Mushrooms, snow, and Mondays

They’re popping up like mushrooms, other people’s babies.  In addition to the onslaught of photos of our nephew, I see them as I walk through campus, in slings and strollers.  They visit the library, the research showcase.  Usually, I’m not bothered (not much, anyway) but every once in a while I feel it, that tug, that wanting that seems to start in my gut and spread through the marrow of my bones, into my fingertips, to the ends of my hair, until I am a creature entirely made up of want.  It doesn’t happen so often, but when it does it leaves me shaken.  I feel empty, brittle, and husk-like.  And connected with that wanting is always the sad knowledge of what I had – those few moments with Teddy in my arms, such a cruelly short time, but more than enough in which to fall utterly in love.

Someone I used to be friends with (and there are a few reasons why I don’t currently consider her a friend, but the main reason is that she is the sort of person who, when she was doing missionary work in Guatemala, adopted a cute little black kitten, named him Sambo, had him de-clawed and then abandoned him when she moved back to the States) emailed me with a birth announcement.  It was a boy, of course.  We don’t talk more than once a year, and I’ve decided this is one baby I don’t need to hear about, so I added her email address to my spam filter.  Chances are good she’ll never notice, and this is what spam filters are for, isn’t it?

Can you read between those last few lines and see it, the jealousy and the anger?  Why her and not me?  This type of question pops up in my head all the time in spite of my best efforts to squash it.  It scares me that I’m still angry, that I may always be angry.

It snowed over the weekend (about 4 inches).  Last year, I seemed to see good omens everywhere.  This year, I mainly see harbingers of doom, and I try not to think too much about spring snow, about what it might symbolize if I were writing my life as a novel.  It is melting, the snow, but not fast enough.  I need to see crocuses in the flower beds and new leaves on the lilac bushes.  This year needs a romantic comedy sort of ending, a romance novel ending, a chick-lit ending, a happy sort of fairy tale ending.  And all was restored to her – this is what I want, even though it’s impossible.

With the snow and the babies, this is a harsh Monday, the kind of day I wish I could hide through, sleep through: hibernation, now there’s an idea whose time has come.  But I trudge through work, I give my best fake smiles until they start to feel more real, I move through the day and hope it will be over soon.

N stopped by my office bearing chocolate this afternoon, just as I was thinking I really needed a bit of chocolate to get through the day.  I am lucky, even though I’m unlucky.  I am lucky, even on an unlucky Monday full of babies and snow and back-to-work ennui.

In the words of REM

I am…

My grief has been bubbling over again these last few days.  Knowing that we’re going to try again has brought so much I missed with Teddy to the surface, and the news of our new, wee nephew hit me like a Mac truck in spite of all my good intentions and attempts to prepare myself.  I am happy for my in-laws, intensely sad for myself and N, and struggle to communicate the happiness while keeping all that other stuff – the fear, jealousy, resentment, and disbelief – to myself.   I feel torn and fractured, tired of trying so hard to focus on the happy.

I am Superman

But today?  Today I cooed over a coworker’s new baby, admired his long fingers and joked about whether he’d grow into his long toes.  I did it without crying, though I can feel a few tears coming on again.  I’ve been sweet to the in-laws, supportive of worried colleagues, haven’t lost my temper when it’s been sorely tried, have planned a nice Friday evening dinner and a walk home, and have, in general, held it together.

and I can do anything

So today, instead of being Grief Girl, I am Superman.  Figuratively – I didn’t grow man bits or anything.  You know what I mean.

(and yes, I know, The Clique sang it first)

(and yes, I fully expect to be Grief Girl tomorrow, which is why I’m crowing about my small victories right now)

Safe arrival

We have a nephew.  His middle name, like Teddy’s, is Isaac.

It was very sweet of them to remember our Teddy in their son’s name.  It makes me feel a little less as though our little guy will be forgotten in the joy over this new arrival.  I hope he brings them all the laughter I envisioned Teddy bringing us when I chose that name.

Part of me, the wounded and jealous part, wishes, just a little bit, that they would have asked us about the name first.  I am trying to shut that part of me up; it’s not the important part.

Part of me thinks it’s terribly unfair that Teddy isn’t still here to bear that name.  That part has a righteous complaint, and I can’t shut it up.

But I am trying to be mostly glad for them, because it is a joyous thing, this birth.  And I’m trying to focus on how kind of them it was to remember us at this birth.  I’m trying to focus on that instead of focusing on reliving my own time in L&D.

I really am happy for them.

But I miss my own boy so very much, and I can’t stop crying.

Right now

My sister-in-law is in labor. We’ve been worrying about them all day (induced this a.m.)

It helps that N has been worried, too.  Noticeably worried.  Not frantic, but on the cusp.  It makes me feel less like a crazy woman.

I am scared for them, jealous (still, damn it), and trying like hell to be happy for them.

Ian McKellen’s King Lear was on television tonight –

Why should a horse, a dog, a rat have life, and thou no breath at all?

Why, indeed?  It’s scary that I now find comfort in what is commonly believed to be Shakespeare’s most disturbing ending.  I’m not alone, you see, because of Lear.  I wonder if Shakespeare, who had lost a son, felt similarly.

