As I move further out from the twins' birth, and as I come closer to feeling physically healthy again, I find myself increasingly sad that I'll never get to experience a "normal" pregnancy. Let's start with the obvious: I'll never be pregnant again. I had my TAC removed. As of my last ultrasound, my uterus is filled with new scar tissue. I'll turn 40 in less than 60 days. I only want 2 kids. Another pregnancy is not in the cards. Even if it was, there's approximately 0.02% chance of it being pleasant and normal.
I'm sad that I didn't get to enjoy A & T's pregnancy. Most things in my life, if they didn't go well the first time, I knew I could work hard and get a 'do over'. I trained for and rode a bike century in 2015. It was an awful experience. But it's ok, because I know I will someday train for and ride another, and with what I've learned it will go better. Hitting closer to home, my earlier pregnancies didn't end well, so I kept slogging through it and was somehow lucky enough to get to living children.
This pregnancy though, was awful. I had two weeks of enjoyment before the hyperemsis, combined with the crappy first ultrasound, just crushed any happiness. I was so sick I couldn't remotely enjoy being pregnant. Once the vomiting stopped, the nausea was still there up until the horrible rib pain started. Then the babies came too soon and I didn't get to hold them. I was scared for them. I got separated from them for days, and I had weeks of agonizing pain. There was absolutely no time that I got to enjoy being pregnant, or enjoy the early days of motherhood. Unlike that bike century, there's no do-again this time.
I don't feel motivated to 'get over' some of the grief in my life. My grief over losing the girls, I'm ok having that as a part of me. But this grief over a pleasant pregnancy and newborn experience? It's holding me down and I'm not ok with it. I want to move on. I felt a huge sense of relief when we scattered the girls' ashes and spent some time memorializing them. So I'll learn from that. I'm going to have a funeral for my dream of a normal pregnancy. A wake, perhaps. I'll get some good food, some good wine, and toast to that lovely dream. . . and then let it go. It's a dream that deserves a nice send off, and I deserve the closure that send off can provide. So please, raise a glass with me to the passing of a dream.
it does deserve a nice send off, you deserve it. i have a question, the one year mark since i gave birth is coming up and i have no idea what i want to do to remember my son's birthday.
ReplyDeleteOh JT, I remember struggling so much with this on Alexis and Zoe's first "birthday" too. It was the day before I left for Chicago for my TAC, so we didn't do as much that year, but we did celebrate their memory by having a quiet night out together. I also wrote them each a first birthday letter and burned the letters along with a memory candle.
DeleteIn subsequent years we've given donations in their memory to organizations that helped us through their losses, and we've taken trips back to the site where we were first pregnant with them and where we scattered their ashes and Quinn's. We mostly visit that site on Quinn's birthday due to Minnesota's weather, but it's the place I feel closest to them and where I get the most peace. It also has a fire pit, so I can keep up my tradition of birthday letters.
Sending you so much love as you approach his birthday.
This is such a hard one - the envisioned birth experience and non-preemie infant care is absolutely something to grieve. The wake you have envisioned sounds like a really lovely way to honor that sadness and feel those feelings.
ReplyDelete- KatherineA/Inconceivable
I love the ending of this. You're absolutely right - you deserve to mourn the "normal" pregnancy you wanted but didn't get, and you deserve the relief and freedom of letting go of the dream. I will toast you, hoping that the dream goes peacefully.
ReplyDelete