non geordie mum

2011-11-24T01:16:00.005Z

Since J was born, as I may have mentioned, the anxiety has pretty much gone away.

It feels good. It's a relief. After living on a knife edge for so very very long, from October 10th to June 22nd, it's nice to be able to breathe out, and - mostly - relax. Maybe it sums up where I am if I tell you that I still get up every so often to check that J's still breathing, but that I don't use the breathing pad with his baby monitor?

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I did believe it was that simple. For a while.

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I can tell you what day it was that I became aware of the spoken word blog round up. It was Sunday October 23rd. I know it was that day, because I nearly recorded and posted a new video for the project there and then.

I wanted to record a new post, and I remember the date, because... that's the date in 2009 that the baby, my snowflake, stopped growing.

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I thought that - slightly inappropriate pregnancy reactions aside - I was OK with pregnant women these days. One of my lovely real-life-and-internet friends is pregnant at the mo; she told me fairly early on and... actually, I *didn't* have that reaction with her. Because she knows my story. She's read my blog, and she's sent me lovely messages at difficult times, and I know she gets that the odds are good but there are no guarantees.

But suddenly I was confronted (mostly on the internet, but still) with three women telling me they were 16 weeks pregnant. One of them is a fellow BLM at that. But here they all were, having waited until 16 weeks to announce their news, so super-cautious compared to many, really.

But apparently, even when a pregnancy isn't my own, 16-17 weeks sounds incredibly dangerous to me.

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Today a lovely woman came round to my house. She runs a local company (I won't link for reasons that will become clear but if anyone wants the details please just ask) that does trials of real nappies for two weeks. She unexpectedly brought her toddler, but that was OK. I love kids, and her toddler is a great specimen! But she also brought along her bump.

If someone had asked me yesterday or even this morning whether I was OK with pregnant women these days, I would've said yes, although possibly with the caveat of 'but I must try not to freak them out'. But apparently... I'm still not. Not really.

(Or maybe I'm OK as long as I get bracing time?)

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I've been hyper-aware since the beginning of October of the date. Of all the dates. October 2009, I was pregnant. October 2010, I was pregnant. This year, J is here in my arms. It's strange to think of the synchronicity I mentioned last year - the thought that maybe my snowflake stopped around for a year, only leaving after J arrived.

And - as I'm sure you can understand - I'm hyper-aware of the march towards 25th November. The date we found out it had all fallen apart. It's past midnight now, so it's my friend's little girl's second birthday. I found out H had had her baby by text as D drove us to the hospital two years ago tomorrow, Friday. It was sunny. H's girl was born and all was well. We were going to get an extra peek at the baby. What wasn't to love? Life was good.

Except, it wasn't.

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I'm extremely tired at the minute. J has this lovely (...not) new thing where he won't stay asleep when I put him down. It meant that last night I only got two hours of real sleep.

The tiredness is so bad that I'm finding it pretty hard to cope. (And yet here I am posting at 2.20am. Damned night-owl-ness.) I even found myself snapping at J. I hate myself for that. My poor baby. It's so not his fault. He doesn't choose not to go to sleep. I can see how tired he is, how much he needs mummy cuddles. I just feel so helpless when he's fussing and I can't figure out what's wrong, or when he wants to feed for hours on end, or...

I don't know if it's just the exhaustion, or if it's the coming anniversary.

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I'm not crying. I don't know if I'll cry on Friday. Anyone who lives in this postal code (or who's been reading for a while) will know that the run up to an anniversary is almost always worse than the anniversary itself. I do know I've resolutely avoided planning anything at all for that day. I don't know how I'll feel, what I'll be like. I might go up to the cemetery with J (not taking him for any reason more profound than he goes where I go). I might stay home. I might go into town and have lunch, and remember. I might decide not to think about it. Not to relive that day.

I'll do what feels right when I get there.

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That was the worst experience of my life, but I would never choose to undo it. Neither to undo that baby's tiny life, nor to make him or her into a baby that survived. Not any more. Because to do so would undo J.

(I'm aware that I'm almost certainly an oddity around here for that. I'm kind of OK with that.)

I've always been very aware of how precarious our paths through life are. It was so unlikely that I would meet D. So very unlikely that I would fall for him. So not-going-to-happen that he would fall for me too. So add up all the circumstances that had to fall into place for me to get pregnant with J, and he's the most unlikely baby ever to exist, and yet the most perfect baby ever. And I am so happy, and so lucky, to have him.

(Times I went to check that J was breathing while writing this post: 1)

2011-11-14T01:43:00.001Z

Keep meaning to do an update on the last post - no time to do so now other than to say J is getting his tongue tie snipped in the morning. Keep everything crossed, OK? It's really simple procedure but still scary.

I also have my arm in a splint because I have de Quervains tendonitis. It makes typing interesting.

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updated to say that it went fine :) baby boy hasn't got used to his full range of motion of his tongue yet but he's already getting there! so relieved!

2011-11-12T02:23:00.003Z

The woman upstairs has been playing loud music for hours. She's driving me insane. Luckily the baby and the hubby are fast asleep.

(she's in her 50s and nice during the day. but at weekends she goes a bit mental and starts playing very loud music, often repeating the same tracks again and again AND AGAIN. not to mention the, errrm, let's just say *loud noises* that we often hear. In FAR too much detail. in contrast, the 20-something lad next door who's pretty rough looking we rarely hear. the one time he had a party and really disturbed us he was mortified to realise quite how much he'd disturbed us and promised not to do it again, and he hasn't.)

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Anyway.

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I found out for utterly-sure today that J has a tongue tie. I've thought so for a long time but have brought it to the attention of numerous medical professionals who's basically gone 'hmmmm' and then ignored me. I suspect this is the cause of his extreme weight gain: feeding extremely often to compensate for not getting as much milk as he should per feed. May also be related to his reflux issues and the fact he often chokes while feeding. Poor guy.
He also has a hydroceal on his tes.ticles and an umbical hernia. No one serious problem, but loads of little things.
While I need general anaesthetic (!) for a minor procedure on my ears. I'm a bit horrified. But my ears have been bad since mid-February and the (mean) consultant was insistent, saying it's important to find out whether there's an underlying cause of my recurring problems. Which is all very well but I'm pretty scared (read absolutely terrified) of the whole idea. Partly for me - I've waited so long for J. I don't want to be taken away from him. But mostly for J. What if something goes wrong? What if I have a bad reaction to the anaesthesia and die? Extremely unlikely but what the hell would he do without his mummy? I'd rather go deaf. Seriously. Deafness in one ear is a million times better. At the very, very least.
I also have either tendinitis or tenosynovitis in my left wrist. Got a referral for physio for next week - thankfully they put it through as urgent because I'm actually starting to have difficulty picking up J, who at nearly 19 weeks weighed 19lb 15. According to the chart, that's the weight of an average 9 month old. I used to find it amusing, before I realised that extremely rapid weight gain can be related to tongue tie.
You're supposed to be able to use moby wraps up to 35lb, but I was told today that 20lb is a more realistic weight limit as beyond that their weight means the wrap comes untied too easily. So I need to either figure out the mei tai I bought a while back (which is apparently Ok but not great) or invest in a woven wrap. Which wouldn't be too much of a problem but...
The car seat that is supposed to take J up to 13kg (incidentally I hate working in both kg and lb but need to use both) is going to need to be replaced soon, as although last time he was weighed he was only 9kg he's already nearly too long for it. Which is more of an issue because...
I found this website and now we're going to get him a rear facing group 1 seat, which will necessitate a trip to York - the nearest shop that stocks them. Bloody marvellous. If only we'd known beforehand...
The neighbour's boyfriend is just leaving (3am) and i went round to ask her to keep it down in future. (Maybe I should've waited til the morning but I'm pretty sure that if I did I never would have said anything.) I was nice about it and just said 'can you keep it down in future, the music's been pretty loud'. She responded by bitching in extremely vulgar terms about a problem we've been having with the drains that we thought we'd sorted out. I will talk to her in the morning, but seriously. I've never been entirely sure about her and it's nice to know she really is a nasty piece of work. (Well, not nice, but at least I know for sure.)
I am sick of living here.
But! I just realised I'm five months into my maternity leave. Which is nearly half way through what's planned. And honestly, right now, I can't imagine ever leaving him until he's much older. Which is an issue because I'm the major wage earner.

None of these is a major problem, but put 'em all together and mix with a bucketload of sleep deprivation and I'm finding life pretty tough right now.

2011-11-04T20:33:00.003Z

I would mostly call myself OK, these days. Cautiously. But yeah, mostly OK. The anxiety is a million times better than it was, and I'm so thrilled to get to mother J, my little darling.

I would like to think that I'm aware of other people's circumstances on fb - not even those I know about, so to speak. But those who I don't know have lost babies, too. I try and keep it low-key. But I can't resist sharing pictures of him. Strange, when at first D had to twist my arm to put any pics up at all.

But.

But.

When someone tells me she's pregnant, these days, I can - and do - react in the socially acceptable way. Oh, fantastic! Congratulations! How far along? That's what people in the non-babylost world want to hear. And to be honest, these days, it really is the first thing that comes into my head.

But from that second onwards, I have to stop myself from saying the second thing. Because what I want to say at that point isn't to share my most recent pregnancy, or tell stories about how the little creature in my pram or my arms. How he tormented me with not-moving, or his birth story, or how fantastic a baby he is.

I want to say, I lost my first baby. If you get bad news, if you end up walking this path of the babylost, please tell me. Even if you can't see me because you can't bear to see my happy ending - and that's OK! - let me point you in the direction of glow and blogging and the places that helped me. Let me know your baby's name, if you want to, so I can remember him or her. Let me tell you that it's OK to back away from people who don't support you, or even to cut them off entirely. Let me think of you on the dates that hurt.

A neighbour told me today that she's pregnant, and that she has her first scan on Monday. The neighbour who helped us push our car out of the snow the morning we went to the communal cremation ceremony, at that. And I so had to stop myself from saying 'you remember that morning our cars were stuck in the snow? Guess where we were going that morning!'

Seriously. She told me she has her first scan on Monday. I said 'I hope everything is perfect'. I meant it. It was the only honest thing I could think of to say that wouldn't freak the poor girl out. But at the same time, I was thinking I hope everything's OK. I hope you don't have to go round telling people it's not. I hope, I hope.

feeling like...

2011-10-17T17:49:00.003+01:00

a bad mama. and wife. and general person.

so tired. J has regressed to waking up 2-3 times a night, after waking up just once per night for a long time. and i'm usually good at the mum stuff, although i find everything else hard (can manage to do washing and feed myself and get out and about to places, but tidying/washing up/making phone calls etc are mostly beyond me). i can do the bit where i sit and talk to him or sing to him for hours, i can change his nappy three times in a row (he hates pooing in a dirty nappy; i'm sure he waits for a nice clean one) without getting frustrated (... well that's a lie, but i kind of expect it now and joke with him and he smiles at me).

but these last few days my happy baby has turned grumpy and the lack of sleep has made it so much harder to cope with.

i'm still singing to him and chatting to him and caring for him and interacting with him, not to mention feeding him, but it's just five degrees harder this last couple of weeks, and i just want a day off. and i keep catching myself paying more attention to my laptop and twitter/fb than to him.

of course, i'm all about the attachment parenting. even leaving him for 45 minutes to go to the dentist seems like a huge thing to do. he doesn't really take bottles, so he is with me All. The. Time. and if i had a day off, i would find it really bizarre and i'm pretty certain i'd be back with him after all of 90 minutes at the most. but.... most nights i end up sitting up till well after midnight (currently 1.30am and counting) just to get some time on my own. and i hate that as it means i never go to bed with D.

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i will say though... he went through a phase about 3-4 weeks ago when he was feeding where he kept letting go and smiling up at me. he then stopped and i was sad.

he's been doing it again today. the most winsome smile i've ever seen. when i'm getting frustrated because he's been grumpy or squawking or impossible to comfort, and he does that? it does make it all worthwhile.

i just wish i could catch up on my sleep.

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i can hear other people saying it's hard and sympathise with them. give them support. when it's myself, though, i tend to think i should just suck it up. so many people would kill to have any baby, let alone such a cheery one as J. i should just bloody well get on with it.

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tomorrow is the la le.che leag.ue peer su.pport training. (i'm sure you can understand i don't want anyone googling it finding such a whiny blog post.) and the absolutely maximum amount of sleep i'll get is 5 hours. probably less because he didn't feed that much before bed, so he'll probably feed at least once overnight. and i just want to stay in bed and hope he lets me sleep. but i think i need to get out and see other mums, no matter how tired i am. because it feels like it's been a bit of a while. and J and i haven't been out of the house today (monday) or yesterday. i think we're both probably a bit stir-crazy. i guess they'll just have to cope if i'm a bit late though.

... i really should just go to bed now.

A year?

2011-10-10T23:45:00.004+01:00

One year ago today, I found out I was pregnant.

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I got up early to pee on a stick. Could barely believe my eyes when I saw the result. But at the same time knew in advance what it was going to be.

I went into our bedroom; told D that I'd just taken a pregnancy test. 'Oh well,' he said. (We were that resigned to negatives.)

I asked him if he wanted to know what it said. He was pretty surprised that there was something to know.

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We assumed it wasn't going to stick. That it would only last a few days. But getting pregnant at all was a positive sign. But within a few hours we were talking like it was definite.

That pattern continued all the way through, for me at least.

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It's hard to understand that this time last year, I was pregnant; this time two years ago, I was pregnant. Even though that baby only had a couple more weeks to live.

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I've just spent a long time re-reading the posts from my pregnancy and the time immediately before. It's so hard to really comprehend that the baby lying asleep in the cotbed in my room is the same baby who refused to kick regularly, who repeatedly scared the life out of me by not moving for days on end. He's so kicky now, it's definitely hard to marry the concept of the baby I was pregnant with with the reality of the baby I now have.

In six and a half weeks it will be two years since we found out our first child had died in utero.

I find that sentence nearly impossible to truly comprehend, in all respects. Even down to the fact that J isn't therefore our first child. Because he isn't. But at the same time, he is.

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I'm still sad when I remember what happened. I didn't think I was any more. But more than one of my old posts brought tears to my eyes. But I think that now I'm more sad for that baby than for myself. Sad that he or she never got to live. Sad that she or he never got to find out what takeout s/he preferred or who s/he looked like, not sad that I never got to know. It's not fair, that my first child never got to live.

Up till now, all my grief has been for me. But... I think now that I see J experiencing all that a 15 week old baby experiences, I understand more what my snowflake missed out on him or herself.

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It raises a wry smile to read this post. Sometimes we really do have to hit rock bottom before things start to improve. I must have written that about the same time as J was starting to implant.

And... it seems right to link this post. After being so, so desperate to be pregnant, I was so ambivalent for those first few days. But now I cannot imagine my life without J.

My life is so filled with love, these days.

I'm not sure how I will deal with the anniversary. Generally speaking, the sadness and the anxiety have gone... but I don't know how I'll manage when the anniversary is actually here. Especially given that it's supposed to start snowing soon; given the fact that soon it's going to be dark and cold and undeniably winter. Having J will help - of course it will. But it will still be hard.

I said I wasn't going to post more pics. But.... I can't resist. This is of J sleeping a couple of nights ago.

Plenty of space added in for those who need to look away.....

'bonding with your bump'?

2011-09-12T19:29:00.001+01:00

Back in September 2009, I was pregnant.

Two years. God, it's so long ago.

I got a book out of the library. Bonding with your Bump. I was really excited. I started massaging my bump. Talking to the baby. Doing all the wonderful things that naive first-time parents who don't live in or around the ALI neighbourhood do. Expecting that everything will be perfect.

But then. What happened happened, and it became abundantly, horribly clear that I had been talking to myself. And, possibly naively - hell, totally naively - I went back to that book. Wondering what it said about losing a pregnancy. Thinking it would at least have a few sentences about how women could cope after losing a much-wanted, much-loved baby. Thinking it would definitely talk about pregnancy after loss. After all, who is potentially going to find it harder to bond with a subsequent pregnancy than a woman who has lost a child?

It. Had. NOTHING.

Not a single word.

Well. In one or two places pregnancy loss is obliquely referred to, mainly referring to parents’ reluctance to share the news about their baby until they are past the 12 week ‘danger’ period. But nowhere does the book explicitly discuss - or even allude to! - the loss of a baby and how devastating this can be. There is certainly nothing acknowledging the possibility of losing a baby once the first trimester seems to be safely over; there's nothing to acknowledge that even if you do everything right – give up alcohol and caffeine, eat healthily, reduce your stress levels, etc – a successful pregnancy is not guaranteed.

The bloody book even states that parents may find it hard to tell people that they have had a miscarriage if they have shared the news of their pregnancy before the 12 week 'danger period' is over (and oh my God, if only pregnancies were safe once you were past 12 weeks.....) No consideration of the fact that most women will need love and support if you lose a baby, no matter how early.

I wrote to Miriam Stoppard, less than a month after losing the baby, saying all this. I never received a response. Not even a form letter.

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I actually got the book out of the library again when I found out I was pregnant last year. Wanting to bond with the baby, knowing that I needed help. Thinking it couldn't be as uncaring as I remembered. But it was, it was. I've looked through a few of her books now. I've never found one that even mentions in passing how utterly devastating pregnancy loss is.

Even worse, the book discusses the effects of stress and anxiety on an unborn child in extremely negative terms, without putting it into the perspective of a mother who has lost a child and how stressful and scary a time pregnancy can be. And it seems terribly unfair to scare women who are already terrified of pregnancy into thinking they are damaging their unborn child by suffering from anxiety and depression - related to the loss of their child!! - in a subsequent pregnancy. (I suffered from debilitating anxiety and moderate depression at times, but have ended up with a very calm, chilled, happy baby, so obviously it's not as simple as she makes out.)

I don't want her to withdraw or rewrite her book. But I do want her to add in some information about pregnancy loss and how to cope with a pregnancy after infertility, miscarriage, stillbirth or neonatal death. And as always, contact details for SANDS wouldn't go amiss.

I've written an open letter to Miriam Stoppard. I'm thinking about publishing it here and asking people to tweet the link to her. Because apparently writing to her publishers didn't work, and honestly?

If she added a chapter about pregnancy post-loss, this book could be a comfort to women who are pregnant post-loss. But right now, it feels like a kick in the teeth. And bereaved parents are the last people who need to be kicked in the teeth.

will I ever...

2011-08-16T21:34:00.002+01:00

lose the fear?

J isn't 100% at the minute. He always has reflux but the last two days he's been sick once; today he's been sick twice.

He seems OK in himself. His temperature is fine and he's alert and happy in himself and my instinct is that he's fine.

.... But there's that fear. That *before* my instinct said that everything was OK, too - even sitting in the scan room after two midwives had been unable to find a heartbeat, ffs; what the hell was I thinking? - but my baby was dead. Do I trust the evidence of my eyes and the baby who's still smiling at us? Who's just pee'd and poo'd so obviously isn't dehydrated? Who's still 'talking' to my husband on the changing mat?

I honestly don't think there is any purpose to calling the out of hours GP service at the minute. It feels like it'd be a waste of my time and might stop someone who actually needs help getting quickly. But... not doing so is scary. What if there really is something wrong and I'm just not spotting it?

Aaaargh.

Parenting after loss was always going to be tricky.

google plus

2011-08-14T19:02:00.002+01:00

meant to say - i'm now on google plus. feel free to connect, or to ask for an invite if you want one. i'll need your email address if i don't already have it.

i hardly know anyone on there yet but i think in time i'll prefer it to fb. so much more control over how you post.

snapshots from the first two months

2011-08-08T17:46:00.003+01:00

thank you all for your warm welcome to my little boy!

there is so much i want to write about - labour and birth, my mental health, how awesome a dad my husband is - but these snapshots will have to suffice, for now.

