ICLW

If you're here as part of ICLW, welcome! (If not, you're still welcome! And you might want to check out the ICLW list, since it includes a lot of great blogs.)

It's been a year since I participated. Last time, I was new here and still reeling from a miscarriage late in the first trimester, after TTC for a while. I'm still trying. This past year, I've tried IVF both with and without stimulation. In fact, I'm in the middle of a no-stim cycle now. The Timeline page has more details, and the Index page has a list of posts that may be a good starting point.

Whenever I start listing the TTC facts, a rebellious feeling kicks in. But wait, I want to say. There's more to me than lab results and treatment lingo!  Except ... there hasn't been much more lately.This is all so draining, important, and time-sensitive that it's easy to forget how I also love reading, photography, spending time outdoors ... and some other stuff I can't seem to remember right now.

These past few years, mindfulness practice has helped me to maintain some balance. So has gentle exercise. So has connecting with other people, even (especially) when I just want to curl up into a ball. Really, anything that gets me out of the worry-loop in my head and out into the world tends to help.

Lately I've realized what a habit it's become to rein in my dreams and shut down my feelings. You know—it's the idea that if we don't acknowledge our desires, we won't be disappointed when they're not fulfilled; if we don't let ourselves feel joy when it's here, we won't miss it when it ends. But avoidance doesn't work. It just sucks the energy and motivation out of life. Instead, I'm exploring ways to stay open to hope without clinging to one specific outcome.

Anyway, feel free to look around, make yourself at home, and comment on anything old or new. And best of luck on your own journey!

(source)

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.

Unsubscribe Me, You Heartless Androids

On various blogs, I've seen women write about being flooded with baby-related coupons soon after a miscarriage or stillbirth, and I've cheered when some of those women sent a cathartic reply. No-one has added insult to my injury in that way yet … although who knows? It could still happen. There are a few days left until what would have been my due date.

No, I get a different type of "you've got to be kidding me" mail. They're glossy ads from a certain hospital—the hospital where I went after my HIV exposure three years ago. Yes, the anniversary is this week. This is a month with a lot of memories.

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Three years ago, my partner and I had just learned about his positive HIV test from our RE, and I was—to put it mildly—EXTREMELY UPSET. But I was still practical enough to sit down, get online, and (frantically) research what to do next. What a relief to find out that there WAS something I could do!

If someone who's been exposed to HIV seeks treatment with 72 hours, he/she can start a course of antiretroviral drugs known as post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP). They're typically given to medical workers who've had a single incident, like an accidental jab from a used needle. This treatment isn't fast or easy; it takes four weeks, and the side effects can be brutal. Also, there's no guarantee. Infection can still occur, although the rate of infection after PEP drops by close to 80%.

However, there's some controversy about using PEP for exposures that occur outside the workplace. There are concerns about encouraging "unsafe behavior." In other words, if people get the wrong impression that they can just pop a morning-after pill for HIV, they may tend to be less careful.

OK, that MAY be a valid concern, but it's not really relevant here. Mine likely was a single (sort of) and relatively serious exposure, since we spent the whole weekend trying to make babies. We'd timed the visit carefully to coincide with ovulation. It was also the first time we'd seen each other in a month or two. (We were in the process of moving and lived in different states at the time.)

After a year of visiting infertility docs, I was used to unpleasant medical treatments. And now I was informed about PEP, pros and cons. So YES, bring it on! I was still within that precious 72-hour window. But doctors weren't returning my phone calls, so I ended up in the ER.

Where they totally dismissed me. I explained the situation. I argued (with all the civility and logic I could manage). I BEGGED. But no, it was "hospital policy" to reserve PEP for workplace exposures, they said robotically. I couldn't believe it. This was MY body and MY money (I was paying cash) that we were talking about, and I could hear the clock ticking closer to the deadline with each second that passed.

Not only would they not consider letting me make this decision for myself, but they were totally callous about it. They wouldn't refer me to another facility that might help. To top it all off, Dr. Robot told me something untrue that managed to freak me out even worse. He stressed that I'd have to wait a full year to learn my HIV status for sure. Wrong. In fact, I got definitive results—negative—from a viral-load test two weeks later. On Friday the 13th, by the way. It is now my lucky day. I really should play the lottery on Friday the 13th.

Anyway, there was one member of the ER staff who was human. One nurse took a moment to remind me that Magic Johnson has been HIV positive for 20 years now without progressing to AIDS, that it's not the death sentence it used to be. It was a 60-second interaction. It was also the lifeline that helped me to leave there that night with my sanity intact.

