times, I still thought of them with joy and excitement, more than anxiety and fear.

What I wouldn't give to go back.

Then I wonder … what good things am I overlooking in my life right now, because I'm so eager to go back, to go forward, to be anywhere but here?

ICLW Thanks

As my first ICLW comes to an end, I'm already looking forward to the next. It's been enlightening, healing, busy, and fun. I found some wonderful blogs to follow and got so much food for thought. In fact, there are ideas for many more posts swirling around in my head now, along with topics to research, questions I should remember to ask my doctors, etc.

I even managed to, you know, keep up with the commenting part. It shouldn't be a surprise, but secretly I wondered how this week would go, since it turned out to be busier than expected when I signed up. And, as always, the regularly scheduled depression was there to interfere.

I tried to comment on every blog that I read and to go down the list randomly, not just picking situations that seemed to have the most in common with mine. And I'm so glad. Before, I might have turned away from those who wrote a lot about their supportive spouse, pregnancy, or existing children. (Sorry—it's just a self-protective thing.) I might have resented women whose TTC odds seemed better than mine. And I would have missed out.

Because here's what I learned: we're ALL struggling with pain and fear, just in different forms. Yeah, we know this. But it's one thing to know intellectually and another to read about it in depth, day after day. Those people who "have it better" than me in one way or another? They also spent everything they had on multiple IVF cycles / have a husband who's away from home on military deployments / have a child with a serious birth defect / have a high-risk pregnancy / fought infertility for a decade / need major surgery to correct a uterine problem / lost babies to miscarriage and stillbirth / just lost someone else they loved / and many more situations than I can list here.

So I bow to those people—to all of you—for living through what you have and for sharing your example. Thanks for getting me out of my own head (see link above!) and making me feel at home.

A Small World

I wasn't around this past week because I've been out of town for work.

That phrase doesn't sound quite right. It makes me picture the impersonal glass and chrome of airports, rental cars, and conference rooms. In this case, though, it meant something much different: a seven-hour drive across familiar countryside, bitter cups of gas-station coffee in my lap. At the end was a place where I had lived for many years, which I hadn't seen since the spring of 2010. I've always had some strong and mixed feelings about this town.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The part I want to tell now is the simple part, the part about meeting with my boss, who still lives in the town I left. I didn't think our meeting would be simple. I wanted to explain why I had been missing work, to reassure her that I wasn't just losing interest or, conversely, battling some deadly disease. I wasn't sure how much to say or how to say it. I just knew that this conversation was one that would be best to have in person.

She didn't know the whole story about my years of infertility treatments, three months of pregnancy, or two weeks of miscarriage. She DID know about my breakup and, therefore, had probably assumed that parenthood was now the last thing on my mind. How to bring the subject up?

I didn't have to worry. As soon as we sat down at the restaurant for lunch, we fell right into talking about the subject that was foremost on her mind: the recent loss of someone dear to her. It had been painful and awful for everyone involved. Two months later, she was still in shock. I knew the feeling: desperately wanting not to think about something so painful, but knowing that for now it is the ONLY thing, so needing to think and talk about it anyway.

My boss (I’ll call her E.) asked about the time I spent volunteering with hospice. It was something I did briefly years ago, partly as a way to honor my grandfather (the one in my last post), who had done the same thing himself. I had no great insights to share. I hadn't changed the course of anyone's life or death. I just showed up when I could to change the sheets, hold cups of drinking water to dry lips, and sit with families in the kitchen, keeping watch. That's all I could do with E. We just sat together at our little table as the snow drifted past outside.

We talked about grief, of all things. She seemed grateful to be able to talk about it, and frankly, so was I. It felt real. Then slowly and without any false cheer, the conversation turned toward a baby who had just been born into her family. This was the time; it was clearly my turn.

I told her that the main focus of my personal life lately has been on having a child. No puzzlement from her, just a nod. Then she told a story that blew me away. She mentioned another one of her long-time employees, a woman I had met a few times over the years, and said, "I don't think I'm speaking out of turn here, because she has always been open about it. Around the time when she first started working for me, she was single. Circumstances in her life had just worked out that way, but she really wanted to be a mother and was running out of time. So she had her son with the help of a sperm donor. That was 18 years ago. She met and married her husband later on."

I was dumbstruck. Not only was E already familiar with the concept of single mothers by choice, but she had already hired one, ANOTHER one, back when almost no-one had heard of such a thing! Even in a company as small as mine, I would not have to be the first after all. I would not have to be the odd one out.

I had teared up a little before, when we talked about grief, and now I felt it happening again. I told her a few more details, but not a lot; there was no need to say much. She got it. She just got it.

Again I thanked her for allowing me to work flexible hours recently. It's one of my few perks. As I said, it's a very small company, so we've never had paid health care or even paid days off. But I wouldn't want to work anywhere else, and this meeting—this reminder that we are people to each other first, and business roles second—was a lovely reminder of why.

Redemption

When my grandfather died a decade ago, I cut off most of my hair. Sitting on the bedroom floor, crying but calm, I plaited and cut off two 20-inch braids that had taken my whole young adulthood to grow. It was a way to honor the impact of his loss—the first loss that really knocked me flat. It was a tangible way to split After from Before. Not that I thought of those words at the time. In the moment, it just felt necessary to DO something. As it turns out, cutting hair in mourning is an impulse that's certainly not unique to me.

Afterward, my hair evolved into an edgy kind of pixie cut, then eventually grew out again to its default look: natural waves down to the center of my back. That's how it has remained.

Until a month ago, when I found out that my pregnancy—my new and fragile hope after so much time TTC—was about to end. Then I cut my hair again. This time there was no ceremony, no thread of love and thankfulness woven through the grief, as there had been with my grandfather. There was just me, wild-eyed with sharp scissors. I hacked so impatiently that some handfuls of hair I grabbed were much too thick to cut. They ripped and tangled, leaving crazy tendrils behind.

It was only a decade between these two events, but a decade with enough letting go of dreams that I now felt desolate. What was left? In that moment, looking forward, it was hard to see purpose ahead. I was a thousand years old. A medusa, a crone carrying a dead baby in her womb. It was only right that my outside should match the inside.

Then my eyes caught and held their own reflection in the mirror. That was enough. I looked like an animal with its leg caught in a trap, trying to chew its way loose. How could I add to this injury? I let the scissors fall.

But by now, hair filled the sink. I fought to keep from throwing up as I gathered golden handfuls of it into the trash. Then I wrapped my head in a scarf and was too ashamed to uncover the damage for days.

Finally, I unwrapped and washed it, brushing out the last handful of loose strands. I let the snaky tendrils dry. Then I looked in the mirror, afraid, and was amazed by what I saw: lots of hair still falling past my shoulders, plus a new, soft cloud of waves around my face.

It was beautiful.

Freed from their former weight, the sides had more volume and curl. My hair was so thick that, even with literally half of it gone, there was still plenty of it left. You know that saying about how struggles "build character"? My hair has plenty of character now.

When I look in the mirror, I still relive that awful day. I'm also able to laugh—believe it or not—at the absurdity of hacking half my hair off in an effort to look ugly, and then somehow looking better afterward. I have failed at THIS TOO.

Most importantly, when I look in the mirror now, I relive that moment when I let the scissors fall. It’s a constant reminder to be gentle, toward myself and toward anyone else who is in pain.