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he was over 8 1/2 lb when the was born. he only fitted in newborn clothing for a few days. lucky we mostly bought 0-3 month stuff. although he's really, really long, and putting on weight at an astonishing rate. he still has plenty of room to grow outwards into the 0-3 clothes, but lengthwise he's nearly out of them.

we only had to stay in hospital two days, not the five they had told me. and even that was because it took us a little while to get breastfeeding established, not because of any concerns about the ADs.

breastfeeding can be tricky at first. i cried to D at one stage while we were still in hospital that it felt like someone was helping me learn to ride a bike and was pushing me off and letting go - and at the stage where most people realise and fall off but then realise they can do it, i was still falling. again and again and again. but then a lovely midwife realised i was struggling and helped me lots overnight. including arranging for D to come back in and spend the night in hospital with us to help me cope and to help look after J. she was brilliant.

La Leche League are looking for peer supporters in my area. I'm looking into it.

it's amazing how little sleep you can happily survive on when you need to. having said that, he's already slept over six hours a couple of times. pretty amazing for such a young fully breastfed baby.

i said before he was born that i was pragmatic about breastfeeding, that if it didn't work i'd be disappointed but not gutted. i was lying. i would've been totally gutted.

he seems so advanced! he's already been properly smiling for ages. he's even laughed a few times. babies don't normally do that for a good few months.

he hardly cries. i am so lucky. and so grateful when he does cry (thank goodness! it's good to know he knows how to cry when he needs somehing!) and so totally freaked out at the same time (OhMyGod, what on earth is wrong?? please stop crying baby boy! i have no resilience to his cries because i'm not used to them at all).

i cannot figure out babywearing. and i've given up because i'm so scared we'll never crack it, and because i'm so tired. but i really, really want it to work. so i must get back to it.

he loves lying on his mat and kicking and moving his arms about. sometimes when he's crying it's what he actually wants, for us to just put him down already so he can play! he's far too young for that but it really seems to be what he wants.

no one told me about tummy time. i'm really mad that i only know about it from blogs and only thought to google it this weekend. luckily he seems to enjoy it so hopefully it won't hold him back too much.

two weeks paternity leave is nothing at all. D took two weeks paternity and two weeks leave, and now he has no leave left until christmas. christmas is so far away.

he took a bottle of expressed breastmilk yesterday for the first time. accepted it beautifully and still breastfeeding nicely. such a relief.

at one of my antenatal classes the midwife told me that breastfed babies don't need winding. What. A. Lie.

when he was less than 24 hours old they were concerned in case he had a blockage as he was throwing up bright green gunk after every feed. they wanted to put dye into his stomach and make sure it went through properly. D had to hold down his arms while they put a tube into his stomach. it broke his heart. then they took him down to x-ray to put in the dye and take the pictures. he cried so hard. it was heartbreaking. but i'm sure it was far more traumatic for us than for him - i'm sure he'd forgotten about it very soon.

he's huge for his age - following the curve for 91st percentile! - but he's my teeny tiny baby boy. and i love him to pieces.

he's here!

2011-06-28T20:56:00.003+01:00

i'm sorry for keeping you all in suspense for so long!

our son was born alive and healthy -a few days after his due date- after a relatively short, very intense labour, weighing over 8lb.

he is beautiful and we are so, so in love with him. and we cannot believe how lucky we are.

i need to write more, but it will be a while. i can't get my head around anything at the mo, but i had to let you all know that he is ok.

thank you all for your support during my pregnancy. i couldn't have done it without you all.

(details removed for privacy reasons)

2011-06-19T22:21:00.003+01:00

the other night, D was talking to my belly, telling the baby to hurry up and come out. and he said 'come out, we miss you!'.

and that is the most illogical and the most perfect thing he could have said.

we've never met him yet, but we miss him, and we can't wait for him to be finally on the outside.

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today is my due date. i've had some twinges but nothing more. i'm getting more and more anxious, more and more afraid that something is going to go wrong.

i need him to be ok.

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i've always been of the opinion that i really don't want a caesarean unless it's really, really necessary. but the last day or two... part of my brain wants to call the hospital and say just get him out, already. get him out safe and well. i'm not sure how long i can wait for him to turn up on his own.

come on, baby boy. time to make your move. before your mummy starts cracking up again.

2011-06-14T23:08:00.003+01:00

I doubt anyone saw the post I just posted here and then took down immediately but google reader picked it up (luckily when it was just one line long, not the whole rant) (also, damn you google reader! is there no way to remove these posts from your clutches???) so I just want to apologise to anyone who picked it up from there and say that I was having a ridiculously petty whine and that then I remembered just where I live and how insensitive it was, so I deleted it again.

Sorry about that.

unexpected

2011-06-12T21:58:00.004+01:00

Someone asked me at the beginning of the week whether I was going to miss being pregnant. Someone who had just met me and has no idea of the stress and anxiety this pregnancy has caused in me. How much of an emotional wreck I've been.

And you know what?

The answer. It's 'yes'. I really am going to miss it.

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[This next section... I hope it doesn't upset anyone. I'm sorry if it does; I won't be surprised... I find it upsetting myself. I finally put into words some feelings I had at the beginning of the second trimester that I could barely acknowledge even to myself. It's horrible but it's how I felt at the time. I'm very glad things didn't come to pass like this.]

Makes no sense, does it? I've hated the last eight months or so. I've been 100% certain that the baby is either dead or going to die very soon for large chunks of this pregnancy. At times, in the second trimester... part of me would almost have been relieved to find out the baby was dead, because it would have meant that I didn't have to live with the uncertainty any more.

(I hated myself for thinking that. I still do. I'm so glad he's still OK. Right now, even if he's fated not to make it, I'm glad we've got this far. I'm glad I've had this time with him, even though it has been traumatic and scary as hell.)

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If you'd asked me back in March or April - or earlier for that matter - whether I would miss being pregnant I would have either laughed at you or, quite possibly, slapped you. Being pregnant wasn't the point. Having a baby was the point. Getting to take home a living, healthy baby.

But somehow things changed. I think the therapy and CBT really did make a difference. Right now... I'm still terrified. I'm getting more anxious again. 39 weeks today, just two weeks left at the most; I am not going past 41 weeks even if I have to refuse to leave the hospital. But I'm enjoying him living in my belly. The times where D and I sit and watch him shifting inside me and laugh, fascinated... they're worth all the times when I lie in bed with my hands on my belly, willing him to move, terrified he's stopped for good.

And there are still a fair few of those.

---

I think that as much as anything I want a do-over. I want to go back and be less anxious. Not not-anxious, that was never a realistic aim. But I think back to what a wreck I was in March and April particularly and it just seems like such a waste. If only I could have come to this place of zen a month or two earlier. When I had my leaving lunch from work, someone said I'd been a completely different person for the last month or so, and she was right. I've been completely different, and a lot less exhausting both for myself and for those around me. Hell, if I manage to hold out until tomorrow, I've not been to the hospital for monitoring because of freaking out about the baby for four whole weeks. That was unthinkable just a couple of weeks before that.

---

I want to meet him now. Like, now. But at the same time, I don't want this pregnancy to be over. I don't know if we'll ever even try for another baby. I don't want this to be over before I'm ready. Now I'm finally enjoying carrying him.

+++

My blood pressure was up on Thursday, but no traces of protein in my ur.ine. Today my blood pressure was normal but there were traces of protein. They're keeping an eye on me. Baby seems to be doing fine though.

One week until my due date. Baby is engaged and I'm uncomfortable. I hope he turns up on time.

+++

I can't imagine anyone who reads here hasn't heard the terrible news about lis and T. I honestly cannot get my head around it. I honestly thought that this time things were going to be OK. I.... I want it to make sense, and it's never ever going to.

Please offer her your love and support in this horrendous time.

2011-05-21T13:52:00.004+01:00

36 weeks tomorrow. All still seems to be well. As of last Monday the baby had started to engage (3/5 palpable, for those keeping track). I can't feel him move so well now. I suspect it's partly because he's started to move lower, but also suspect that he's turned to face more inwards than he was before. I was so hoping that we'd get that really cool stage when you can actually see fingers or toes poking through from the inside, but I think we missed the window for that. It's a shame.

I'm focusing inwards now, I guess. I'm reading some blogs (I can't even think about reading all of them) but can barely make myself comment anywhere. I think I might try and accept that right now I need to focus on myself and my baby.

The anxiety is less than it has been in years. I could have pretty bad pain last night and just wait for it to pass, as long as I could feel the baby moving (and I could). That would have been entirely unheard of a few short weeks ago. (Pretty sure it was ligament pain; I'd had the same pain on the other side a week or so back and the assessment unit couldn't find any reason for it.) Feel fine today.

I guess if all is well I might not update now before the baby's born. I'm looking forward to the labour and birth - although still terrified he won't survive. I guess I'm just looking forward to actually having something positive to do. (Our flat is falling to pieces round our ears but that's another story.)

And I'm really looking forward to meeting our baby.

I just hope it all goes right and he ends up alive and healthy and well.

2011-04-24T10:21:00.005+01:00

Something else I wanted to say.

I talked here about the fact that the end of November, the anniversary of finding out the baby had died, will always be harder than the beginning of May, when my due date should have been.

And I still think that's true. May is a time for sad smiles, for thinking about what-might-have-been. November is a time for remembering shock and grief and cold and misery.

Last year the run up to 6th May was horrible. I slid back into grief and depression after thinking I was getting better, doing OK. But the day itself was OK. Not too bad.

This year... I would be lying if I said that being pregnant didn't make it easier. It does - although the fact I'll still have six weeks to go til my due date reminds me of just how very long it took us to get pregnant again. Ten months + felt like a very, very long time. It's hard to accept that from our loss to holding a living baby (please) will be a gap of over eighteen months. (And in related news, tomorrow is 17 months. How on earth has it been so long???)

The sadness isn't as heavy. But it's still there.

But... to wish for my first child back would mean undoing the life I carry right now. And I wouldn't do that for the world.

(Even if he's fated not to make it either.)

I wish I could have had them both. But things would never had worked out like that.

So. Anyway. I guess all I'm trying to say is that I will remember my first child, my snowflake. And...

It would mean the world if you would, too.

Just put a little note in your diary. Stop and think of us on 6th May, just for a minute.

Thank you xx

---

Edited to add: when I clicked 'publish' the ad that came up read:
Special Memorial Websites
Create a beautiful, special tribute in loving memory of your baby
www.muchloved.com

Is it just me or is the fact blogger has worked out I lost a baby and is tailoring ads to me disturbing as f**k???????

radio silence

2011-04-18T20:39:00.004+01:00

i'm ok, as is baby.

i should clarify. physically we're both doing fine. emotionally i've been very up and down. actually terrible at times. although i'm doing better this last eight days or so.

---

i've been writing posts in my head. about the terror that has been regularly filling my brain and the ridiculous frequency of me running into the hospital for monitoring. about how i had written my active birth classes and other antenatal classes in my diary in pen, but could only write the number of weeks i am one or two ahead and in pencil. about how much denial i've been in about how much i love this baby, this creature living inside me. about how terrifying the first attempt at the 4D scan was (baby had his feet in front of his face and was very still; i was terrified he was dead). about how amazing the second one was.

but you know what?

i just have no interest in being on the internet right now.

i feel like i've been living on the internet for far too long. before babyloss even. i've been living on blogs and facebook for a very long time.

i've kind of been reconnecting with the real world. it's been a long time. i've been ignoring some of my real-life people for far too long. i'd kind of forgotten that some of them existed.

and i feel really bad. there's some crappy stuff going on out there. some really crappy stuff. but....

this last week or so, while i've been limiting my internet time, i've not been up to hospital for monitoring. i've been calmer and happier.

i've started to believe that there is a chance - a good chance - that i will stay sane, and the baby will be born alive and healthy.

---

i suspect i'm not capable right now of offering support to many people and taking care of myself at the same time. (i can support a few people on a more personal basis; i'm thinking of two friends in particular who have had terrible upheaval in their lives in the last couple of weeks, and i wish i could do more for them.)

but my entire blogroll and google reader? no.

i just can't do it.

and i haven't got the energy to let myself feel bad about that.

although i do feel i should.

but i can't withdraw entirely.

after all, i'm still terrified that i'll need you all again, worryingly soon.

(i believe this baby has a good chance, but as we all know round here, sometimes that's not enough.)

so please know that i'm still reading. not quite as regularly, but i'm still there.

even if i can't make myself comment right now.

i'm thinking of you all. and wishing you good things in the future. in whatever form that takes.

---

i'll be back at some point, whatever happens. but for the minute, i'll be away. if you want to be in touch, you can email or find me on fb (actually you probably can't, but email me if you're interested). i'm not very good at either right now, but it's better than nothing i guess :/

2011-03-15T21:46:00.001Z

the hospital have cancelled our 4d scan that was booked for tomorrow :(

not sure when we'll be able to reschedule for, but i just wanted to let you know in case anyone was looking forward to an update tomorrow.

i'll let you know that happens.

2011-03-13T22:47:00.003Z

i'm still not here (although apparently i am commenting on other people's blogs still; i'm quite surprised) but these thoughts have been going through my head for a few days and i think i just need to splurge them.

---

i'm not going to be able to drive for much longer. the pedals in our car are quite far forward and my legs are relatively short. the steering wheel won't raise any higher, and i'm already starting to think my bump is unnervingly close to it. this is quite frustrating. i don't need to drive for work or anything, but... it's frustrating and quite limiting to think i'll have months when i can't.

---

i want a necklace for the new baby. i have one for my snowflake, but it seems kind of disloyal to the baby to only have one for his sibling. but i've no idea what kind of thing i want, and i'm not sure whether i really want to buy one before he's born. will have to keep thinking about this one, i guess.

---

i've been reading birthing books - i mentioned that here. i ended up writing a review for one of them on amazon here, at least partly because it disturbs me how against antenatal testing the author is and how little time she gives to her arguments against it. she doesn't even attempt to state the case for testing, just emphasises that they are not compulsory, and... i don't know. it just really freaks me out. i can't imagine it will do any good and that a future edition would change on the strength of one amazon review, but you never know, do you?

at least maybe they'll include contact details for Sands next time.

---

i talked to my mum about the situation with my cousin. i wasn't sure how she'd react but she was very understanding.

she saw my cousin's brother a couple of days later. and she talked to him about it. i was mortified, but apparently he didn't even let her get very far into the story before he stopped her and said to tell me not to upset myself about it, that she gets very upset and lashes out quite regularly and that i shouldn't take it personally.

i don't think she told him the bit where what she had said had quite upset me, but his response made me feel much better.

---

and a funny one to finish.

D anthropomorphosises just.about.everything. he's good at it, and he mostly makes me laugh. but last week in the supermarket he picked up a box of mini Cornish pasties, and he said 'they're so small, and they're out without their mum!'

and i cried.

right there in a.s.d.a.

for the sake of the poor lonely Cornish pasties.

i think i need to get a grip :)

2011-03-09T21:32:00.004Z

i need to step back.

i have loads of blog posts i want to write, and loads of comments on blogs i want to write, and... just generally lots to do.

but i need to step back.

my pregnancy is going well (my midwife, with a look of slight distain, today called me 'normal' - it was a joke, but true, right now at least). my baby is finally moving so that i'm sure of what i'm feeling. when i went to visit my sister last friday, that wasn't true. but by sunday his movements were so strong that my other sister could feel them. it's like he suddenly got the hang of it.

i'm still worried - he was quiet this morning, and i was scared, but i had a midwife appointment today and his heartbeat was fine, and he's moving a lot this evening - but... it's not as bad. it's nowhere near as bad. it almost feels like 'normal' pregnancy worrying, rather than 'pregnancy after loss' worrying.

i have a 4d scan booked for next week. i'll let you know how it goes.

i'm scared to say it 'out loud', but i'm happy. i've finally got some proper good memories of this pregnancy, ones that last more than a few hours here and there. i hope the 4d scan next week will create some more, and some more concrete ones.

i can admit, now, that if he died now i would be glad that he had existed. that i would want to remember him. that i wouldn't erase his life if i had half the chance. i can't say that about my first pregnancy. at least not with confidence.

(the main reason that i wouldn't want to erase that pregnancy now is that to do so would also erase this child. my son. and that's a strange, uncomfortable thought. please know that i love my first child and wanted him or her more than anything. but i'm not sure, if i had the chance, whether i would change history.)

---

i keep coming back to the internet. but right now, it feels like habit and fear that keep me here, not a positive choice.

i had a great weekend with my sisters. we didn't do anything amazing - had a trip to a lake and went on a boat, watched three films (!), ate nice food - but... it felt normal. felt like something a normal pregnant woman would do, spend time with her sisters and enjoy being pregnant.

(not the part where i feared that the plane journey had somehow killed him. that bit wasn't good. but he's ok.)

i think i need to go away and be normal for a while.

---

i might post at my other blogs while i'm not posting here, it's hard to say for sure. but it's worth keeping an eye out, i guess. and like i say i'll let you know how the 4d scan goes.

i don't think this will last for long but if it looks like becoming permanent i'll come back and say so.

but i think i'll be back here by the time 2-3 weeks has passed. if that.

2011-03-03T08:39:00.005Z

i posted something on facebook.
one of my cousins read it as an attack on her and how she parents her son.
i didn't dream in a million years she could have read it like that, and i never would have posted it if i'd realised.
it was probably a stupid thing to do anyway.
she responded angrily and when i read her response i could understand why. and i'm glad she responded rather than just being angry with me and hiding it.
but.

but.

she said something like 'you try breas.tfeeding while looking after two kids after two and trying to feed them healthily'.

and oh god, it hurt.

i wish my life had worked out like that.

i wish i could confidently believe that this baby will be ok.

i wish i knew for a fact that i'll be able to breas.tfeed like i hope to, like i plan to.

and that my husband will agree to us trying again.

and that that baby will be ok too.

i wish i believed that i could ever know what that feels like.

---

i apologised to my cousin. deleted the offending post. i hope she understands that i wasn't criticising her, even though she read it that way. and i hope noone else who saw it thought i was criticising her.

i hate that i hurt her.

---

i was so jealous when she was pregnant that i had to hide her on facebook.

she's always been lovely to me.

---

i don't know how to end this. i just guess i wish i hadn't made that stupid post.

---

i don't think anyone would, but just to be clear: please don't criticise my cousin. she's not the one in the wrong.

and don't tell me i'm not in the wrong. i did something stupid and hurt someone who's doing a brilliant job and i wish i hadn't been so stupid.

2011-03-02T22:57:00.004Z

i just marked a load of posts unread in google reader. i hate doing that but sometimes i need to.

i'm hoping to keep up when i'm back. but i just wanted to make sure y'all know that i'm reading, even if i never get round to commenting.

maybe one day i'll stop being such a comment-perfectionist and then i'll comment more :)

2011-02-28T22:53:00.004Z

my line manager said to me today 'do you think your hormones could have anything to do with it?'.

and i had one of those light bulb moments.

i had completely forgotten that even in a normal pregnancy, women have mood swings and get upset and scared and panicky and worried.

and when you factor that into the equation - i suppose i'm really not doing all that badly, am i?

---

i haven't replied to email from anyone - except an odd one from my mum and someone i hadn't emailed in months - for over two weeks. i keep getting emails and meaning to reply but being completely incapable of sitting down and actually doing it. i don't know why, and it's driving me mad. i'm usually bad at email but not this bad.

comments, too. i appreciate them all, but i'm not replying - and barely commenting on other blogs too. i'm sorry. i really am.

i hope to catch up after i've been away.

i'm really sorry.