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A few months later, when the dust had settled, when it was time to get my mind off my own problems and feel useful in some way (since all of my other goals had just collapsed), I filled out a volunteer application at that same hospital. I offered to help shepherd patients through the ER, a function their website said was needed. And hadn't I seen for myself just exactly how much it was needed? Going back there wouldn't be easy. But neither was shutting myself off at home with traumatic memories. Might as well try to replace them with something better.

Nobody contacted me. I'm sure it was nothing personal. In the context of a hospital ER, whatever scene I made that night was nowhere near enough to make my name live in infamy for months afterward. I figured the volunteer coordinators were just busy, or had lost my form, so I gave them a call to follow up. They never did bother to call back.

But boy did they sure manage to add my contact info to their marketing list! Now every few months, just when that awful memory starts to fade a bit, the mailman drops off a helpful reminder about their world-class standards for patient care, blah blah blah. At first I just threw these ads in the trash with a snort of disgust, but since they have the nerve to keep on coming, it may be time to contemplate some kind of reply…

The Law of Attraction (Part 2)

Last year, after a dismal RE meeting and five hours in traffic, I came home to find that my whole garden was dying. It was a big patio garden, and everything (all but two or three plants in the corners) had caught some kind of awful, fast-spreading disease. I still don't know quite what it was. I just call it The Plague.

Hearing this story, a woman I knew suggested I might be putting out negative vibes that were attracting these problems into my life, a la The Secret. Maybe my identity was getting wrapped around this idea that "bad things happen to me."

Let's back up a little. This garden was really special to me. I didn't know much about plants, since I'd always lived in apartments where gardens weren't allowed, or where (if they were possible) it seemed silly to make that investment when my time there would be short. But last year I'd had enough of waiting. Tending the garden was tending the part of myself that needed to keep believing in the possibility of growth. And the garden wasn't modest; it was BIG, lush, beautiful. The woman's suggestion that I killed it with my low expectations, negative thoughts, bad-luck cooties, or whatever, really shocked and pissed me off.

But she was right about one thing: my identity WAS getting wrapped around the idea that bad things happen to me. And it was making me more depressed. What if I hadn't been quite so depressed? If my powers of observation had been better, if I'd had more energy, might I have been more concerned about the one plant that looked sick before the others? Then maybe followed an instinct to research what was wrong, and taken action before the infection suddenly took off and spread? I think so. I think what killed my garden was 90% disease, combined with 10% ignorance and inaction.

God grant me the
Serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

Courage to change the things I can,

And wisdom to know the difference.

When I think about what I can and can't control, the garden comes to mind, along with a story from a few years earlier. I was trying mountain biking for the first time. "Focus on where you want to go," my boyfriend at the time suggested. "Don’t focus on the rocks and ruts in the trail, or you'll think Oh no, a rock, and you'll freeze up and stare at that rock, and sure enough you'll hit it." He was exactly right. Not that I never wiped out when focusing on the route I wanted to take, but focusing on the obstacles usually made my fear, and therefore my clumsiness, worse.

To sum it up, I don't think special "Laws" are required to explain what's going on. I just function best when focusing outward on the situation itself, when my mind isn't clouded by fear, despair, or other internal reactions. OK, so how do we get to that state? I'll let you know when I figure it all out. (Don't hold your breath.) What I've learned so far is the importance of trying to find balance—not grasping after overly specific outcomes (I'd like that BMW in blue, please.), while still allowing enough healthy desire and will to keep moving ahead.

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.

ICLW

If you're here as part of ICLW, welcome! (If not, you're still welcome! And you might want to check out the ICLW list, since it includes a lot of great blogs.) I signed up for a second time because last time was so worthwhile.

You can read the basics of my infertility journey here, and my first post explains why I started writing about it.

What's new this month? I'm still sitting out the recovery time after a miscarriage, which means there will be more than a 5-month gap between my last cycle and next. I have mixed feelings about the next.

On one hand, I wanted to start trying right away, because last time (almost) worked and that was awesome—it felt like a miracle. Also, there's just no time to spare; I have severe DOR, and it's probably time to move on to the most aggressive options.

Which leads to the mixed feelings. Surely I'm not the only one feeling discouraged, afraid, and overwhelmed sometimes? When those feelings are at their worst, I want to curl up under the covers and avoid dealing with anything else that's painful (enough already!) ... even if there may be rewards beyond the pain.