---

i made lemon cake tonight. i'm going to take it to work tomorrow and try not to eat the entire lot myself.

scratch that. i'm going to go to bed now and try not to eat the entire bloody thing right now. that will also be pretty difficult.

sunday night freak out

2011-02-28T00:36:00.004Z

wow, not had one of these for a few weeks. guess that proves how much better i've been doing these last three weeks or so.

i was ok. i've been scared again today, asking D for reassurance all the time, but i've been ok. talking about when we'll want people to come round and meet the baby after he's born - you know, the kind of stuff you don't exactly talk about on the days when you're convinced your baby won't make it.

i cried a little this morning. talking about whether you would change what could have been. of course i wish things could have worked out differently - but it's not that simple any more. to want to go back and change the past would mean undoing this baby, this little boy who i already love. and i couldn't do that.

does that kind of make my snowflake the price i had to pay for this baby?

that's sh.it if so. horrible.

but seeing as i've already paid that price, i might as well accept it. the only thing haggling would do right now is cost me more.

---

the problem is, as i realised this morning, that i'm now at the stage where if the worst happened and this baby died too, i would not want to undo it. i would not want to wind the clock back and undo my baby's existence.

and i think that maybe that's why, as i switched the light off tonight, i started to cry. and cry and cry. because i love this little one. more than i want to. i don't want to be lost in hope. i want to hold some of myself back. so if the worst was to happen, i'd have a tiny piece of me that wasn't fully destroyed. and i know better than to think like that. i know that's not how it works. but still i try.

my midwife keeps telling me to have faith in my baby. and i do. i do have faith in him. i believe he can do it. but i don't believe in my body's ability to keep him alive and well. and worse, i don't believe in my body's ability to signal that something is wrong. last time i carried a dead baby for over four weeks and only discovered the truth at a routine check up. this time, i guess lack of movement would mean that at this stage i wouldn't have that kind of gap between something going wrong and me finding out, but.... but. still.

he's moving differently this weekend. he seems to move less at weekends anyway, but he's moving differently yesterday and today. i can't put my finger on how but it's so hard not to second guess. are his movements getting weaker? is it a bad sign that they've changed? should i go and get it checked out? and i'm just so scared of not getting checked out, but i'm scared of getting checked out too.

and my heartbeat is high the last few days too as well, although my blood pressure was fine when i got an emergency appointment with a nurse on wednesday, but i'm still scared that there could be something wrong, that my rapid (well, around 80bpm) heartbeat could hurt him, or could be a sign of something wrong.

---

(while i've been writing this post, of course, he's been moving more definitely. so at the least, i think i can believe he's ok right now.)

---

at the end of this week, i travel to my parents' house. i stay there overnight and then fly with one sister to visit our other sister in mainland europe. without D, who will stay home and do some DIY without worrying about me inhaling fumes or the like.

i think that this fear, this terror of something going wrong *now*, is partly because i'm scared that something will go wrong while i'm away, in a foreign country where i don't speak the language well enough for a hospital stay (although my sister could translate well enough, it's not the same) and where, worse, i would be without D.

what if the baby dies while i'm away?

what if he stops moving and my sister has to find me a hospital so i can get them to check he's ok?

what if they need to do an emergency section? would he be considered viable there? (i think he would, but it's hard not knowing for sure.)

and what if something went wrong and D wasn't there?

---

i had a dream last night. i was staying at a hotel. maybe for a family wedding, i'm not sure. but i wandered off to a nearby park, running across busy roads to get there.

and i climbed in up a steep and muddy hill, let myself in through huge wooden doors.

but i was barely inside before hotel staff approached me. before they told me i couldn't go in there. i didn't belong. i would have to leave.

and i didn't get the symbolism when i woke up. but tonight, while making my hot chocolate after getting out of bed, suddenly it became clear. that's the outcome i'm afraid of. that even after all this time i still won't get to be a mother. i still won't get to enter that mystical land.

---

this sucks. (understatement of the year?)

i just want to know that my little boy will be OK.

Progress?

2011-02-23T20:49:00.004Z

I was talking to one of my sisters on the phone on Monday and realised that about 2/3 of me now expects this baby to be OK, at least in the long run. More precisely, 1/3 of me expects him to die, 1/3 to be born early and have problems but to be OK in the end, and 1/3 just expects him to be OK. Considering that at times during this pregnancy I have been 100% sure he's either going to die or dead already, I am amazed by this. I didn't honestly see it coming.

We've booked the 4D scan. Mid March. Apparently a consultant obstetrician does it, so if anything is wrong we've got the right person in the room with us. I still don't know for sure that we'll do it, but I think I do want to. I want to see what my baby looks like.

Rach said something in the comments about me definitely feeling movement now. I guess I am. But I'm still entirely unable to say out loud 'the baby's moving' without qualifying it with 'I think' and 'I'm not really sure' and 'Maybe'. Even when I say to someone 'I find it really hard to say this without qualifying it, but the baby's moving right now' I find myself injecting 'I think' and 'probably' and all kinds of other things. (And to be honest so far I've only been able to even try to say it and sound in any way definite to D and one of my sisters.) The anterior placenta doesn't help I don't think. A lot of the time it feels like he's dragging my internal organs around, rather than kicking or punching me.

I'm still scared for him. I still don't trust my body's ability to care for him and keep him alive. But so far he's doing well. I am doing better at focusing on that these days.

I spoke to someone from an antenatal mental health group I've been going to today. I haven't seen her in a while as I've been busy those afternoons and the group was cancelled today. She said I sounded a hell of a lot better than I did last time I saw her. And she's right, I do.

Having said all that, the last few days my heart rate has been higher than usual and my blood pressure's felt a little high. I'm going to see if I can get it checked out tomorrow. Just to be sure.

Did I tell you about my ears being blocked up? They still are. I'm supposed to be flying out to visit one of my sisters next weekend, with my other sister. I'm looking forward to the three of us spending some time together. My ears had bloody well better sort themselves out before that. I'm sick of only being able to hear in my left ear.

---

Oh. And tomorrow I'm going to see Val McDermid, my fave author, at an event she's doing. And on Friday I'm going out for tea with D and a couple we're friends with. And on Saturday I'm meeting Becky who is a lovely friend of mine. I've not been this sociable for weeks. I'm quite proud of myself.

(I can't be bothered with links today. I'm very sorry my lovelies. If I can be bothered tomorrow I'll add them in!)

2011-02-22T22:49:00.003Z

i had to go to the hospital tonight. the baby didn't move all day and i was scared to death. he's ok though. they listened to his heartbeat and he's fine. the midwife used the word 'perfect', which scared me, but she meant well.

---

i think i've mentioned that there are four other pregnant women in my work. i've spoken about being pregnant to three of them since finding out they were pregnant. the fourth i've only seen in passing. she's one of those people who's lovely but i never see her so i always forget that she's lovely. anyway, i bumped into her today, and we ended up chatting. and i found out she had an ectopic pregnancy at the end of last year.

i had suspected that she'd lost a baby, but it's not the kind of thing you can exactly ask. but she was quite open about it, and we ended up talking about pregnancy after loss. her experience was obviously very different to mine, but her experience of pregnancy after loss... well, let's just say it was nice to talk in person, out loud, to someone who gets the fear and the reluctance to believe the best and the being slightly freaked out by all the pregnancies in work and the not really being a normal pregnant woman and ... just everything.

i wanted to hug her at the end but didn't want to freak the poor girl out :)

2011-02-20T23:09:00.003Z

Thank you all for your support last week. I still can't come anywhere close to believing what happened to my friend. It's just so wrong. I can't get my head around how unfair life is.

I want to say more about that situation but there's not really anything else to say, is there? I can't really support her; I know how hard it is to deal with pregnant people in the aftermath of a loss, so there isn't really anything I can do. And that's hard to accept but it's true.

---

Emotionally and mentally, I'm still not doing too bad, considering. I'm not doing as well as I was before I heard about my friend but I'm still doing OK. Not panicking. Fairly worried but at a bearable level. Finding it hard to believe that my baby is OK but also finding it hard to believe that there could be anything wrong. Which, on balance, I'll take; it's better than the long time when I was just waiting for the minute where it went wrong.

We're thinking about getting a 4D scan at the hospital I'm booked into. D has some money saved that he was going to put towards a TV and I have £50 from Christmas that I don't know what to do with, so we'd only have to find an extra £25, which I'm sure we could do. Part of me thinks that we should save that money and use it on things for the baby. But part of me thinks that... well, part of me thinks it will help me to believe in the baby. That it will stop the part of me that's still holding back. Most of me isn't now, but... part of me still is.

And part of me thinks that... that if this baby doesn't survive, at least I'll have that memory. At least I'll always know it was real.

I don't know. Part of me thinks it's a good idea, part of me doesn't. Any opinions welcome.

---

Physically I'm mostly OK but my ears are stuffed full of wax and I can't hear through my right ear and haven't been able to since Monday night. It is driving me insane. I cannot wait to get my ears syringed (I don't think it's going to clear up on its own but I have to wait for the wax to soften which is going to take FOREVER.)

---

And, there's something I've been wanting to talk about at my private blog, but before I do I wanted to know how people react when they know their friends and family are going through a tough time - what a 'normal' response is. But I only have five readers over there (do email me if you want to join them!!!) so I'm posting a survey here. It's only got one question. Please do fill it in! Here you go.....

Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world's leading questionnaire tool.

2011-02-13T18:08:00.003Z

i've been planning on writing a nice positive post about how i'm coping well and haven't freaked out in 10 days and counting and all that. well, everything is still ok with me, but i just found out that a friend of mine from an online pregnancy-after-loss board (not someone who has a blog) has lost her baby at 23 weeks. and i cannot understand why she has to go through this again. it is so wrong, and so unfair, and i don't understand, and i don't know what to do for her; i don't have any contact details other than an email address and that's just not enough.

previously she lost twins. she has now lost three children all at a similar stage of pregnancy and has none living. i don't understand. i don't understand.

it's not right and it's not fair.

2011-02-09T21:33:00.005Z

i went to see the midwife today.

i made the appointment a couple of weeks ago, when i was freaking out. it was the first appointment she had.

i haven't freaked out since my scan last week. almost a week ago now. that's pretty impressive for me, really. but i went along to the appointment anyway. i had a few questions (i always have questions. i bet you can believe that, can't you?).

(incidentally, the cbt is going well. at my last appointment my therapist reckoned i made a bit of a breakthrough. i thought he was overstating his case a bit at the time, but i've been less worried this last week. it's possible that he was right. dammit. i hate when people are right. if you're interested don't forget to email me and ask for an invite to my private blog.)

---

last night, i thought to myself that maybe i would be brave enough to let her listen for the heartbeat. i wasn't sure. D wasn't going to be there, for a start. and although the scan was only a week ago... well, a week is a very long time. and although i'm 21 weeks now, i've still not been certain about whether i'm feeling movement or not. it's been about 7 weeks since i first felt something that could be movement, but i'm no more or less certain that that's really what i'm feeling than i was back then. i did find out at my scan last week that my placenta is anterior (attached at the front), which probably explains that and is good to know - but it's still all a bit nerve wracking.

so, anyway. i went in. i asked my questions. then i did it. i asked if she could listen for the baby's heartbeat. i hopped up on the bed - so glad that i was in a different room than last time; i don't know if i'd have been able to do it if we were in the same place.

and i did it. i let her listen.

it was hard to pick up; the sounds of the placenta, with it being at the front, were much louder than the sound of the heartbeat. (which makes me doubly glad that we've never tried with a doppler ourselves; i would have freaked if we were unable to pick it up, and if even my midwife found it tricky past 20 weeks i doubt we would have managed it ourselves.)

but i heard it. the beating of his heart.

it was amazing.

comparative mourning

2011-02-09T16:12:00.005Z

i read this article on the guardian website a while back. it talks about a family who lost a three week old daughter, and how hurt they were when the vicar removed fake flowers from her grave. it talks about a couple who lost their 25 year old daughter, and how when they visit their daughter's grave they routinely put fake flowers on other graves nearby that have been neglected.

the vicar says "The metaphor of flowers is the beauty that weathers and decays. That is why we always put real flowers in the churchyard where they are associated with funerals. Plastic ones don't decay, so the metaphor gets lost."

hmmm. i don't buy it. and those who have lost loved ones know all too well that nothing is forever. for some (including me, sometimes) flowers dying brings back the pain all too clearly. don't those who mourn deserve to do it in their own way, metaphor free?

anyway, hasn't he seen how fake flowers fade and crumble over time when left out to the elements? they may take longer about it, but they don't last forever.

but i like the quote from the sociologist at the University of Bath.

"There are competing expectations about grief. For some people it's about moving on. For others it's about an ongoing relationship," she says. "There is a view of stages of grief that ends with 'letting go'. Some people don't do that. They never will let go, and that is OK."

they will never let go, and that is OK.

doesn't that make a change from what the grieving are usually told? the implication that if you don't 'move on', whatever that means, that you are somehow faulty?

---

then today i read this article on the BBC. which, to be honest, is even more depressing.

apparently there is a cemetery in essex that a national newspaper has seen fit to call the 'poudland cemetery'. (for those not native to the UK, that's quite an insult.) other mourners have taken offence at the fake flowers and wind chimes and the council have said that any wind chimes or ornaments left in the trees by 1 march will be removed. people will only be able to have two wind chimes and two solar lights. i don't want to link the article, but it's here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1352498/Essex-Council-bans-ornaments-Cemeteries-Poundland-graves-go.html

i personally think the first two pictures are absolutely beautiful.

the BBC article talks about a 'class war' in mourning, and i think they're right. i think that the displays of teddy bears and wind chimes get dismissed as 'tacky' by the folk who are there to mourn parents and grandparents. by those who haven't lost children. children who should not have died.

but i don't think anyone gets the right to judge anyone else's grief. to call it tacky or to ask them to move it elsewhere.

and i will be honest. before i lost the baby i might have thought it was tacky too. but i see things differently now. i see the love and the pain and the loss that makes people want to bring some comfort to a baby's grave, or a child's grave, or even an adult's. and i ache for the grieving.

---

when we were in barcelona last summer we went to visit a cemetery, the Cementiri del Poblenou. it was completely different to anything i've ever seen in the UK. we spent a long time wandering round and looking at the graves.

all the flowers in that cemetery were fake. real ones would never survive in the spanish sun, not in summer at least. i'll never forget the sound they made as the breeze blew and they rustled. it wasn't quite like anything i'd ever heard before. the sound of spanish mourning, maybe.

i want to post some pictures i took. i hope no one finds this disturbing, that i took pictures of graves. i loved them and i wanted to remember them. i'm sorry to anyone who finds it distasteful.

these people were loved. i'm sure that by some standards these graves are tacky, too. but i think they're beautiful and amazing.

Outside my front door...

2011-02-08T21:44:00.002Z

Just the one has come through and flowered.

I would have thought I'd be upset about that, but it feels kind of right.

---

This poem was written on the front of the order of service when we went to the communal ceremony at the west road. It made me sob.

The world may never notice

If a snowdrop doesn’t bloom,
Or even pause to wonder

If the petals fall too soon.
But every life that ever forms,

Or ever comes to be,
Touches the world in some small way
For all eternity

2011-02-06T18:44:00.001Z

i have loads to say, but no space or time to get it out right now. but i wanted to link this post, by tash, because it's amazing, and gives me hope.

2011-02-03T22:10:00.003Z

first things first?

the baby's fine.

---

this post is rather bitty. my brain's jumping around. sorry in advance about that.

---

i was actually ok this morning. quite calm.

i wasn't very optimistic though. i cleaned up before i went. made sure the house was tidy (well, as tidy as it gets round here) and the washing was done. i even left my toothbrush and PJs and deodorant and moisturiser out, in case i needed to stay in hospital for any reason and D needed to come back and pick them up for me.

i was even ok in the waiting room. they were running late, so we had to wait about half an hour before we were called in. i was chatting to D about the White Stripes breaking up and stuff. but when they called us through and i got onto the bed the sense of dread returned, the sense that there was no hope. i started crying. D had to explain why.

but the baby was fine. all the checks they do, fine. spine and stomach and lips and feet and heart and everything else, all fine.

and? he's a little boy.

same as they told us three weeks ago. i don't necessarily trust being told once, but two different people... yeah. and anyway, it feels right. i was expecting a girl - i only have sisters - and i was a little shocked when they first said boy, but only for a few seconds. after that... it felt right.

---

it seems more real since finding out he's a boy. like there's more to lose.

---

i just talked to D. i'm shocked at how worried he is about my mental state. he says i'm not showing any signs at all that i'm happy to be pregnant. i hadn't realised how badly i seemed like i was doing, to him at least.

he needs me to enjoy this. even if things are going to end badly.

i don't know if i'm capable of doing that. but i need to try. for D's sake and for my little boy's sake, if not for my own.

---

yesterday some pain started. nasty abdominal pain, on the left side of my torso. i saw my GP tonight and she reckons it's just muscles and ligaments doing their stretching thing. it's... weird. it feels like it should be scary, but it's not.

but it's really painful, and it's something that constantly makes me wonder if everything really is ok.

---

basically, everything is ok.

people are expecting me to be thrilled. i'm relieved but... just relieved, and tired. i'm glad he's ok but haven't got the energy to be excited. not yet at least.

the movement has felt a bit more definite today. maybe if that trend continues over the next few days i'll feel a bit more excited?

i hope so.

---

i'm having a little boy. i never thought i'd really want a little boy, but i do. more than i can say.

2011-02-01T23:05:00.003Z

i said before that i didn't want to be in my second trimester, that it didn't feel like a safe place to be.

it's been getting worse. now i'm further than i even thought i'd got last time, now i'm in uncharted territories, it feels like i'm on one of those old maps, where cartographers wrote 'here be dragons' because they didn't know what was out there. and it just feels like i'm waiting for one of the dragons to pick me off.

---

i've just had a nosebleed. a great one where the blood somehow managed to drain into my throat. eww. anyway, nosebleeds are a pregnancy thing, right??

yes, i'll clutch at any passing straw right now.

2011-02-01T21:26:00.003Z

D is out tonight. With some friends from work. I was out earlier but cried off as early as I could and came home.

He just called. He is drunk and on his own in his friend's car while she and another girl are off getting burgers. He's waiting for them to come back so he can get home.

Hopefully he'll be home soon.

At the end of the call, he said 'love you, and the baby'.

and it broke my heart. because he is trusting me to look after the baby. to keep it alive and well and healthy. and i don't believe it. i don't believe i'm capable of that.

i want him to have a night off from everything. from my fears and craziness. i want him to be drunk and happy. yes, even on a work night.

i just need everything to be ok. i can't stand the thought that his heart might break on thursday. right now that thought is actually worse than the thought of my own heart breaking.

i could bear it happening to me. i don't know if i could bear it happening to him.

2011-01-31T21:58:00.004Z

doing a bit better this evening. still finding it hard to believe there is hope. but not entirely impossible.

it's just... my bump isn't growing. i'm not sure whether it's staying the same or shrinking. and yes, i over-analyse. constantly. i've been crazily hungry all the way through - and suddenly, i'm not. i'm normal-hungry. still not feeling anything that i'm certain is movement. it's now over 6 weeks, maybe even 7, that i've been feeling maybe-movement, and i'm no more or less certain than i was back in december. the last week or so, i've not been feeling round ligament pain either. then today pains that are more similar to period pains than anything.

any one of these things i could rationalise away, but the combination of all of them scares me, so badly.

anyway, thank you so much for all the support. it's amazing how many people read and who take the time to let me know they're thinking of me.

i kinda hoped that my own midwife would get back to me today but they must've wiped the message i left for her. maybe i'll try and speak to her tomorrow.

but i don't want to go to the hospital before thursday. i guess... i've waited this long, i want to hold out til the bitter end. thursday, for better or for worse, i will know what's going on in there.

it's just so hard.

i want my baby to be ok.

i just want to be able to believe.

2011-01-31T07:17:00.002Z

so, so scared. all my belief is draining away. i need my baby to be ok. i'm so sure that something is wrong.

i'm so terrified.

i got a text yesterday saying 'i'm absolutely sure that everything will be fine this time'. i think the more unrelentingly positive people are, and the less they acknowledge the reality of our fears, the less positive i can feel. the less hope i feel there is.

i need you to be ok, little one. i love you so much.

dopplers and scans: a retrospective

2011-01-30T18:32:00.007Z

my post about dopplers and scans... i was worried about it before i posted it. i was hoping that people wouldn't read it as a criticism of their choices or a judgement on their strength. it really, really wasn't meant that way. pregnancy after loss is horribly hard and no one gets to judge how anyone else handles it. i am really, really sorry to have sounded like i might be judging anyone else's coping skills.

---

can i tell you some of the less exemplary reasons that i haven't gone for a scan, or don't want to use a doppler, while freaking out?

- because i'm scared that D would roll his eyes and tell me to stop panicking over nothing. (i have no reason to think he would. but i'm paranoid.)

- because i don't want to drag D out of work to take me to the hospital. i don't want them to get sick of him being in and out all the time. i don't want them to start making it awkward for him if i really do need him at some point.

- doppler... i wouldn't be able to use it without D. what if i couldn't find a heartbeat? so in the middle of the night i'd have to wake him up. if he was at work i'd have to wait. and if i had one there looking at me and i couldn't sleep i would just focus on it, and want to use it. and i would stare and stare and get myself more and more wound up.

and the biggest one of all....

- because i'm scared.

because i'm scared of not being able to find a heartbeat, and deciding whether to go to the hospital. i'm scared of going to the hospital, and having to explain that i can't find a heartbeat, and having a scan, and seeing the baby on the screen, still, unmoving, no flicker of life, too small.

i know that if something is wrong, the use of a doppler wouldn't make any difference either way. but... it feels like it would hasten the grief and the pain into my life.

---

another way to explain it. you know how some people can try drugs and enjoy them but never do them again, but some people are called to repeat the experience again and again, and end up addicted?

i've never tried anything, not really. i know i'm one of those people who would end up needing it to get out of bed. and i think for me, doppler use would be the same thing.

(i suspect that even in a 'normal' (not post-loss) pregnancy, if i'd started using a doppler i would end up pretty much like that.)

---

i agree with sally that it does most definitely depend on the circumstances of your loss. nothing would or could have saved my baby. but if i'd known that earlier intervention could have saved it, i don't think my reasoning would hold true. if i'd had appointments in my pregnancy when the midwife had listened to the heartbeat and i had heard it too, the idea of a doppler would almost certainly be more reassuring.

i also think that the distance between pregnancies is relevant. it took me nearly a year to get pregnant again. i had some distance. the anxiety and depression had started to lessen. of course, when i found out i was pregnant, the anxiety skyrocketed again, but it started from a lower baseline. if there had been less of a gap, i might not have been able to see things quite so dispassionately.

like i said last time, i have no doubt that sometimes i'm just going to go to the hospital and get the damned scan. my next scan is at 20 weeks; after that is 28 weeks then 32. will i be able to hold out eight whole weeks without seeing that my baby is OK with my own eyes? doubtful. very doubtful.

but like i said last time, too, dopplers only have negative associations for me. i've only had one used on me once, and later that day, as a direct result of that use, i found out the baby was dead. yes i would've found out sooner or later, but the doppler's use hastened that moment. in my head, the events (use of a doppler; discovering baby's death) seem interconnected.

if that wasn't the case, maybe they would feel more reassuring.

---

so a doppler doesn't seem like an option. and going for a scan every time i'm scared and anxious doesn't seem like much more of one. so i feel that i might as well make that into a positive choice, something i'm choosing, rather than just letting it be something falling out of terror and anxiety.

does that make any sense?

i hope it does.

i hope no one felt that i was judging them for coping differently to me. i swear, that was never my intention.

2011-01-30T18:22:00.004Z

i wrote this on wednesday last week but never posted it. here you go. i should say i was really worried. i'm not feeling quite that bad today.

---

Recently it feels like every minute of every day is an act of faith. I have very little faith that things will turn out well. I inspect my bump daily and try not to panic that it's getting smaller. i inspect every sensation in my abdomen - is it a movement? is it just a vein twitching? It feels like my bump is getting smaller, not bigger. i turn sideways, inspect myself in the mirror. try to compare and contrast. where was it out to yesterday? is it smaller today? why are the movements not getting stronger? what will i do if the scan gives me bad news on thursday next?

i have my antenatal classes booked. part of me thinks we'll definitely be going. part of me worries that we'll be in too much of a state to remember to cancel when everything goes wrong and they will phone and tell us off for not turning up.

i consider our options if this pregnancy doesn't work out. will we try again? will D say no? i hope not, but i wouldn't blame him. This pregnancy is hard. it's hard on him to have to reassure me constantly when i know that he must be worried too. would we adopt? ask for screening to rule out a problem in one or both of us? but even if there was, even if it was treatable, there are still no guarantees it would work out. next time. and we would have lost even more time. it took nearly a year to get pregnant again. if the timescale was the same it could be august 2012 before i had a living baby to hold. i would be 36 by then. the odds of a second child would be slim. they're already slim; i'm not sure D would ever agree to go through this again. like i say, i wouldn't blame him.

and yet part of me is confident. part of me believes. all will be well. the baby is fine. how could it not be?

will i regret not getting a scan? last monday? this monday? was something really wrong? did we miss our opportunity to fix a problem?

eight days. this countdown is lasting forever.

---

four days to go now. it still seems a really, really long time.

dopplers, and scans

2011-01-28T22:44:00.003Z

thanks to carol, who has just commented. you've reminded me that i was going to write a post about why i don't want to get a doppler.

i would like to state for the record, though, that i know i'm an oddity around these parts, and that what's right for me would decidedly not be right for everyone. for some a doppler is the only way of keeping sane in pregnancy post loss, and for them i'm glad that they have that option. but for me.... well, read on.

---

sooo... back at the beginning of the end, i had a midwife appointment. she listened for the baby's heartbeat. couldn't find it.

it was the first time she had tried to find the heartbeat.

that, right there, is my only experience of anyone coming anywhere near me to listen for a baby's heartbeat. the only association i have with it is anxiety, with death following swiftly behind.

so far, i haven't let her try in this pregnancy.

even the mere idea of her trying to listen for my baby's heartbeat is incredibly stressful.

---

it's probably fair to state that this experience colours the rest of my opinion about whether doppler use is a good thing for me, or not.

---

i've been told that any time i'm freaking out that i can go down to the hospital and get a scan.

since then, i have freaked out more seriously and more regularly than i have done at any other time during my pregnancy. i was kind of hoping that the result would be the opposite, that knowing i had the option would mean i didn't have to use it.

so. when i freak out, i have two options:

a) call my husband, tell him to drop everything and meet me at the hospital. rush to hospital. ask for scan. get scan. find out the baby's fine. or not, obviously, but finding out the baby's fine is the most likely outcome at this stage.

b) breathe. tell someone i'm scared. cry. breathe some more. drink water, wash face. try and focus on something else. anything else. calm myself down. later on, feel the sensation-that-might-be-movement. realise that i was almost certainly freaking over nothing. be scared that i'm not freaking over nothing, and that if i'd gone to the hospital that they would have been able to do something and that i've cursed my baby. over a few hours and days realise that this is unlikely. wait for the next scan i'm due.

so. a) may sound better to most of you, but honestly? i'm not convinced.

one of the things i'm trying to do in CBT is stop worrying, and stop expecting disaster at every turn. from that point of view, when you look at my options:

a) implies that there is a really-real problem, that needs to involve medical professionals and an ultrasound scan. a) implies that my anxiety has a basis in reality - that just because i'm scared and anxious there might be something wrong with the baby, when in reality the two things aren't directly connected. yes i'm scared and anxious, and yes it's possible that there is something wrong with the baby - but those things aren't linked. there is no causality at play.

b) implies that my fears are understandable, that they are there because of a horribly traumatic experience - but that they are not intrinsically linked to the health of my baby. b) implies that i can choose how to react to my anxiety. that i can choose to give in to it and decide that only proof that the baby is alive right now can cure my fears, or that i can choose to put my faith in this baby and in myself, and just get on with my day.

and giving myself that choice, and choosing not to go to the hospital? that makes me feel stronger. just a little.

of course, the part in grey at the end of option b) isn't so good. but tiny steps, right?

---

when i freaked the other day i couldn't get hold of my midwife (she's on leave this week) so i ended up speaking to the duty doctor, and he said that if i couldn't settle without a scan, of course to go along and get one - but that if i could calm myself down on my own, that would be the most preferable course of action. and i think that helped too, knowing that there is a line i can draw, and that if i cross over then actually, it's ok to go to the hospital. so far, i've been on this side of the line, the side where i can choose to concentrate on something else, even while thinking 'it's pointless, why am i not on my way already, the baby is already dead'. it's not even that i override that line of thinking - it's an almost constant companion, these days - but usually if i wait long enough it quietens down so that i can ignore it and get on with my day.

and that kind of feels like a lesson for life. that when i'm panicking about something i can choose to give in, and make the fear feel real even if it's not, or i can choose to take enough time to calm myself down and then get the hell on with something else.

and that... feels like a better lesson to pass on to my child than the idea that panicking is real and must be taken seriously.

anxiety sucks, and is hard to take, and i hate it.

but i can beat that sucker.

it's going to take a long time and it's going to be hard work, and i don't doubt that sometimes i'm going to give into the fear and just go and get a damn ultrasound. but it feels good knowing that twice i've just got on with things, all on my own.

fourteeen months

2011-01-25T23:26:00.002Z

fourteen months ago today.

life keeps moving on.

my snowflake seems so long ago, and so far away.

and almost like something that happened to someone else.

in some ways i'm grateful for the anxiety. it's a physical reminder of my grief.

sh.it. i should really remember to tell my therapist about that.

---

i miss you, my little one. i haven't forgotten. even though some days it feels like i have.

i wish you were here too and i was trying to figure out how to prepare you for your sibling.

update

2011-01-24T20:14:00.003Z

i want a bath before bed so this is the (relatively) short version.

- i did my exam this morning. i actually ended up doing 2. i hadn't prepared for either. i got 90% on one (pass mark 47%; average mark only a little above that) and 98% (only one question wrong! - pass mark 67%) on the other. and i was stressed. go me. i didn't cry or anything. although i did cry in the car on the way. and then found out that i'd been following someone i knew a lot of the way. luckily she didn't seem to notice.

- i went back to work afterwards, although i called D beforehand, to see if he'd seen my note (i printed off this morning's blog post and left it for him to read with a message). he had, and he agreed with my opinion that going to the hospital would just reinforce in my subconscious that the only way to calm down when i'm freaking out is to go for a scan, that i have no choice over it or control over it. i think in the long run reinforcing this thought process would raise my anxiety levels, not lower them. and seeing as i can barely make 7 days without freaking out, i don't think that is an answer, not for me at least.

- i tried to call my midwife, just to get her opinion on that, but i couldn't get in touch with her :( in the end i called my doctors surgery and asked to speak to the duty doctor. i explained the situation to him (he's not someone i've seen) and he agreed that in the long run it would be self-defeating to run for a scan every time i panic over nothing (or, more accurately, over understandable fears but with no apparent trigger). he said that if i was finding it impossible to settle without a scan, that's different; but if i can give myself some time and calm myself down without running to the hospital, then that's better in the long run. for both myself and my baby.

- i want to deal with my issues before the baby is born. i don't want to teach my child to panic and to worry constantly. i want to be a better example than that.

- i'm terrified that the huge amount of stress i was putting on myself this morning (the first exam had relatively easy questions but you have to answer them *really* fast and i was panicking that i would run out of time... i didn't) has damaged the baby.

- i'm terrified that there really is something wrong and that in doing what i think is right for my mental health i'm losing time and that the baby either will die because of my lack of action, or is already dead. and then i will not only have to deal with babyloss again, but with actual guilt.

- i think i've felt movement today. but i've been thinking that since before christmas, and i'm still no more certain than i was then. if anything i'm less certain. shouldn't it be getting more definite? bigger? stronger?

- i don't want to get a doppler. i will blog about the two reasons why tomorrow, if i remember. i realise people are trying to help when they suggest it but it makes me frustrated. i know i'm the oddity in these parts for being like that, but hey ho.

---

ten days. nine days now, really. single digits. that's do-able, surely? without me losing the precarious grip i have on stability right now?

2011-01-24T07:27:00.004Z

last night, lying in bed, i had a sudden flash of what it would be like if you were gone. if you had slipped away without me even knowing. and it was shocking, and pain-filled, and dark. it was a bad, bad place.

i am so scared that it's true. i am so scared that you have left me.

i regularly ask your dad whether you are doing ok. and he answers me - sleeping, he answers. or happy in there. and i honestly believe him. even though there is no way that he could possibly know what you're up to. i believe his instincts. i have no faith in my own. last time around, i thought ~~you~~ the baby was fine. but it turned out it hadn't been fine for a long time.

(it turns out that even now there is some part of my brain that feels like i'm carrying the same baby. i thought i understood by now that that's not true, but it seems not.)

and once more, there is no real reason to think that anything could be wrong. but then there wasn't last time, either. and so the lack of worrying signs is not reassuring. not at all.

my 20 week scan is in 10 days. 10 days. can i get through that without cracking up? without crying every day? D's not in work today. this would be my best opportunity to drag him to the hospital. but, god. haven't i already done that enough? would he complain? would he understand? i'm spending so much time second guessing that i don't even factor in whether it would be mentally good for me to do so or not. would the reassurance help me? or would giving in to the terror just make me believe that there really is a reason to worry, other than the fear of loss, the fear of history repeating itself? i wish i knew.

i just want to know you're ok. even the smallest possibility that you're not hurts me badly.

----

i have a sodding exam to go to this morning. i'm doing an adv.anced appre.nticeship through work and i have a test for it. i'm going to go, and hope that i don't break down half way through.

2011-01-23T22:05:00.004Z

here's a question for you.

i've been reading a couple of books about birth. one is Stand and Deliver and one is Juju Sundin's Birth Skills. and they're very interesting, yadda yadda yadda, and make me realise that i really do need to prepare for birth starting earlier rather than later.

BUT.

the books don't mention stillbirth. not at all. not even in passing. not even contact details for SANDS. and... i don't know. i can even (kind of) understand pregnancy books not discussing it, at least not properly. because they are more general. but it seems extremely remiss, knowing that 17 babies die before or shortly after birth every day in the UK, to leave that fact out of a book about the process of giving birth. not even to give the contact details for SANDS.

what do you think?

2011-01-21T23:05:00.005Z

something has just occurred to me. i don't think i've ever mentioned except possibly in passing that i am currently undergoing CBT from a psychologist to deal with the Generalised Anxiety Disorder that i was slightly prone to even before babyloss and that has got a hell of a lot worse in the last 14 months.

it just suddenly occurred to me that this might explain me, my stress, my anxiety a lot better.

anyway. i have tonight started a blog to talk about my CBT and anxiety, but also to talk about my ongoing quest to try and tidy up my bloody house. however because of the nature of what i'm talking about i've set it up as an invite-only blog. comments will be on, but i am not open to anyone second guessing my therapist :) the tidying my house, however - anyone can kick my ar.se about that part!

if you want an invite to the blog please email me. you're all very welcome to read, but i don't want it to be open to the entire interweb :)

2011-01-17T22:43:00.002Z

feeling better tonight, thanks to a very understanding colleague in work who calmed me down when i turned up in tears. she wanted to send me home, but i would have just freaked out on my own at home. i was ok at work. at least i had distractions.

i think i've felt some movement tonight, but it's hard to know for sure.

i just wish i knew how this was going to end.

2011-01-17T08:19:00.004Z

cross posted with an online pregnancy-post-loss forum:

after being 100% happy and confident all weekend after the scan last week went so well, i'm now back down to earth and terrified that the baby has died :(

i think the only reason is because i've been confident and not-worried all weekend, so *obviously* that means this is the moment where something has gone wrong (at least in my twisted brain). i felt something last night that i'm pretty sure was movement but it's still pretty early - this is the furthest i've got in pregnancy and i never felt any movement last time, but even so i'm just thinking 'well that just means it died overnight instead of yesterday'. i never really feel anything in the morning anyway but i just want it to move so i know it's ok.

i just want to know it's ok in there. hang on my love. please hang on.

2011-01-15T23:46:00.005Z

i kind of hope that this post might bring some small degree of comfort to people in the very newness of grief who believe that their OH does not care about the loss of their child.

---

i genuinely believed when i wrote that last post that D did not care about the loss of our child - at least, not as deeply as i did. i had seen him mourn a child before. it did not look like this. ergo, he did not care so much. and on some levels i could understand that. the loss of a child you love who loves you must be terrible. i know that in some ways he still regrets what happened, although he had very little choice in the matter.

but now, over a year after our loss, i can see that it did affect my husband. that he was sad that we lost our baby. that it did change him. i was just in a place where i couldn't see that at the time.

even though it was not as hard for him as it was for me, it was still a horrible experience for him. but for him, the hardest part of a horrible experience was coping with seeing me descend to a dark, scary place, without any confidence that the woman he had fallen in love with would ever return to him. and to him, that overshadowed the loss of our child. and thinking about it now, it must have been terrible for him to see me go through all that and not to know how to help me. i can't imagine how i would have coped with seeing him go through the pain i've suffered in this last 14 months.

around new years eve, D started talking about cutting his hair. it was short when i got pregnant in 2009, but he started growing it at that time. i think he thought that it would be his last chance. that he'd have to cut it when the baby was born.

but then, what happened happened. we lost the baby and went into freefall. i fell deeper into depression. D didn't - couldn't - understand what i was going through. grief is always different. even if two people suffer the same bereavement it will be different for them both. but he kept going. what choice did he have? he went into work, every day. hardly any time off sick, as always. he comforted me when i cried. (the times when i let him know i cried, anyway.) he worried about me. i didn't really realise he worried about me until i was a lot better. he hid it pretty well.

and all that time, his hair got longer.

and i didn't see any connection. until around new years. over a year later. when he started talking about cutting it. and said that it was time to stop mourning.

---

i've been wearing a bracelet that noone would ever think was a sign of mourning. he's been growing his hair. and i didn't even realise. all this time, even if it hasn't been visible - even to me, the person who knows him best - he has been mourning too. he's even had a visible sign on his person, like i did. like me though, it's one that's not obvious.

this morning, he finally cut his hair. i was sad when he went out. his hair looked gorgeous. all soft and smooth. i took a couple of last photos, my hubby with long hair. i stroked it and kissed it and said goodbye. i know it must sound pathetic. but i was a bit scared. i even made him cut me off a lock. to remember. i'm crying as i write this. i realise that must sound ridiculous.

he came back. with short hair. shaved at the sides. spiky at the top. it actually looked awful at first but he dived straight into the shower and when he came out it looked good. completely different from before, but good.

and today we've tidied up, a bit. and cleared out, a bit. and decluttered, a bit. and we kind of have tentative plans to carry on with that tomorrow. and my hubby looks good.

it's not that it's 'time to stop mourning'. part of me will always be mourning. but we have a chance at a living child, and whatever happens, we still have each other. this last 14 months has been incredibly hard for us as a couple, and this next 14 months will be, too. but the last couple of months, i've been really realising quite how much i love this guy. realising that he has always been there, even when he hasn't understood my grief. realising that if we can come through this amount of shit and still love each other and be happy as a couple, then we can (probably) get through anything. i'm bloody lucky, in many ways. except for the babyloss thing.