So last weekend, in my best kind-but-firm "mom voice," I had a little talk with myself about the avoidance habit. It was an infertility intervention—a name I borrowed from this post at The 2 Week Wait, which says:

I know firsthand that it's easier to hope that things will work out somehow. That maybe next cycle, somehow, I'll get pregnant if I pray really hard or maybe I'll get pregnant while I'm in Disney World or maybe I don't have a problem and I just need to eat more chocolate.

No one wants to have an IVF. No one wants daily blood work or to be regularly intimately involved in vaginal sonograms. It sucks, it's not fun and it's not the way you expected it to be. The fact is though that if you're not getting pregnant, this is my personal urge to you to fight. Fight hard. See another doctor, get another opinion, be your own advocate and don't waste time avoiding what may be the very thing that can help.

That last sentence was just what I needed to hear. My own "intervention" involved several days of medical research and financial planning. (I've done all that stuff before, of course, but it's been a while.) It helped me separate feelings from facts. (Both are valid, but it's important to understand which is which.) It was unpleasant. It was also necessary. I now have a much better list of things to consider and to ask my REs.

So that's what's new. When I'm not obsessing about TTC options, I'm probably thinking about fostering options or just trying to maintain some sense of humor and perspective. Feel free to look around and comment on anything new or old. I'll pay you a visit in return. Sharing this journey with and learning from others has been one of the main forces helping me stay sane.

Happy ICLW!

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 Welcome

If you're here as part of International Comment Leaving Week, welcome! (If not, you're still welcome! And you might want to check out the ICLW list, since it includes a lot of great blogs.)

This is my first month of participating. In fact, it's my first month of blogging, so I should probably introduce myself. You can read the basics of my infertility journey here, and my first post explains why I started writing about it.

Because things have been difficult lately, my posts are going to be on the serious side. Please don't hesitate to comment, though. Serious does not equal unfriendly. I really like connecting with others, and I still like a good laugh (even if I'm usually not the one to initiate it these days).

Thanks for stopping by.

(source)

Endings

I just sent a card, signed with love, to my ex's ex-wife.

It's not as strange as it may sound. She's never been a problem to me. She and he had a child together and live in the same town, so they've maintained a friendly (not close) relationship, as grown-ups try to do. They were married a long time ago. She ended it after recognizing that she was a lesbian. In fact, at the very same time that he and I started dating back in the 90s, she started dating her wife. Now the two of them are separating.

Yet she looked beyond her own problems to mail me a short but heartfelt and handwritten sympathy note, signed with love. How unexpectedly kind. So I sent her one in return.

No more unhappy endings, please—not for me and not for anyone.

Hello, Blank Page

"For some reason, just before I take a look inside myself I always think it's going to be fun." (Alan Alda, Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself)

OK, I know that this is not going to be fun. I was planning to write a fun blog—maybe one about renovating the old house that my partner and I planned to buy, or maybe one about parenting (the project I looked forward to the most). I pictured myself learning things and spilling over with eagerness to share them. I was ready to jump in and get my hands dirty, literally: I would hang drywall and change diapers. I would take pictures and lovingly document the building of our life together.

That was the plan. In reality, the home is not to be, my partner of more than a decade is gone, and I'm miscarrying the much-loved baby who took years to conceive. Yes, right now. After 12 weeks of pregnancy, miscarriage is far from a quick thing; it's been going on all week. So no, this is not going to be fun.

And my first impulse is certainly not to write about it. My instinct, like most people's, is to escape from pain—to lock the door and turn off the phone, have a stiff drink or five, and smash things, then hide the baby keepsakes in a shoebox in the back of the closet somewhere.

And then … what? It's a dead end.

That's how I grieved the loss of my partner and home. Not only did escaping from the pain not work, but the efforts just hardened my anger and grief into bitterness and despair.

My heart, as I picture it now, is not like a faucet with separate controls for hot and cold. There is only one source, so to turn off the grief is to turn off all potential for joy as well, to turn off giving a shit, and even to turn off the energy I need to get out of bed and get through the day.

If it sounds like I'm still learning things and sharing them, however much the lessons differ from the original plans, I should warn you that trying to sound in control is a habit and a defense. The truth is that this is as lost as I've ever felt.

One new thing I've done this week, though, is to stumble across other people's blogs about baby loss. And that's how I came to be here, starting a not-fun blog of my own. Other people have put the unspeakable into words that are raw and still somehow beautiful. To borrow a line from The Velveteen Rabbit: "Once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand." These other people's writing has been one of my few comforts this week. Maybe it's been a comfort to them, too?

If anything is guiding me now, it's this thought: I don't want to freeze up with bitterness and despair. If I have to feel these things, and apparently I do, then let the feelings stay fluid. Let me do what I can to keep the faucet open, if that makes any sense.