---

the other day, while we were waiting for the scan, i was crying. i was so scared. and then i said to D, 'even if it's bad news, we'll get through, won't we? we'll be ok? in the end?'

and he said yes. and i believed him. i still believe him. and i stopped crying.

maybe that's all there is to it.

2011-01-15T23:34:00.003Z

i wrote this post a long time ago now. in may last year. not far off an entire year ago.

i wasn't sure whether i should post it or not; it was filled with pain and unhappiness, so i left it saved as a draft and never published it.

now i want to write something else about my husband, about how the loss affected him more than i knew, and it will make more sense if you read this first. so please do read, but know that the light i'm casting him in is not entirely fair, although i thought it was at the time. and please do read my next post, to understand more how our loss affected him.

---
---

my baby wasn't the first child my husband has lost.

over eleven years ago, a child was born.

it wasn't my husband's child. it was his girlfriend's, but not his. this came as quite a shock.

but. he did what seemed to be the right thing. he took the baby on. looked after him. was the main carer for the child (... the baby's mum was young, was more interested in going out). looked on the baby as his own.

then. arguments. threats. 'i'm taking the baby away.' she never did.

until he couldn't take any more. called her bluff. handed over the baby. told her not to come back.

he never saw that child again.

---

and he mourned.

for six months, he had cared for this child. loved him.

and then - nothing.

it took him a long time to be able to dismantle the cot.

i saw him during this time. he was broken. devastated.

---

when we found out our much-wanted baby had died, he was also devastated.

but.

it did not last so long.

---

i have seen him grieve for a child before. a child that was not even his. the child of a woman he did not love.

but -

a child who was real. more than just a concept. a child he had held every day. a child who loved him, who depended on him.

---

he grieved for our baby for a few days. and then, he moved on.

---

i don't think he has any idea how hard i find this.

---

i don't think he has any idea what this is like for me.

---

i have no idea whether i should post this or not.

---
---

please remember, i know differently now. please don't judge him on this. it wouldn't be fair.

2011-01-13T21:56:00.003Z

long story short: i had a scan today at 17+4. was scared to death before i went in but everything was fine. baby measuring spot on for where it should be. yawning, turning, wee-ing, swallowing. five more pictures. a heart with all its chambers and kidneys and a gall bladder.

and, a doctor who has agreed to give me scans at 28 and 32 weeks as well as my 20 week scan in three weeks' time, and who told me that any time i'm feeling anxious to phone up and that he will put on my records that i should be given a scan. i love my hospital.

i will do the longer version of this post at the weekend for those who are interested! although it probably won't be as long as it would have been if i hadn't posted this :)

2011-01-11T07:02:00.005Z

yesterday was D's birthday. this was my post from his birthday last year. we first kissed on his birthday, so it's always a special day for us.

we'd known each other somewhere around a year at that point, maybe a little longer. i'd been hugely attracted to him from the first moment i saw him, but i had a boyfriend i was happy with so i just put it down to pheromones or something. D had never given me any inkling that he might be interested. we were just friends, albeit i was in awe of him; he was a proper goth at the time and seemed far too cool even to be my friend.

that night, i ended up going out with a load of people for his birthday while my then-boyfriend went out with some other people. i got rather drunk in the pub and ended up saying to our best friend, J, 'don't let me get off with* D tonight'.

little did i know that D had cornered J separately and said to him 'don't let me get off with B tonight'.

* 'get off with' in the 90s = 'make out with', i guess.

so, yeah. at this point J threw up his hands and left us alone. we were all supposed to be going clubbing afterwards but only J and the two of us ended up in the queue, D telling me he was cold and putting his hands in my coat pockets to keep them warm. J disappeared the second we got into the club.

i held out as long as i could, but i wanted so badly to kiss him that it was always just a matter of time.

i told my boyfriend the next day what had happened. for the next four weeks or so i flitted from one to the other, not thinking there was any future with D, but unable to stay away. in the end even D told me i should go back to the boyfriend; he thought at the time the other guy was the better long term prospect.

as for me... well, i kinda wish i'd put together in my head that anytime you start kissing other guys, you really should stop to consider whether you want to stay in your primary relationship. as it turned out, i didn't, but i stayed with him out of a misguided sense of guilt until a year later, when - irony of ironies (or maybe just karma catching up with me?) - he cheated on me.

it took another couple of years after that, but in the end i bumped into D again, and had the same sense of being slammed into a wall from full speed of 'this is the guy you should be with'. it took me a while to get up the courage to tell him how i felt, but when i finally did he told me he felt the same :) we've been together ever since - 10.5 years. we got married nearly 7 years ago now.

last night D picked me up from work and told me that he needed to drop something off in town before we went home - not unusual. he drove us into town and parked the car. 'come with me?' he said.

that part was unusual. i wondered why, guessed maybe he had discovered a work connection with someone we know as we walked down the street. but then he stopped and grabbed my hand. 'it's cold,' he said, suddenly a little bashful. 'can i put my hands in your pockets?'

and then i realised we were right outside where the club used to be. as near as we could get to the place where we first kissed.

fourteen years. it's amazing to think of all the years that have passed since our first kiss. and you know what? for the sake of having him, even all the pain i have lived in the past 14 months is worth it. i love him that much.

i couldn't stop grinning for the rest of the night. this guy next to never buys me flowers. he wouldn't ever dance with me, anywhere, even to a song he loves. he'd never make me breakfast in bed. but he will drive me to the scene of our first kiss 14 years later, just to make me smile.

love you, D. thank you for helping me get through this last year's shit. you mean the world to me and i love you more than i can say.

6 january 2010; 6 january 2011

2011-01-06T20:04:00.009Z

one of the things we were told when we first went to the R.V.I. for medical management of my miscarriage was that if we wanted, we could attend a communal cremation ceremony at the Cre.m on the We.st Road. if we had wanted to have a funeral or a personal service, we would have had to pay for it ourselves, but the hospital arranges and pays for this ceremony once a month. the remains of each baby would be placed into a box and the boxes placed into a coffin. there would be a service at the Cre.m and then the coffin would be burned and the ashes scattered in the Gard.en of Remem.brance.

D didn't particularly want to go, but i did. we were told it would be held on 6th jan. and that it would not be particularly religious.

that part was a lie.

(god, back then i thought i'd be back at work by then. i wasn't back for over a month after that. i should have been off for longer.)

back then, it was snowing. it had been snowing since mid-december and it would be snowing for some time to come. and i had found this story, in which a mother turns up ten minutes late and misses the ceremony (but it turns out that her daughter was not cremated that day anyway... it's horrendous). so i was terrified we were going to miss it.

so that day i woke up at 6.30am. we were ready to leave the house just after 7.30. it was snowing heavily, and when we tried to move the car, it got stuck in the snow. we tried to dig ourselves out; it didn't work. D tried to push; that didn't work either. in the end the girl next door, who we'd never done more than exchange smiles with previously, helped push us out. then we helped push her car out. it was ridiculous.

in the end we arrived at 8.15 for a 9.00 ceremony. they hadn't even started clearing the car park. we parked and got out. walked around in the snow for a while, before looking for the waiting room and finding both it and a hot drink machine (thank goodness).

then it transpired that the hearse bringing the coffin had been delayed by the snow, so there would be quite some wait. oh, the irony. or something.

so we waited.

in the end, there were four other sets of people, i think. three other couples, and a family. complete with children and grandparents. i was quite upset by this at the time - why would someone bring children to a ceremony like that? how insensitive! - but now i realise that this will have been important to those children. to have a chance to say goodbye. i just wish someone had told us that it wasn't just for us, that we could have taken other people along if we wanted. we wouldn't have done so, but it wouldn't have floored me so much that other people did.

after the ceremony, we drove home. D was due back at work but he phoned and said he was taking the day as leave. we went for a walk in the snow. i cried on and off all day.

---

my family has never been the sort of family that 'does' visiting graves. i've never really understood it. but things change. i've been up to the cre.m twice since then. the Snowdrop Garden... it's peaceful, and it's sad. it's somewhere to go, and to think. it's somewhere safe.

---

in december, as january neared, i realised that i felt a bit weird about this date, 6th jan. i asked my line manager if i could take the day as leave. she agreed. i decided to go up to the Cre.m. just to sit there for a while.

i needed to sleep in. but i woke up as D was getting ready for work, and got up for a glass of water. i peeked outside, and there was a thin smattering of snow on the ground. it felt right.

i slept til nearly ten. i was so exhausted yesterday, it felt good. it was lunchtime before i got myself together to leave the house. i was tempted not to bother going - it's quite a trek to get there, and i'm still tired; i could have enjoyed a day relaxing in the house - but something made me go.

i'm glad i did.

---

when i got off the bus at the Cre.m, it was starting to snow.

as i walked to the Snowdrop Garden, the snow got heavier. it wasn't sticking, but it was coming down.

as i sat in the garden, it snowed.

tiny snowflakes landed on my bag. this was the best picture i could get.

for a long time i just sat. not really knowing what to do.

and then i started to talk. i told the baby, i miss you. that i wish you was safe with me. i wish i was wondering how you would deal with a little brother or sister with such a small gap. i will always love you, and miss you.

and i started to cry.

and as i stopped talking and crying, the snow started to slow.

and as i left the garden, it stopped.

---

i don't believe in signs. but ...

... this felt like one.

---

i miss you, baby. i miss you so much. i wish you were here. i wish i could have both you and your tiny sibling. it's not fair that i can't.

i love you loads. more than i can say.

2011-01-06T14:36:00.007Z

yesterday i went to Almonds and Raisins, the health food shop i go to most in Newcastle (for many reasons, although vegan chocolate cake slices are one of the most important... yum).

anyway. i asked the lady behind the counter about whether she knew anything about Bach flower remedies, as someone has mentioned that they might be useful for me and i was wondering if they are safe in pregnancy. the upshot of the conversation is that she didn't know, but she was very wary about taking anything in pregnancy that hasn't been prescribed (which is my opinion too). but as a result, she realised i was pregnant, and i ended up telling her what happened... i was going to say at the end of last year, but i can't say that now. at the end of 2009, i guess.

and. she. was. horrified.

'seventeen weeks? you didn't find out for five weeks?'

and you know how some people could make that sound like a criticism? like, 'how on earth could you not know something was wrong?'? (the thing i think myself.) well, she didn't. and it's a long time since i've seen that look of compassion on someone's face.

and i was ok while we finished talking, and when i left the shop. but as i walked towards the library, i realised it again. five weeks is a long time to think you're pregnant when you're actually not. and when you think you were well into the second trimester and the 'safe' (ha ha) period, to find out that as far as the NHS is concerned you had a first trimester miscarriage, not something that deserves investigation, or even extra scans the next time around? that's an extremely hard thing to deal with.

and! i didn't cry, but i was definitely tearful as i walked on.

but then... my brain continued with this train of thought, but then it made a leap. an amazing leap.

partly because last time is my only experience of being pregnant, of wanting and expecting a living child...

and partly because i'm pregnant at the nearly exactly same time of year and living through a very similar winter to last year's grief-filled season...

and partly because i'm terrified to believe, in case my belief somehow kills the baby....

i haven't been living this pregnancy.

i've been reliving my last pregnancy.

and we all know how that turned out, so i've just been waiting for bad news to turn up. and really, i've been expecting it in the next few days. i'm well aware that on saturday i'll be 16+6. the day when it all went to shit last time.

in the meantime, i haven't really realised that this pregnancy is different. even though so many things are different to last time. a different hospital. more scans. a baby that moves slowly, deliberately on the ultrasounds, rather than last time's that wouldn't keep still. a bump that is growing, albeit slowly, rather than last year's, which popped out and then didn't really change.

a baby that i already know has lived longer than the last one, even if it only turns out to be one week and three days longer. it's progress. maybe not a huge amount, but it's progress.

and with all that came a lightening. not a huge one, but a lightening all the same. my fears have not disappeared, but they've become a little - just a little - more manageable.

and i'm starting to realise that maybe... just maybe... there is hope.

maybe this baby will make it.

---

this also kinda links into this post inspired by a comment from Merry

---.

and i'm still really scared, and i'm still going to blog about it, because i need to let the fears out, because i don't want them staying inside, where the baby is.

but... maybe there is hope.

maybe this baby will make it.

maybe a week today the scan will see a baby that's moving, that's the right size, that's healthy, that has a perfect heartbeat.

not definitely. nothing's guaranteed. but it's a possibility.

and maybe that will keep me cracking up. for the next seven days or so, at least.

2011-01-04T01:13:00.003Z

back to work tomorrow and i can't sleep tonight. it doesn't help that we've been going to bed well after midnight and sleeping til late. it's been lovely, though. even though D had to work between christmas and new year it's felt that i've had a lot of time with him.

i don't want to go back to work. i want to stay at home with D and hide from the world. i wish i could.

---

the house is a state. i haven't done a single one of the things i planned to do while we were off. except chill for a bit, i guess. there are still piles of stuff piled everywhere. more than there were before.

i was reading frustrated fairy before and she mentioned flylady.net. it's a site/support thing/email list for those who need a bit of help/guidance to tidy up and declutter, i guess. i signed up and have been reading the beginning parts which start with cleaning your sink. so i cleaned my sink (unfortunately can't make it shiny as it's white plastic so i kinda feel like i already failed) and then i cleaned the kitchen surfaces and the bathroom. and got things ready for work in the morning. yay, right?

except that i cleaned the bath. and lifted the hoover. and did some bending and stretching. and then panicked because i'm scared that all that will somehow have hurt the baby.

except that there's a part of me that won't shut up, that's telling me i can't have hurt the baby, because it's dead already.

and i'm just sick of this. the constant uncertainty. the fear and the dread. the not-knowing. the fact that even if i get through my next scan in ten days or so and my 20-week scan at the beginning of feb there are no guarantees that this baby will be alive and well.

i make D say good morning and good night to the baby. i rub my belly. i make sure i don't lie on my back or my front. i obsess about whether my bump is growing or shrinking; panic when it seems smaller than it did the day before. i panicked this morning when i weighed myself and realised i've lost a pound (lb, not £). i do everything i'm supposed to do; don't do anything that's not considered safe.

but there's a voice in the back of my head that talks too loudly for me to ignore. a voice that tells me i can do what i like, but that it's all pointless. that the baby is dead and gone already, that i can't do anything to hurt it now.

---

i hate the way pregnancy after loss is tainted by fear.

---

it's not that i want to sleep through this pregnancy. i don't. i want to experience it. i think all i want is a glimpse. july 2011. did we make it? is the baby alive and safe? and if we did, and it is, then i can relax.

but unfortunately, it doesn't work like that.

---

if i get to sleep now i can scrape 4 hours sleep before work. not enough. not enough at all. but i guess it'll have to do.

around and around and around

2010-12-30T13:40:00.003Z

to see me talking to D last night, joking about what the baby was up to and whether it can hear yet, you would think that i'm faking the fear that i talk about on here.

but then, if you talked to me when i get upset and scared and convinced that the baby's dead, you'd think i had to be faking when i joke with D about the baby.

---

in reality, they're both true. even when i'm scared and convinced the baby is dead and there is no hope, i'd still be shocked to the very core to find out there was really something wrong. even when i'm joking and talking about the baby, i'm still hating myself inside for believing.

the joy and the terror coexist, nearly every single moment. it's exhausting.

---

i'm 15 weeks 4 days today. i'm not hating this part of pregnancy quite as much as i thought i would. since i had that scan a couple of weeks back time has actually been passing at a more normal rate, not superslowly as it was for the first trimester. but still. last time around, the baby was long dead by now, but i still wouldn't find out for another 9 days. part of me is expecting a similar outcome, part of me simply can't believe that the same thing would happen again.

and yes, i know how naive that is. i would expect more sense from myself, knowing all i know now.

---

last new year's eve was when the shock wore off and the pain and the grief really started. i'm a bit nervous about it. i'm going round to a friend's house with D; it'll just be us, J and her husband, but... what if the echoes of last year get too strong and i just sit there in tears?

i think i'll be ok, but it's hard to tell for sure.

---

i still need to write properly about christmas. soon.

2010-12-29T00:23:00.005Z

i thought i was doing really well. i coped fine with christmas and relatives and even one of my aunts patting my belly*, i didn't jump backwards and slap her hand away like i wanted to or anything. i was so proud of myself.

but then i told one of my sisters that i think i might be feeling movement, and then i started crying. i'm so scared. i thought i was feeling movement last time too, but the baby was long dead by that stage. so i really, really wasn't.

thinking i might be feeling movement seems dangerous.
telling people i think i might be feeling movement seems dangerous.
talking as though the baby might actually be born alive in june seems dangerous. even when i qualify it with 'hopefully' or 'if we're lucky'. and believe me, i always qualify it.
being in the second trimester seems dangerous.
believing that there is even a tiny flicker of hope for this baby seems dangerous.
thinking that this baby might currently be alive seems dangerous. and like the most ridiculous thing to think in the entire universe.

---

but doesn't this baby deserve some belief? and some hope?

---

*weirdly, my sister's husband touched my belly last night and even though a) i really don't want anyone ever touching my belly without an invitation to and b) he is the least likely person ever to do that i was ok with that, it didn't seem invasive or anything. possibly because he was doing it to make sure a pregnant friend of my sister's knew i was pregnant too. maybe that somehow made it ok?

---

and actually i was glad he did it, because although she hasn't lost a baby (that i know of) she somehow gets it and it was really nice talking to her about pregnancy and my fears. i almost felt normal. it was nice.

---

anyway.

i'm at my parents' house. D was here with me, but he left this morning as he has work tomorrow. i go back in the morning. i think maybe i'm freaking out because he's not here to keep the lid on my craziness.

i'm so exhausted by simultaneously trying to believe that there is hope and by trying to crush out any ounce of hope that flickers before it takes hold.

i want this baby so badly but i want the other one too.

there's no way i can have both and it's not fair.

i want to have them both.

it's just not fair.

---

in just a few days Last Year will no longer be last year.

it seems like my snowflake is drifting further and further away from me. that soon my little mite will be lost to me forever. even more so than it already is.

---

D strongly thinks this baby is a boy. i am secretly (well, not so secretly) hoping for a girl. i'm not quite sure what to do with a boy.

i don't have any strong feelings about what it actually is. as long as it's alive, i don't really care.

D is talking about what 'he' is doing in there. about what he will be like.

before i was pregnant, D was very vocal about the fact that he did not want to believe in any pregnancy until it was over and we had a healthy, living baby.

his belief and his optimism simultaneously help me to keep going and utterly terrify me.

2010-12-23T21:56:00.005Z

when i first discovered the world of the babylost and the many, many blogs out here, i was astounded. i had no idea that women were going through this. no idea what was really happening. it was such a comfort to me that other women were going through the depths of grief. that other women had done it and had managed to struggle out the other side, even though their wounds and scars were still very evident.

but the one thing i mostly couldn't do was read the blogs of women who were pregnant again. and women who had other children were a toss-up. some i could read; some i really, really couldn't. most - although definitely not all - of the blogs that i felt drawn to were those who had lost their first child (or, indeed, all of their children).

in time, i became more able to read the blogs of those with other children. some of them have become real friends. many of them have supported me even when i haven't been able to support them.

most of them have also given me hope.

---

the one type of blog i couldn't deal at all with was the kind of blog where someone was pregnant post-loss and nervous, but didn't really seem to talk about their grief any more.

which makes it really bloody annoying that that's exactly the kind of blog that this has now turned into.

i don't want to be healed. i don't want this pregnancy to wash away my grief and my love for my first child. i don't want it to make me all better. i don't want to forget.

i don't cry for that baby any more. i hate that. doesn't it deserve my tears?

---

i'm honestly amazed that so many people still read - especially those who are newly babylost or have been ttc for a while. but i appreciate you all and your support and your comments so, so much.

other people's children

2010-12-22T20:57:00.004Z

when we found out i was pregnant, there were already pregnant people around. my friend J's girlfriend was due in the september, eight months before me. H was due in the november. A (no longer a friend) was about six weeks ahead. my female friend J was going through IVF and ended up being about two months behind me. i was so excited that so many of us were going to have babies in the same academic year. i was fascinated by the fact that J's baby was born when i was only 6 weeks pregnant, but that in a few years our children would be in the same academic year. it seemed crazy and maybe even unfair that he got all that extra time to develop.

---

but then, of course, everything went wrong. we didn't get to have that baby. i got a whole bucketload of grief instead.

---

and then it took another ten cycles to get pregnant again.

i hadn't really realised until the other day that there will be nearly two full years between our child (if it even lives) and J's. and that thought felt like a punch in the guts. i know in the grand scheme of things it's not really all that bad, but... two years, man. two years. i've been wanting children for so long. their pregnancy was unplanned. the baby is delicious. my friend is doing so well in a situation that's hard for many reasons. but it just seems so unfair that he gets to be a full two years ahead of us in the whole parenting thing. that the chances are he will want to give us advice. it's not supposed to be that way.

it's supposed to be us blazing the trail for others. we've been together over a decade. they've been together maybe two, three years. this is all wrong.

---

we see J's baby all the time. we're probably the people he's closest to outside his family. he's always happy to see us.

i've written before about the jewellery i wear now. my snowflake pendant and my black plastic bangle.

since the baby was old enough to grab things, he's grabbed at my bangle. it's the same size and shape as his teething rings; he thought it was his. i used to take it off my wrist and give it to him to chew.

these days, he takes it off me and puts it on his own wrist. and smiles at me, proud.

when i hold him, he plays with my pendant.

---

these are just things that babies do. nothing amazing or out of the ordinary.

but it occurred to me the other day that this is the closest he will ever get to interacting with my first child. with the baby i was supposed to have. with the child who was supposed to be his friend.

and it makes me glad that he does those things. but so, so sad.

2010-12-19T21:13:00.001Z

i just marked 165 posts as read in google reader. i've never done that before. i hated doing it. but i need to give myself a break, and trying to catch up was making me even more stressed than i already am.

i phoned one of my sisters in tears before, entirely unable to order my mum's christmas present. too stressed by photo options and bad reviews of websites and deadlines for christmas ordering. i should get the order through by the deadline but christ, i was stressed.

---

i stayed off work sick monday. went back tuesday. tried to deal with the terror. by the time i got home wednesday i needed to know what was going on. i called the maternity assessment unit and lasted about ten seconds before i started crying. they told me to go in the next day (thursday) at 12. that i would go to the end of the list and might have to wait quite some time, but that they would scan me. just this once.

we decided that D would stay in work until i called to say we were getting close. hoped they would give me some idea of how long i'd be waiting. as it turned out when we reported to the MAU a lovely midwife asked 'so do you just need to know this baby is alive?' when i told her yes she said she'd just do me a quick scan before her shift finished at 12.30. i asked if she could wait for D to arrive and she said of course.

i thought the scan would just be a 'there's the baby, it's fine, now be on your way' kind of thing, but it lasted about 15 minutes. she looked at the baby in detail and gave us another 10 (TEN!!!!) pictures. and it was fine. heart still beating away, baby still moving around and lying in bizarre positions. moving much slower than the last baby, but i think i'm kind of glad about that; i still wonder if it was moving around so much and so fast because it was in pain. i know it shouldn't be possible at 12 weeks, but it doesn't stop me being scared that it was and that i didn't know :(

so today i'm 14 weeks. and today i believe we've got a shot at this. no guarantees, but a decent shot. i'm still kind of scared, and i still feel that the 20 week scan is just too bloody far away for comfort, but right now i believe in my tiny baby. i'm scared for it, but i believe.

and just for the record, i've heard so many horror stories about the R.V.I., but for me they've been nothing but amazing. i far prefer it to ra.ke lan.e.

2010-12-13T01:51:00.004Z

i've been disturbed recently. for ages actually. why? because i've felt mostly ok. i haven't wanted to cry. i only cried even on the anniversary of our loss because i made myself write a post talking about it.

i don't like that. i don't like feeling as though this pregnancy has somehow fixed me. made me forget my first child, as if i'm too busy focusing on this second one to remember what we lost.

---

but i guess it's ok. it turns out it's just denial talking.

i got in bed tonight. all was well. D and i looked again at the scan pics; that's not really something we've ever done before in either pregnancy, get the pics out to look at them. we were laughing and joking and just chatting. we put the light out. all was well.

except. it wasn't. i moved around, trying to get comfortable, and i remembered the sonographer telling me to move from side to side and to bang my bottom on the bed to get the baby to move. and i thought, if i banged my bottom on the bed now, it would make the baby move. maybe even start it spinning around.

and then i started to realise that i don't believe that for a second. that somehow in my head i think that i believe the baby is somewhere in the machinery of the hospital, because that's where we saw it. it's not inside me. that's just crazy. i'm not pregnant. the baby's somewhere else. (if there even is a baby. how can there really be a baby?) in limbo somewhere. waiting to see whether it gets to live or die. and to be honest i'm just waiting for it to die. i don't want it to, but it feels like it's just a matter of time. maybe my time's up already. maybe i'll have a few more weeks this time. or maybe this time i'll get to go full term and then fall (fail?) at the final hurdle.

i don't feel any connection to this baby. i think i did before, but it's been fading away. the first scan, i cried. i was so relieved. the second scan, i cried before we went in, for fear of what we would see and because D had got trapped downstairs because of a fire alarm (he got to the EPAC before they scanned me, but i was so terrified he wouldn't) but i didn't really cry at the scan. at the 12 week scan i was crying when they called us in but again i was ok when they did the scan.

i think i believed i was pregnant early on but that the pregnancy would fail early on, too. and i was glad when it didn't, but i guess now i'm in my second trimester i can't get my head around the idea that i could possibly end up with a baby in six months. now more than ever i'm just waiting for things to go wrong.

i don't want to be in my second trimester. it doesn't feel like a safe place to be.

---

i keep hearing about people who feel their babies moving really early, like 12 weeks. and i'm so utterly bitterly jealous i almost (almost, not quite) hate them. the last midwife appointment i had last time around i was 16+6 and i thought i was starting to feel movement. the midwife said it was possible. but obviously, i wasn't. the baby had been dead for weeks. i guess if i was feeling anything it was my body starting to think about moving things on.

i can't imagine ever feeling this baby move. i can't imagine ever being able to feel it kick me. or be able to let D feel it. it seems so utterly far away, unreachable. every day of this pregnancy seems to last forever. i already feel like i've been pregnant for a year. june next year sounds like a different century.

i can't imagine i'll ever get as far as worrying about giving birth.

i just wish i knew if everything was still ok in there.

---

hang on little babe. please hang on. i know i don't even really believe you exist, but i want to. i want to be wrong again. so, so badly. i thought my last baby was alive when it had died. now i want to be wrong again, this time to find out that really you're fine, even if i can't imagine that possibility in even one of all the potential universes.

i need so badly for you to be ok.

i love you. even though i barely believe in you, i love you. please know that above all else.

2010-12-10T19:59:00.002Z

i know that a lot of my readers here are babyloss people who have probably seen this quote already, but i still wanted to share it, because it's very powerful.

'If you know someone who has lost a child or lost anybody who's important to them, and you're afraid to mention them because you think you might make them sad by reminding them that they died, they didn't forget they died. You're not reminding them. What you're reminding them of is that you remember that they lived, and that's a great, great gift.'

Elizabeth Edwards. Lovely quote, but so, so sad that it's necessary.

2010-12-09T12:02:00.003Z

just got the results back from the Combined Test. my risk of Dow.n's Synd.rome is 1 in 50,000. bloody hell, i didn't think it was going to be that low.

of course, that doesn't stop me worrying about whether or not the baby's died in the last week. but at least it's one less thing to have to worry about.

(of course, the risk of losing the baby last time was 0.4% or less, so i don't know why this should be reassuring. even a low risk such as that doesn't mean the baby is definitely ok. please let it be, though. alive and healthy. please.)

2010-12-05T14:42:00.002Z

i still have to write about going to see interpol on 25th november (it was amazing).

but.

we were also due to go and see biffy clyro in manchester on friday. but the weather was too bad for us to travel down. bugger.

and you know i mentioned that two of the songs that helped me to cry were songs the singer wrote about the death of his mother?

they played them both. acoustic versions. i'm so gutted i missed it.

pregnancy mentioned

2010-12-03T23:06:00.004Z

ok, i know it might seem weird to title this 'pregnancy mentioned' when i've done little but talk about being pregnant for the last... jeebers, nearly 8 weeks now.... but, well, this post is talking about 'normal' pregnant stuff. so it might be harder to read. and i kind of wanted to warn you all before you started to read so that if it's too hard you can click away and read something else instead.

---

honestly, i don't mind if you do. i've also posted a scan pic right at the end of this post which i know might be too hard to see for some people.

---

so. this might be the most 'normal' pregnancy post i've ever written.

i'm only 11 weeks or so, but i'm already showing. i've been trying to disguise it in work with jackets and cardis and scarves, but i don't know how successful i've been; noone's actually asked me if i was pregnant, but i know that before i was even 8 weeks pregnant at least three people in work had guessed; and i'd been off work sick since before i found out i was pregnant until only about three days before that.

(so, yeah. that was a bit weird. two of the people i work with closely but one i don't see all that much of. i guess they all knew we were trying again, but still, it was a little creepy.)

i've been telling myself it's just my imagination that i've got a noticeable (if still small) bump, or just the fact that hell, i've put on a hell of weight in the last year (eating while depressed will either do that or make you unable to eat; i was unable to eat for a few weeks then started eating again, a LOT). but just before i lay down on my front, which i haven't done for a very long time now. and... it felt different. it felt... i guess it felt like there was something small and hard in the bottom of my abdomen. it was quite uncomfortable.

and. i've been starting to get less and less comfortable in my jeans; they fasten but they feel tight and they're getting pushed down and feel less secure. rather like they're going to fall down, in fact, which isn't a good feeling.

so today i bought a pair of maternity jeans. and a maternity top. (i bought a maternity top the day before my scan too. i was telling myself i'd take it back when i got bad news the next day.) i tried them on. i look pregnant in them. (far more pregnant than i actually am, too.)

last time i did not buy any maternity clothes. last time i didn't even look at any maternity clothes. last time, in fact, pregnancy did not really impact on my thinking or my self-image or even my plans for the medium-term future. i didn't really think about it. i knew we'd have to plan sooner or later, but before we got there it was suddenly all over.

---

i didn't expect the scan to be reassuring, even if everything turned out well. i expected that i would be reassured at most for the next couple of hours. instead, i find that i feel far more secure. this scan was a very different experience. we didn't have to go back into that room. we were at a different hospital with a better set-up. the sonographer was incredibly reassuring. neither of us saw anything to worry about.

in fact, i just went back to look at the pics from last year. i remember them as much, much clearer than they actually were; while we were there we could see the baby clearly, but on the pictures there's almost nothing to see.

it's amazing. this time we saw a clear baby.

i don't pretend to believe that this confidence will last forever, but even if it lasts just a few days, i'll be happy. i was terrified that, knowing that these equivalent days were the last few of my last baby's life, i would be a nervous wreck. i'm so relieved that i'm not.

thank you to you all for having hope for me when i couldn't hold it for myself.

and thank you merry for making me laugh, if you are reading this :)

after all that worrying.....

2010-12-02T17:35:00.003Z

the baby was fine.*

it was very still at first, and i was a little nervous - even though the sonographer could tell me straight away there was a heartbeat, and let us listen to it too.

but to get the nuchal measurement the sonographer needed the baby to move, so she got me to roll around and to bang my bottom on the bed. after that, the baby moved a lot. the thing that amazed me most was the way it span around and around. it's amazing that a tiny little creature inside me can be moving around so much but that i won't be able to feel it for weeks.

by the date i ovulated, i should have been 10+6 today. at the last scan though, the baby was measuring four days ahead of that, so i was hoping that that growth would have kept up, making me 11+3. but i was afraid that it would measure 11+4, because that's what i was when we had our 12 week scan last time around.

so of course, this baby measured 11+4 too.

but i think i'm kind of ok with that. this scan was very different. we got to hear the heartbeat, and it was definitely fast enough (not sure what the actual rate was). the nuchal measurement was good, and... there were no niggling worries for either of us from what we saw. we did mention to the sonographer how slow the heartbeat had seemed to us both last time, and she said 'yes, that doesn't sound good'. i still find it so hard to believe that noone picked up on it when we (who don't know anything about this stuff) were both concerned. we asked the sonographer so many times and in so many different ways if things really did look good. luckily she'd read my notes so she understood, and was very reassuring. and told us many different ways that yes, everything looks the way it should.

---

it's hard to know that this time last pregnancy our baby only had four days still to live. but everything feels very different this time round. i'm starting to believe that (whisper it) there might - just might - be a good chance that at the end of june, we'll be taking home a living baby.

oh, and we both preferred this hospital to the other one. so that's good too.

---

the only real problem was the consultant appointment. my midwife had referred me because she wanted me to get another scan around 15-16 weeks to stop me from going insane. but according the the all-important protocol, there is no reason for this to happen, so i ain't gonna get it. right now, i'm ok about that, but ask me again in another couple of weeks and i might well be going mental. we'll see, i guess.

ah well. i love my midwife for trying.

---

*incidentally, entirely depriving me of any opportunity to say 'i told you so', so if you could all be so kind as to not say that? i would really, really appreciate it ;) thankyouverymuch!)

2010-12-02T07:20:00.003Z

6 hours 40 minutes until my scan.

not freaking out, but my stomach feels hollow.

i know i need to eat breakfast or i'll be ill later, but i can't face it.

i only realised this morning that if i get bad news today i'll have two loss dates only one week apart.

i feel like typing that was tempting fate.

but i wish i'd realised it earlier and asked to change my scan date when i thought about it earlier.

---

i'm terrified.

---

i might not be able to update until later this evening but i will do as soon as i can.

thank you all for understanding.

2010-11-30T21:48:00.002Z

the lovely Angela Rodman has an amazing giveaway on her blog. spread the word!

---

i went to see my doctor today. we've decided that i'm going to start weaning off the antidepressants. i'm quite optimistic about it, but at the end of the day if i start to struggle i'll just go back onto them and try again later.

---

i am actually a little more positive today. kind of. in a wonky kind of way.

i can't imagine this baby is alive. but i also can't imagine it's dead. i just can't imagine there is a baby. the idea that there really might be one is just ridiculous. like i say, my brain cannot grasp what is supposed to be happening.

last time, i didn't really believe there was a baby until we had the scan. which, unfortunately, fell only four days before it died. unfortunately, i then spent over four weeks with a dead baby inside me, finally getting excited about what was going to happen, utterly unaware that it was already over.

i suppose that if i acknowledge this pregnancy - the bump that has to be more fat than baby, the tiredness, the hope that i'm too terrified to let in - then i acknowledge the fact that it's already too late. that if i lose this baby too, i am sunk.

---

i'm scared that the minute i believe in this baby will be the minute it dies. it's weird; some people are terrified that buying baby clothes or nursery furniture will somehow kill their baby. i'm actually ok with all that; i've bought far more baby things this time than i did last. for me, it's love and anticipation that i'm scared will prove fatal.

after all, it was when i was finally filled with love and anticipation last time that the baby died.

---

i realise that some readers might find it hard to hear how negative i feel about the chances of this pregnancy sticking.

it's similar to anticipatory grief, i think. last time, i was so utterly unprepared for the possibility of things going wrong (i was past 12 weeks!!! NO ONE has a miscarriage after 12 weeks!!!! well, except for all the people that do....) that it utterly broke me when it happened. as a result, my psyche is trying to prepare me for the possibility of the same thing happening again by telling me that it's already happened. i mean, that's all very well. it sounds really sensible.

apart from the whole fact that it doesn't actually work at all. but who cares about that part?

if that doesn't protect me, i have nothing to stop me from falling into the ravine.

---

less than 40 hours until my scan.

update

2010-11-29T20:18:00.004Z

we're knee deep in snow round here. unheard of at this time of year.

---

i've been getting random stabbing pains at the edge of my left b00b. rather disconcerting.

---

i scared the bejesus out of myself this morning. i helped D push our car back onto the pavement this morning after it got stuck in the snow half into the road. and then remembered i'm ten weeks pregnant. i know it shouldn't make any difference, it shouldn't be possible to hurt the baby like that, but i'm still terrified i did.

---

our 12 week scan is on thursday. it falls when i should be 10+6. but last time we had a scan i was 8+4 and the baby measured 9+1. so if it measures less than 11+3 i will be terrified that everything is going wrong again.

---

of course, that's really only my secondary fear. right now i can't imagine that the scan on thursday will show that the baby is still alive. right now i am convinced it is already dead. and that because i am such a terrible mother, i should have realised this by now.

---

it's not even that i'm anxious about it. i'm calm. i'm just waiting for my world to collapse again.

---

last time our 12 week scan fell at 11+4. the baby died four days later. i realise the odds of the same thing happening again are minimal. but that just doesn't help. i can't imagine a good outcome to this pregnancy. i can't imagine myself with a bump... even though one is already appearing. i can't imagine myself with a baby. my brain just won't move in that way.

---

i'm kind of aware that my experience is colouring my expectation, but that doesn't reassure me either.

---

i don't want to lose this baby.

---

but i'm scared it's already too late.

a year of grief in review

2010-11-25T10:27:00.004Z

it's been a year.

it's been a year.

excuse me if i'm repeating myself. but today marks a year since we found out our baby had died, and i honestly find that hard to understand.

it's been 365 days. 52 weeks. 12 months. four seasons.

how is that possible?

---

i don't even know why today's date is the one that means something. we found out what had happened a year ago today, but that's all. the baby had been dead for weeks by that point; it measured 12 weeks 1 day, which would mean it died on 23 october, but i know things aren't that precise. i went into hospital on 29th november and actually had the miscarriage that day; i say 'had the miscarriage' because that was exactly what it felt like. it felt like the passage of waste products from my body, and that memory will always upset me. i'll write about it one day, but i keep putting it off.

the point is that that date doesn't really mean anything to me either.

---

the memory of last winter seems unreal now. it doesn't seem like something that happened to me. looking back, it's clearer what i was going through; but i don't seem connected to it. it seems like something that happened to someone else.

in the immediate aftermath, i told work that i would be off for two weeks, because there was a girl in HR who was due to go off on maternity leave and i couldn't deal with seeing her. i genuinely thought that two or three weeks would be all i'd need. that i'd go back to work a week or so before christmas when everything was slowing down for the holidays, that it would be ok by then.

looking back, it's clear to see that in the event i spent december running round in shock. going into town nearly every day, sitting in starbucks, trying to avoid the reality of what had happened. christmas we pretended everything we ok - i think we actually put on quite a good show. we even convinced ourselves that we were ok.

at the beginning of january, though, we went to a cremation ceremony for babies who had been miscarried in hospital. just us and maybe four other couples. we'd been led to believe it wasn't overly religious, but it turned out it was; this wasn't comfortable for either of us, but still i sat and sobbed my way through the entire thing.

it was at this point i began to realise that something huge had happened, and i couldn't run away from it. that the way out was through.

january was very dark as i began to accept the depth of my grief. the ground was covered with a blanket of snow for most of the month. it helped. the weather was so out of the ordinary - we often get snow in the winter, but it never stays for more than a few days usually - that it felt like the weather knew that we were in mourning.

in february i went back to work. at the time it felt like i'd been off for too long, if anything. my doctor disagreed, but reluctantly signed me off as fit to go back. i was ok the first couple of days, but then it really started to hit me. that time had passed. that everything was real. it hit me in the gut the day that i picked up my date stamp and it read '25 November 2009'. don't get me wrong; i was aware that time had been passing... but at the same time, i really hadn't.

march was hard, although tiny little glimmers of hope started to show. not all the time, just every so often. but april was mixed. it began well. i almost started to feel like me again. but towards the end of the month, i started spiralling back downhill. by the end of the month i was off sick again, barely able to cope. may - especially the beginning of may, around my due date - was a hard, hard month. i finally went onto antidepressants. they helped.

june and july were ok. i had times when i was doing well and times when i really, really wasn't. at the end of july we went on holiday to Barcelona. it was just what we needed. we came home relaxed and happier.

unfortunately, then i immediately went on my sister's hen do and was unexpectedly confronted by noticeably pregnant women, causing a downwards spiral once more. august and september i forced myself to carry on, sometimes believing that i was really doing ok, but in reality not being ok at all. in the end, work referred me to occupational health, who broke through my defences and had me in floods of tears in less than five minutes. i was then signed off work for another six weeks, during which time i found out i'm pregnant again.

and now we're here.

---

you know what? being pregnant again is hard. i can't emphasize that enough.

it's not a magical cure-all. it doesn't fix my pain.

don't get me wrong; i'm glad that i am. i'm glad that i have a glimmer of hope in my life. it's much better than the alternative. but you know what else being pregnant means? it means the possibility of pain. it means the possibility of losing a second child. it means trying to fight off anticipatory grief.

(D's already concerned that if everything goes well, i won't be mentally prepared. that if we actually take home a living baby, i won't know how to deal. at first i thought that he meant i wasn't prepared for the reality of being a mother, of caring for a baby 24 hours a day. but recently i've begun to understand that that's not what he means. that he's scared i'll be prepared for pain but not for happiness. that i'll end up with post-natal depression because of our history. and honestly, i think he might have a point. luckily, though, in the last week or so i've had my first appointment with psychological services after being on the waiting list since march. and it turns out it's not counselling; it's therapy. it's regular appointments with a psychologist to give me tools to be able to cope with all this.

thank goodness.)

---

i am regularly filled with fear. the terror of things going wrong again isn't constant, but it's regular. two scans haven't really made me any more confident that we will have a good outcome. sure, it's good to know that there's really a baby in there, and that it had a heartbeat when we saw it. but we had that last year, and, well. we all know how that ended.

this pregnancy will either end well or it will end badly. the odds might be in my favour, but it'll either happen or it won't. at the end of the day, i see our chances as 50-50. no better, no worse. either we get to take home a living baby or we won't.

i hope (more than i can say) that this pregnancy will end well, with a living, healthy baby. but i find it very, very hard to believe. because i'm all too aware of just how often things go wrong. i'm aware that when the books say that the risk of miscarriage drops after the first trimester, that they mean exactly that and no more. the risk drops, but it doesn't go away entirely. that even if i get through the first trimester (and that's still not a given, even though i'm getting close now - ten weeks tomorrow), that doesn't mean that i won't miscarry in the second, or that i'm not going to find out that the baby has a condition incompatible with life.

it doesn't mean that i am somehow safe from the risk of having a stillbirth.

my dad said the other week that he was sure everything would be ok. and he meant it well; he just can't stand to believe that this could happen again. but it scares me when people say such things. i don't want to tempt fate. it feels like people are pushing my head above the parapet.

---

in the end, today isn't about possibilities. today is about remembering what was. a year ago right now, we were about to leave the doctor's surgery to go to the hospital. the midwife had said that she thought everything was ok, but that she would send us down there. just to make sure. because she knew i would worry otherwise. and at the time, she truly believed it. the sun was shining. we knew everything was ok. we were just going to get an extra peek at the baby. all was well.

i think that part of me will always be stuck there, waiting at the hospital. believing in that baby. just a little bored. happy to have a chance to see our acrobatic little baby once more.

i want a part of me to stay there. to be happy for that baby. to love it and cherish it. my tiny little snowflake.

---

i love you, my little one. my first child. i wish i'd got to meet you. i wish i hadn't been too terrified to look when you passed from me. i wish you could have known how much i love you. how painful it was for your dad and i that you had to leave us.

i wish i could have known which of us you'd look like. i wish i could have known whether in time you would have liked the music we like or whether it would have made you cringe with embarrassment. whether you would have preferred indian food, or chinese, or pizza. i will always be sad that i don't know who you would have been. even whether you were a boy or a girl. i will never know, and that makes me so sad.

even if all turns out well with this new spark of life - even if we were to have another five or ten or twenty babies - please know that we'll never forget you. i will remember. i hope to honour your tiny life by always remembering how lucky i am to have had a chance to see you leaping and dancing inside me.

---

and thank you - more than i can ever say - for sending me the snow today.

christmas

2010-11-24T21:13:00.005Z

i kind of think this post needs to come with a health warning. i know that quite a few of my readers are facing their first christmas after losing their babies, and this post might be quite incomprehensible to you right now. to be honest, it's a little incomprehensible to me too, but it is what it is. and i hope that at least some of the older-timers understand. at least a little.

---

you know what? i am ridiculously excited about christmas this year.

and that's not usual.

usually, i'm not ready for christmas to even think about starting until december. preferably about the 10th. i get annoyed at the christmas decorations turning up in early november. i scowl when the fenwicks window first appears.

but this year it's been different. i mean, i started out as normal - annoyed by early christmas decorations. but that only lasted a few days. then i started liking the christmas lights. and looking at christmas decorations and - gasp - being excited.

i found myself in HMV today deliberating on buying a cd of christmas music, ffs! the only reason i came home without one is that none of them was quite what i was after. i am SO not the kind of person who buys christmas cds.

we bought our christmas tree last night. and a load of new decorations. we haven't put it up yet, but it'll be going up soon. and i can't wait. i want to wrap all my presents and put them under the tree. i want to write my christmas cards. it's been snowing, and it's due to snow loads more tomorrow, and that makes me happier than i can ever say.

basically, i want it to be christmas.

and i suspect there are two reasons for this. i'll share the slightly more horrible one first, so i can end this post on a nice note.

i think the first reason is that i want to make sure that i get *some* amount of christmas spirit this year. if something goes wrong, i want to have enjoyed myself beforehand.

because last year was a bust. we went through the motions, but neither of us enjoyed it.

but.

last year was a bust. last year we didn't enjoy christmas at all. this year i want to have fun. i want to listen to daft festive music and get excited about mince pies and wrapping presents. i want to see if i can make non-alcoholic mulled wine and non-alcoholic bucks fizz. i want to put my christmas tree up while it's still november and leave it up right the way through til twelfth night. i want to light bunches of candles and turn off the lights and snuggle with D on the sofa. i want to go to carols by candlelight and listen to the choir and sing the carols.

i want to enjoy my christmas. and dammit, if it's at all possible to do so, i'm gonna.

2010-11-24T08:33:00.003Z

there was a thin scattering of snow on the ground outside when i woke up this morning.

it's due to keep snowing today. and tomorrow.

i don't believe in signs, but i am so thankful for this.

2010-11-23T08:36:00.003Z

a few people have stopped in to make sure i'm ok so i just wanted to quickly update* to let you know that i'm ok. feeling much more sick today and yesterday which i'm hoping is a good sign. feeling quite positive in myself. feeling quite quiet though; i haven't commented on anyone's blog in a while now. i'm reading but keeping posts unread in google reader because i want to reply, but can't find any words.

very aware that this thursday marks a year since we found out the baby had died, and rather wary, because i don't feel upset, and that feels wrong.

i'll talk more about this later on tonight. in the meantime, thank you for thinking about me.

*i loves me split infinitives....

2010-11-18T18:38:00.002Z

thanks all for the comments on my last post. i feel more at peace with the situation now.

---

still spotting a little. i've been having some abdominal pains but they seem to have eased off. hoping that's a good sign and not a bad one.

got a midwife appointment tomorrow. hoping she can reassure me a bit.

2010-11-18T08:08:00.006Z

wow. someone i was friends with on lj (livejournal) is pregnant. as you will know i find it really hard to hear about other people's pregnancies... i tried to be ok with it but then she posted two vids of her ultrasound and it was so painful to see.

i sent her a message telling her my history and asking her if she would mind filtering me out of her pregnancy-related posts. i worded it really careful and said that i felt like a horrible person asking her to do this. but she seemed like a really nice person. i thought she would understand. lj's not like fb, you can't just hide a single person (at least not as far as i know).

i got a message back from her this morning telling me that i should feel like a horrible person and that it was disturbing that i would project my problems with pregnancy onto her. she accused me of trying to rob her of her happiness.

oh yeah, and she's deleted me.

full disclosure: she stated in one of her posts that she's terrified of miscarriage, but she's had quite a few healthy ultrasounds and is now over 10 weeks - so her risk is very low. and again we all know that means nothing, but... i still fully expect everything to be ok for her.

she asked me not to reply so i'm respecting that.

part of me wants to tell her i'm sorry for upsetting her - because i really, really am - but part of me just can't understand why a message i thought was calm and considered was read as disturbing and - reading between the lines - cruel.

tell me truly. i can take it. am i a horrible person? i thought not, but maybe i'm wrong :(

2010-11-16T16:36:00.003Z

i arrived at the hospital early. i was waiting outside the EPAC for D when the fire alarm went off and all the doors shut. and not a member of staff in sight.

in the end some staff turned up. they put me in the day room off one of the wards. i tried to call D to let him know but i couldn't get through. i was terrified they were going to make me go in and start before he turned up. i ended up in tears in the day room.

he got through to me in the end though; said they wouldn't let him upstairs yet but he'd be there as soon as he could.

it felt like forever but in the end the alarm was switched off. a nurse told us we could go back to the EPAC. when i got out D was just arriving. such a relief.

---

i'm not quite sure how to say this. i was so adamant that everything was wrong.

the nurse started the scan, then looked up at us and said 'the baby's fine!' in a kind of 'what on earth are you here for?' kind of tone of voice.

last week it measured 7+1, apparently.

this week it measured about 9 weeks.

so it's doing pretty well in there.

---

thank you so much for being there for me, everyone. it means the world.

---

my 12 week scan is scheduled for 2 december. as far as i'm concerned i should be 10 weeks 6 days then. if today's 9 weeks was correct though i'll be about 11+3.

so just over two weeks to get through til we can have another peek.

i'll try not to go too crackers between now and then.

2010-11-14T23:10:00.003Z

no real change. a couple of times there's been more blood. still brown.
i'm going to work tomorrow.
yesterday i didn't think there was any hope. today i think there's maybe 1% of a chance?

but then, last time i didn't know things had gone wrong 4.5 weeks before i found out, so what the hell do i know.

2010-11-13T16:18:00.003Z

no change here. no more blood. still no pregnancy symptoms. i know they can come and go but until wednesday they were pretty much constant. i haven't had any for three days now.

i cleaned the kitchen this morning. D had made gravy yesterday. normally it makes me feel sick dealing with the jug even when i'm not pregnant. this morning, not a flicker. i actually feel less sick than my usual state of being.

still over two full days to go through before i can find out what the hell is going on.

we've given up hope. i mean, i'm not drinking alcohol or eating runny eggs or anything yet (and i crave nothing more than the oblivion of being really drunk right now) but that's only because i don't want to do anything i'd regret in the unlikely chance that everything is actually ok.

---

we started trying to conceive in april 09. (i know that's nothing compared to some of you.)

if you'd told me then that 18 months later i still wouldn't have a living baby in my arms i would never have believed you.

the dream seems extremely far away, and entirely pointless.

2010-11-12T22:23:00.002Z

last time around the baby died four days after a scan.

this is all happening three days after a scan.

---

last time i found out the day after i'd been out for lunch with a group from work.

today i went out for lunch with a group from work.

---

last time it was november.

now it's november.

---

this doesn't feel good.

i'm going to bed.

---

i'm terrified i'm going to wake up bleeding in the middle of the night.

2010-11-12T19:20:00.006Z

i went to the loo before. there was blood.

brown blood. old. not much. but blood.

blood is not good.

---

i called D. work and mobile. couldn't get through. i called my midwife. her phone was switched off.

i got someone to give me a lift home from work. i didn't know what to do. the only number that looked potentially useful in my maternity notes was the number for the maternity assessment unit. i called. they told me that as i hadn't had a dating scan yet that they couldn't do anything for me and that i would have to go to A&E.

A&E is at the General. the Early Pregn.ancy Asses.sment Cl.inic (EP.AC) is at the RVI. i already didn't like this.

i got hold of D. told him to see me at the General. phoned a taxi.

---

we basically waited at the General for over an hour and a half for someone to a) take my blood pressure and b) make me an appointment at the EP.AC. what a fuc.king waste of time. they showed no interest in the fact that although i don't have pain in my abdomen i do feel like i feel when i get my period, or the even more tellling fact that my pregnancy symptoms are easing up - the nurse actually said 'well that's good!'. NO IT'S FUC.KING NOT.

no. it's fuc.king not.

they didn't even check my cervix. i'd think that was something important.

and this is the best bit. the appointment at the EP.AC isn't until tuesday.

i don't feel sick any more, not really. i'm not tired. i've had some blood. i feel like i do when i'm getting my period.

i can't help thinking that it's all over but the bleeding.

---

i really believed in this pregnancy.

---

please don't say there's still hope. i know that technically there is. but... just please. don't say it.

----

edited to add - D pointed out ages ago that the blood was probably from the scan on tuesday. it's not the blood that's freaking me out. it's the sensations that are similar to when i have a period. it's the fact that the nausea is gone and the tiredness is all but gone. i know i started with it, but that's really not the main part of this.

2010-11-11T16:35:00.003Z

yesterday i went back to work after being off sick for over six weeks.

it was really scary.

when i got home i didn't even take my coat off before flaking on the sofa. i dozed for over an hour then watched the Gilmore Girls. i felt so sick and dizzy.

but reassured. sick and tired are good signs, right?

---

this morning it took me an hour to get out of bed. while i was working up the energy, my brain decided to replay being in hospital, miscarrying my baby. it was really quite horrible.

---

it took me a while to get myself to have my breakfast. but i managed in the end. i ate more today than yesterday, in the hope it helped stave off the tiredness and nausea for longer.

---

i felt sick at lunchtime. but better after i'd eaten some crisps. (chips for my american readers.)

i wasn't exhausted this afternoon. tired but not exhausted. i didn't feel really sick.

the afternoons seem to be when i feel worst.

between that and the reruns going through my head this morning, and some random pains to each side of my abdomen, i'm busy being scared it's all over today.

2010-11-09T13:34:00.002Z

i felt like i was walking to my own execution as i made my way to the early pregnancy assessment unit.

i panicked as i walked into the room. D was late and i didn't want them to do the scan before he got there. they started the initial assessment first though and he arrived only just after.

i was so terrified as she started the scan. she seemed to take forever before she told us what was happening. i was so scared the news was going to be bad.

but then...

we have a heartbeat.

(we have a heartbeat!!!!!! can you believe it?!?)

the baby's measuring 'seven plus' weeks - according to when i ovulated i should be 7+4, so that sounds good enough to me.

there's definitely only one. thank goodness.

not ectopic. not molar.

a healthy, viable pregnancy.

and things are looking good. and our chances of miscarriage are 'very low'.

---

i didn't cry until she started to show us the baby's heartbeat. i could barely see it for crying. D said it looked stronger and faster than the heartbeat we saw at the 12 week scan last time. i'm glad he was there, on so many levels.

they wouldn't give us a print out (apparently they don't at these early appointments) but they let D take a picture on his mobile.

---

we're still not telling everyone, but i think we're going to start telling a few more people.

---

i can't tell you how relieved i am. we both are.

---

even if this little one doesn't stick around, at least we got to see it.

wish me luck

2010-11-08T16:05:00.004Z

i called the hospital this morning. they had one scan appointment left for tomorrow. 11am.

please keep everything crossed for me.

---

when i got home today i found my appointment for my dating scan. at the beginning of december strange coincidence.

i just hope i get that far.

2010-11-04T14:27:00.004Z

i went to see my GP this morning.

when i arrived at the bus stop, a single crow was hopping round a few feet away.

my heart sank.

---

i got the doctor to show me the actual numbers from the HCG blood tests.

the first number, at 5+3, was 17,116. the second, 48 hours later at 5+5, was 24,010.

that's not doubled.

---

however, they are pretty high. and apparently when they are over 6,000 mIU/ml they take four or more days to double. but other pages say that levels should keep doubling up to about 7-8 weeks, and i'm not there yet.

and now i've just looked at the table at the bottom of this page. going off that my numbers are higher than the usual range.

shit. i wish i understood what the hell was going on.

---

i don't want it to be twins. i know too many people who've had twin pregnancies end badly.

---

i'm also hoping that this doesn't signal molar pregnancy.

---

aaaaaargh. my head is a mess. i'm so terrified that this pregnancy is over even though it's hardly begun.

i'm also kind of wondering whether i'm further on than i think, but my chart seems pretty definite - not much room for having ovulated earlier than it seems. no?

---

i'm hoping to get a scan on monday or tuesday. i need to know.

---

edited to add, i called the hospital. the woman i need to speak to isn't in til monday. i guess i'll call on monday morning.

2010-11-03T17:25:00.005Z

This is a really interesting piece on the BBC website. It's about a funeral photographer.

I remember reading somewhere years ago that the Victorians took photographs of everything, including their funerals. (Apparently it wasn't just their funerals; they also used to take pictures of the dead.) I could understand the theory of why - they took photographs of everything, both happy and sad - but didn't really understand. Not really.

And I didn't understand. Until last January, D and I standing in the chapel at the crem. And the thing I wanted more than anything else was a picture of the tiny white coffin that contained the remains of the babies being cremated that day.

I knew I should have gone outside and got a picture of it before it came into the chapel. But I was somehow scared. I didn't. And then as it got to the end of the ceremony and I realised that I only had a short time left, I picked up my camera as quietly as I could and snatched a shot of the tiny white coffin.

I was really scared that the other parents there would freak. Would ask me what the hell I was doing. Noone did. I don't know if that's because they didn't realise what I'd done, or because they were too upset to care. D was pretty weirded out by it, but he didn't say anything after a whispered 'are you serious?'

So. I guess all I'm trying to say is that I'm glad someone is breaking this taboo. Even though it's a bit weird that it's a business idea.

---

I should probably say while I'm here that I'm OK. Struggling with nausea. I threw up last Friday but other than that I've just been queasy. More so than last time, which is kind of reassuring, but not constantly (and interestingly not first thing in the morning) which isn't.

I'm 7 weeks on Friday. I was supposed to get a scan around that time but... I guess I'm scared. Even if I do and all's well, it doesn't mean all will stay well. And I guess... if the news is bad it'll come soon enough. I guess I don't want to hurry it along.

warning - dead baby mentioned

2010-10-26T16:58:00.004+01:00

a while ago i read this post, about wanting a warning label on books and films and TV shows that contain dead babies. Warning - Dead Baby Mentioned.

---

I watched Up recently. I cried almost constantly, but I sobbed at the 'married life' montage when it becomes clear that Carl and Ellie can't have children. I knew it was coming, but it was still heartwrenching.

---

I got a book out of the library today. The Truth about Melody Browne by Lisa Jewell. 24 pages in, there it is. Dead baby. Neonatal death, to be specific.

NO ONE talks about dead babies in the real world. No one talks about miscarriage or stillbirth, at least not in my hearing. Why are they everywhere in fiction?

2010-10-25T15:34:00.003+01:00

last time i was pregnant i expected to be bleeding every time i went to the loo.

even after 12 weeks. every single time i expected blood, and looked and looked to try and find it. i think part of my brain was amazed that it wasn't there.

this time i'm still checking every single time. i'm still kind of surprised that it's not there... but this time, i don't think i really expect it. not in the same way as i did last time.

maybe that's a positive sign?

---

of course, as it happened, there was never any blood, last time around. not until well after we'd found out what happened, and after a lot of medication. ironic, no?

2010-10-24T22:33:00.004+01:00

comment from merry:

The trouble is, you are surrounded with people with dead babies without the good experience some of us have to help you know you've gone through something relatively rare. Most pregnancies DON'T end in dead babies.

yes! that's exactly right. and that's the problem, although it's also a good part. hanging around the babyloss quarters of the internet means that i don't feel so alone, that what happened to me wasn't something that doesn't happen at all. but now i'm pregnant again all i can see is the miscarriages and the stillbirths and the neonatal deaths. all i can see are the people who have lost more than one pregnancy (at any stage) or child.

i read the book Avoiding Miscarriage last night. I actually found it quite reassuring. I see our odds of miscarriage as one in two, really - either it's going to happen or it isn't - but according to that stats at this point it's only about one in five. there's a good chance that i'll end up having this baby.

before i got pregnant i couldn't read certain blogs. not 'pregnant women' or 'women with living children', nothing that concrete. some i could read, but some i couldn't, and i never figured out why.

i suspect that for my own sanity i'm going to have to stop reading the blogs of those who've miscarried more than once. i hate that, but i think it's something i need to do.

"Most pregnancies DON'T end in dead babies."

So true Merry. thank you for reminding me. such a simple thought but it seems revolutionary to me right now.

2010-10-24T18:38:00.004+01:00

i got past yesterday - a year since the baby died - without really noticing.

i think it's mostly just hard to believe. that i was pregnant. that it really happened. that i was pregnant with a baby that was alive. that died.

i miss it. i miss my little lost one. but it doesn't seem like something that really happened.

---

i saw my gp on wednesday. i told her that i'd been worried about miscarriage; specifically ectopic pregnancy, molar pregnancy and blighted ovum. that i'd been having some occasional abdominal pains. i was crying on and off anyway. but then she said she wanted to examine me.

my gp's room is the room i was in for my final midwife appointment. the one where she couldn't find the heartbeat. i've been in there so many times since that i'm not so sensitive about the room anymore.

but this time i had to lay down on the same bed, in the same room. i cried. i couldn't even bring myself to tell her why.

i want this to be real. i want this pregnancy to end in a healthy, living full-term baby. but i'm so scared it won't.

and i'm so sorry that i keep repeating myself. i know it must be a little tedious. but hopefully i'll stop soon.

---

hopefully we'll see my midwife on wednesday.

2010-10-22T16:22:00.003+01:00

everything seems to be conspiring against me right now. i still can't get logged into my sodding savings account, and my front tooth broke again today for the third time in twelve days, and i found out yesterday that the full-pay section of my sick leave is about to expire, sending me onto half pay and us on a rapid road to financial destruction.

the thing about my sick pay would be irrelevant if i knew this pregnancy was viable - i will hopefully have a scan before it happens and if everything is ok then i'll go back to work, and everything is fine. the problem is if everything isn't ok.

the thought makes me feel sick. makes me want to curl up into a gibbering ball on my sofa.

but i am five weeks today. five weeks. that's all. i'm not having any symptoms. i'm not feeling sick. i've not got sensitive bo.obs. (shouldn't i have sensitive bo.obs by now?) i'm not having weird tastes or smelling weird smells.

i know i'm lucky to be here at all. i know this is what i've spent nearly the last year absolutely desperate for. i know that i have to go through all this if i want even a hope of having a baby. but...

it's just that right now i don't think this is the one.

---

i just hope i'm wrong.

---

i'm only seeing single crows and magpies again.

i'm so scared of losing this chance at a baby.

2010-10-21T12:21:00.002+01:00

just wanted to say....

if you know me in real life and you're reading here and you've never explicitly made that clear, please could you send me a message (or comment here if you would prefer) to let me know? i'm not aware of anyone that is - other than people who i met through blogging or facebook who i'm obviously aware of.

i know that the internet isn't exactly an anonymous place to write and that i'm not exactly as well hidden as i could be, but i'd like to know if you're there.

2010-10-19T09:38:00.002+01:00

i went round to a friend's house at the weekend. i told her i was pregnant. she was thrilled. too thrilled, if anything. she doesn't seem to understand that nothing is guaranteed. she told me she's not going to put her maternity clothes in the loft, so i can have them. she told me that if we find out we're having a girl, she'll keep the things from her baby for us.

i'm four weeks pregnant, people.

this is especially hard to hear from a girl who thought right the way through to the end of her pregnancy that something was going to go wrong. i thought i could rely on her to keep things low-key. i mean, i didn't want her to pretend that the news was nothing, but i thought she would at least acknowledge that i'm scared.

ah well. that's not what i came here to talk about.

when i was going i asked her to keep it under her hat. and she said yes, of course. i told her that i would tell three of our friends after we have a scan and know what's going on, and that at some point she could tell the rest of the group that used to be my friends. if they're still interested, i said.

i said that because... well. because none of them have contacted me. because they have let me drop off the edge of the world. they have given me no indication that they still remember what happened to me. that i lost my baby. that in the space of a couple of hours i went from pregnant and excited and with every reason to believe everything was ok, to having my dreams entirely shattered. a good number of my 'friends' just haven't acknowledged that at all.

but my friend heard me differently. of course they'll be interested, she said. they're not angry with you or anything.

What. The. Fcking. Fuck?????????????

what have i done for them to be angry with me for? NOTHING. their lives have been carrying on as normal, while i've been sitting here wondering if they will ever remember me. send me a message. let me know they're thinking of me.

yes, i haven't been in touch; but i'm the one that's been grieving over here. i'm the one who's been suffering from anxiety and depression. i'm the one who you hurt so, so badly by your careless facebook posts, showing off your perfect lives.

but she's not the one i'm angry with. she's the one that's been there for me, who's understood. much as i want to lash out, she's not the one who has hurt me.

she mentioned getting the baby christened again. i told her that i'd almost certainly be slipping in at the last minute and slipping out the minute it finished. but i don't think she understood, because after that she said that she knew D wasn't up for church things but that he was welcome to join the drinking part afterwards. D is even less likely to be civil than me. the people who have hurt me, he wasn't over fond of in the first place. and if i slip out the minute it finishes, then i won't be staying for drinks, will i?

i don't honestly miss these people. it's hard that my best friend is still close to them. i wish i could just forget they exist, but i can't.

---

i want to find some women who are pregnant after a second trimester loss who live nearby. i'm not sure how to go about finding them. i think i'm going to ask my midwife, but if anyone has any ideas about how to find any that would be really, really good.

2010-10-18T12:29:00.005+01:00

somewhere in this house is a shoe box.

in that shoebox are the things we were given for the baby. last time around.

and a couple of samples of things that would last until this time around.

and i want that shoe box. so, so badly.

i want to look at the contents, and imagine a happy ending.

but i don't know where it is.

and D denies all knowledge of it existing.

so i guess it must be trapped in the room that time forgot (previously mentioned here).

and that means it'll be a while before i can access it.

---

today i don't really believe that there's even the merest hope that this will work out.

but i still want to buy a blanket.

something to keep the baby warm.

or maybe something to keep my hopes warm when they seem too far away.

---

i think part of me is mourning this baby even while - as far as i know - it's still alive.

---

i meant to say. even D has commented on suddenly seeing pairs of magpies and crows everywhere, after only seeing singles for so, so long.

either i've really infected him with my crazy, or maybe they really do know something.

2010-10-18T09:36:00.002+01:00

i have to learn to stop reading new blogs if they are talking about things that terrify me. if those things happen, i know where they are for mutual moral support, but until that time, i need to stop reading.

if this baby is going to stick, it's going to stick.

if it's not, it's not.

i can't make it go by reading about very early miscarriage, can i?

... can i?

please stay, baby. please stay.

2010-10-17T21:51:00.004+01:00

today i'm mostly scared of ectopic pregnancy and blighted ovum.

today i'm quiet. not excited, not terrified. occupying that grey area in the middle.

today i'm wondering about cancelling my tuesday appointment at the dental hospital for two small fillings. wondering whether the stress would be a bad thing.

today i'm wondering whether tomorrow the clearblue test will say '2-3' instead of '1-2'. and wondering how i'll cope if it doesn't. and wondering whether i should wait another couple of days. just to be sure.

today i'm hoping the midwife calls me tomorrow.

today i don't have any symptoms, and i'm trying to tell myself that that doesn't mean anything.

----

today i'm trying to remember that i'm lucky to have all these things to worry about.

----

today i'm thinking the next 36 weeks are going to last a very, very long time.

news

2010-10-16T17:55:00.006+01:00

october is here again. tuesday next week marks one year since our twelve-week scan. one year since we sat in the darkened room, laughing and watching as our baby moved around, leaping and dancing and refusing to keep still.

and yet. and yet. only four days later, it was all over. the baby was dead.

we wouldn't find out for more than four weeks after its death.

23rd october will be a hard, hard day to get through.

---

ttc after loss is hard. the longing, the desperation to have back what has been lost. the desolation as you start to realise that even if you get pregnant again, you will never get that lost baby back. (it seems obvious, but it took me a while to figure that out. i thought that getting pregnant again would somehow erase my loss. would fix me. if only it was that simple.)

the sense of failure every month has left me utterly desolate at times.

over the last ten months, various people tried to tell me - some gently, some not - that maybe trying again immediately wasn't the best idea. that maybe we should wait a little longer. until i was somewhat out of the deepest, darkest part of the land of grief. but i couldn't have waited. i needed to know that there was hope. i needed to know that one day i would carry a child to term and have it live. i needed this, even though i know that there are no guarantees. i know that even getting to 40 weeks without a single glitch doesn't guarantee you anything at all.

ttc after loss is hard. especially when you're so very aware of the march of time. each month it's not just one egg that is wasted; it's many. each month puts me another month closer to 35; it's not that long until my birthday. some months the arrival of my period has felt like losing my baby all over again.

at the end of september i saw someone who drew the tears out of me that i had pretended were no longer there. she looked at me, concerned, and said that she thought i should not be trying to conceive. said she thought i should be grieving the baby i had lost, and looking after myself.

and i didn't really believe her, but i was somehow more willing to listen to this woman than anyone else.

but her words got into my brain. and as the tears and anger returned, i actually realised that i was ambivalent about conceiving that cycle. i had started to realise that yes, maybe time to grieve and to cry before pregnancy was a good idea.

a little part of my brain heard my thoughts, and it said:

woohoo! this, the month you don't want to get pregnant, will be the month you do!

the rest of my brain was mad. it urged that part of my brain to go away and leave me alone. and although a tiny part of me did actually hope that the prediction would come true, most of me just wanted a few more weeks to wallow in my sorrow.

---

(un)fortunately (take your pick, i'm not sure) fate does indeed have a twisted sense of humour.

i did a pregnancy test last sunday.

it was positive.

i'm pregnant.

(i understand if you need to stop reading. i've been there. it sucks. but no need to keep reading when it hurts. i don't want anyone to hurt because of me.)

four weeks, one day.

and although i am more terrified than i can say, i feel different.

i'm not scared to put my hand on my belly. i never did that last time. i felt like it would be an affectation. i wanted it to be natural. so i never did it.

i want to buy stuff. i never bought anything last time. i have already bought this one a rattle. even if it doesn't stick, it will be a hand-me-down for [please, please] the next one.

i can sometimes imagine myself with a bump. last time, i never did.

i can almost imagine myself with a baby.

---

it's nearly 12 months after the first baby died.

it kind of seems right. not quite a year since the baby died. it almost feels like it has stayed 12 months, to make sure we're ok, and is preparing to leave now the next spirit has arrived.

---

there are no guarantees. like i say, i'm terrified. i have tested every day; all have been positive. i need to know it's still there. i am terrified. of chemical pregnancy; early miscarriage; late miscarriage; poor prenatal diagnosis; stillbirth, neonatal death.

and that's just the main categories. and that doesn't even count all the things i'm scared of once a baby is actually born.

but i'm hopeful. the exact ratio of terror to excitement varies from day to day. but both are constant companions.

love to you all, whether you're ttc, pregnant, or parenting after loss, or whether you are a friend who just wants to know what's going on in my world. and if this news makes my blog too hard to read, that's fine. if you'd rather i stopped commenting on your blog too, please do let me know. i can take it, i promise.

oh. and if you know me in the real world, this news is confidential. please don't blab.

quiet

2010-10-15T20:52:00.006+01:00

i'm very quiet at the mo. i'm still reading. and i'm commenting more than i have in a while. so i guess it balances out.

---

jess at after iris read a list of the names of babies who have been lost. i listened to the whole thing. it was amazing to hear my baby's nickname read out. and it was amazing to hear all those names together. it felt like they were very near while she was reading.

what she said at the end made me cry.

---

last night i posted about (inter)national pregnancy and infant loss awareness day. I said...

---

tonight i lit a candle tonight and remembered my baby, and all the other lost babies out there.

2010-10-08T21:21:00.003+01:00

thank you all for your support yesterday. it helped so much.

i'm feeling better today. still tearful and upset and hurt and needing comfort, but better than yesterday.

----

i don't usually remember my dreams. but the last few months i've dreamed at least three times that i'm at an airport and that somehow i'm unable to catch the flight i'm due to be on.

i don't think it would take an expert to analyse that one, eh?

----

i'm starting to catch up on comments on other people's blogs. i'm not there yet but i'm getting there. i'm thinking of you all and i am so, so grateful for your comments and supports.

this rant brought to you courtesy of a bank tipping me over the edge

2010-10-07T16:57:00.005+01:00

last year. september. D decided that we needed a new car. because ours kept breaking down, and he thought it wasn't safe enough any more. not once there was a baby to put in it.

i personally thought that we didn't have to do that straight away. i thought there was plenty of time. but he insisted. we borrowed money from my parents and went ahead.

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our flat. we'd been looking to move for close to a year. but once i found out i was pregnant i thought again. when our fixed rate mortgage expired we moved onto a tracker mortgage. base rate plus 2%, on a relatively small mortgage. it doesn't add up to a terribly high monthly repayment. i was scared of how little my maternity pay would be; i couldn't justify ending up with a much higher mortgage when our income was going to drop so much. D wasn't terribly happy about staying put, but... well. we thought it was only until i went back to work afterwards.

but it meant that we needed to think about the flat. we needed to get ready for our new arrival. we'd already worked on the bathroom and our bedroom; it was time to sort out the spare bedroom.

but first, D wanted to sort out the lounge. replaster, paint, get a new carpet. i didn't know why he wanted to do that first, but it seemed important to him. and there was going to be plenty of time. it didn't really matter what order we did it in.

the plastering started on friday 20th november. five days before everything was going to fall apart. we moved all the furniture we could from the lounge into the spare room. all our bookshelves (and DVD shelves and CD shelves; MAN we have a lot of stuff). the chest of drawers.

nearly a full year later, it's all still in there. the lounge is replastered and the walls painted. the skirting boards and internal doors are replaced through the whole flat.

the furniture, though, all remains where it was put. actually, i tell a lie; D has moved the bookshelves around when we've needed to get behind them - it's a major faff every time.

but all the things we put in there to get them out of the way while we were decorating are still crammed into that small room. which means that we can only access half our books at any given moment. that our paperwork is piled high on the chest of drawers; technically accessible but without any indication what's where, so pretty much useless.

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nearly a year on. it's taken me this long to realise that the reason we haven't dealt with the room yet is that we're still in no man's land. we don't have a baby; we're not pregnant. we've been trying again for over nine months and nothing; but we don't have a diagnosis that anything is actually wrong.

we can't make it into a nursery; what if it never happens for us?

but then what's the point in making in into something else?

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the whole place is a tip. i have piles of stuff everywhere in varying degrees of urgency. and now my credit card payment is either going to bounce or is going to take me over my overdraft limit because the account my savings are in are unhelpful bas.tar.ds and i can't access it and because we've been overspending like drunken idiots over the last few months because don't we deserve some kind of a break instead of all this shit? and i can't say no to D when he asks if we can get things, because we were supposed to have a baby by now and it's not fair that we don't, and he says 'you should get this!' too and hell I SHOULD HAVE A BABY BY NOW AND I DON'T and buying this doesn't actually heal that hurt but i keep thinking it might, so we keep going into HMV or waterstones and buying DVDs and CDs and books like there is no fucking tomorrow and we've got to stop, we have no money, but i can't.

and apparently having a dead baby doesn't mean that your shit luck is balanced out by suddenly winning the lottery, because... just because, because life is shit i guess, and so all the crap we've bought the last year or so is a) taking up space and b) building up, and i've always managed to scrape something together, but a holiday in Barcelona, two wedding hotel stays, a car service, and something else i've forgotten about have conspired to all fall in the same few months and now i think we are like £500 short of my payment and like i say my savings are in a bank of unhelpful bastards that won't just do a fucking transfer to our current account until i send in a cheque and a direct debit form and THEN i can request them to move the money - EVEN THOUGH I WANT TO CLOSE THE FUCKING ACCOUNT ANYWAY - so. we're screwed.

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i can get round it. probably. my phone cut out half way through my argument with the supervisor at a certain indian bank that kind of sounds like a chemical company (is that enough information for you to figure out who i am not recommending????) so i'll have to phone back sometime to set it all up, even though it makes me want to hit people to have to do so, and pretend i didn't argue with the last guy for like half an hour. but i have an empty credit card that have offered me 0% balance transfers, so i can probably use that.

but i just want to not have to deal with any of this. i just want to burn all the papers that are lying around. or have someone give us a nice shiny new house and we can leave all the shite lying round for someone else to deal with. i don't care.

why am i not pregnant? i'm guessing this meltdown is meaning that my period is on its way. it's not due for another four days but that doesn't seem to be the point.

i just want a baby.

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apparently D - who thinks genetics has nothing to do with whether you are a parent or not and would be completely fine with adoption - isn't even ready to think about when we might start thinking about adoption yet.

i can't just keep on keeping on. i have no hope left. i know lovely people keep telling me that it's not just insane to keep on trying when the outcome keeps on being the same, that it's a sign of hope. but i can't keep having my hopes shat on like this.

i told D yesterday that i'm more mentally stable than he sometimes thinks. i guess this post proves him right.

i kind of think i should wait before posting this but i don't want to.

i miss you so much, baby.

2010-10-06T13:44:00.004+01:00

apparently all i needed to have a proper cry was to really listen to songs by a Scottish rocker mourning the loss of his mum.

i would do anything for
another minute with you, cause
it's not getting easier
not getting easier

I would dig a thousand holes to lay next to you
I would dig a thousand more if I needed to
I look around the grave for an escape route of old routines
There doesn’t seem to be any other way

Cause I’ve started falling apart I’m not savouring life
I’ve forgotten how good it could be to feel alive

Crazy as it sounds you wont feel as low as you feel right now
At least that’s what I've been told by everyone
I whisper empty sounds in your ear and hope that you won’t let go
Take the pieces and build them skywards

we're going to see these guys in december. i kind of hope they play these songs, and kind of hope they don't.

IVF news stories

2010-10-04T19:37:00.005+01:00

Thought some of you might find these interesting:

This looks at the selection of embryos and success rates.

Having IVF means that your chance of having a boy increases slightly (the article makes it sounds like it's suddenly 70-30, but actually it's 56-44 as opposed to 51-49).

This one talks about a test that gives you a better idea of your likely success with IVF.

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i've still been mostly unable to cry. i did cry though at my counselling appointment this afternoon. it felt like a relief.

my counsellor thinks that repressed anger might be making it harder for me to cry. i'm going to try and work through that these next few days.