The phone is ringing…

More on letting go

It’s probably no secret to you now that I”m bad at letting things go. Phenomenally bad, in fact. My childhood experiences with water skiing all ended up with me sputtering water out of my nose because I wouldn’t let go of the rope when I fell. I was so convinced that I could pull myself up again, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Stubbornness runs in my family on both sides, and sometimes it’s a gift, the thing that helps you do what is hard in spite of naysayers and difficulties. Sometimes it’s a curse, the thing that overrides your common sense and need to care for yourself and those you love just to prove a point that doesn’t really need proving in the first place.

I think some of the grief, sorrow, and longing that have been surfacing the past few weeks are because the time when we could try again was approaching. I still want Teddy back, and I feel a little guilty for trying to assuage my grief with another child, or even the chance of another child.

Part of me still wonders if I should seek out healing of any sort, if I deserve it.

Luckily for me, healing has been finding me for the most part, and I’ve reached the point where most days I let it find me and don’t fight it.

This comes back to the same old struggle – I don’t want to let him go any more than I have to. Pursuing the possibility of another child is a way of letting go. I think it may be the kind of letting go I need to do, but that doesn’t make it easier to do.

Wouldn’t it be nice if, once you recognized that doing something would be good for you, doing it would become easier?

Precipice

I stare at my packet of birth control pills – just a few days left.  I can renew the prescription and start another cycle, or (and this is a very big ‘or’) we can start trying.

There are several reasons not to.  I still need to lose more weight to be in a healthy range, and believe you me, I don’t enjoy huffing and puffing as I reach the top of the staircase at work, or the top of the hill on my way home (though I think I need to give myself lots of credit for climbing stairs and walking home in the first place).  My thyroid levels seem to have stabilized, but it wouldn’t hurt to wait for the next blood test to be sure.  We were told we could try again 8 months after Teddy’s birthday, and it may be better to wait the full eight months (and a couple extra weeks) instead of jumping at the chance now, a couple of weeks early.  Added to which, perhaps we should wait until N finishes his dissertation, until we know for certain that we have jobs next school year.

And then, there’s the amount of terror involved.  What if we lose another one?  Such a small sentence, such a giant fear.  After finding out, at 29 weeks, that something was very wrong with my baby, there is no point in any future pregnancy, no magic trimester or week, when I can feel sure that all is well.  And so many of my fears assume that I can get pregnant again, but what if I can’t?  What if Teddy was our one magical, lucky miracle of a chance and we don’t find that out until we open ourselves to new possibilities of hurt?

And yet…

I want to start now.  Hell, I wanted to start trying again months ago.  I want to mother a living child, to give the most amazing gift I can to the world (even though I suspect the world is treacherous and fickle).  I really do want to know what seven months looks like, to know more of what I’m missing.  I want the milk in my breasts to mean something good instead of something heartbreaking.  I want to be trying when our nephew is born so that his arrival won’t hurt quite so much.  I want to be pregnant with N’s sister, who is already at the end of her first trimester. I desperately want to hold a child in my arms who doesn’t need a ventilator to breathe.

There’s a lot of wanting, in this post and in my last, and I know that it’s all connected.  I don’t expect another child to heal me, but I think having one might help me heal.  I’m still trying to untangle that one.

Are these reasons enough?  It’s a scary, disheartening world – melting polar ice caps, starving people who aren’t starving for lack of food so much as for lack of will and effort to get food to them, war and crime and greed and violence and hate.  I think the answers to so many of these problems lie in children who are loved and brave and kind, who are taught that they can shape the future into something better, but it’s still a daunting, serious thing to bring a child into the world – not just for me, but for whoever that brave child might be.

I think about these things, perhaps too much.  I know that any child of mine, of N’s, will be loved and cherished.  We are both ready to love and cherish him/her.  But it’s a giant leap of faith to take, a giant affirmation that I’m willing to trust myself and the universe again, at least a little bit.  And my faith is tattered.

I stand on the edge, for now, taking in the view.  But I’m tired of waiting and nursing my grief.  I want to step off the precipice and see if I fall to the rocks or fly.

Just a note

Darling little boy,

This is one of those days where I miss you very much.  I want you here with me, where you should be.  I want to spend a slow spring break day watching you discover more of the world.  I want to know if you really have your daddy’s chin or if I was imagining things.

I want to know what color your eyes are, what your laugh sounds like, whether you are right- or left-handed.  I want to see and hold and smell you, to be able to gather you up and hug you.  I want to watch you sleeping, to know what your favorite toy is.  Days like today, I want and want and want.

I still can’t believe I get none of those things.

You would have been seven months old this past Monday.  Seven.  I have no idea what that would look like, but I’m sure you would have worn it well.

Time stretches out so long before me, Teddy, and it’s so much time without you, so much time to bear not having you here.  I bear it better than I used to, but I’m so tired, baby boy.

I wish I could get you back, that we never had to let you go.

I wish I knew what seven months looked like.

Turbulence

Flying back from the conference yesterday, I found myself in a small plane crossing two ranges of mountains.  I’ve been on this route before, and knew it was coming, and I know that turbulence is not a life-threatening thing, but, as it always does, it got to me.

Nothing like being thousands of feet above the ground and feeling yourself buffeted by winds and gales as rocky mountains spread out beneath you to drive home the fact of how helpless you really are.  Well, not true.  I felt more helpless than this in June, July, and August, though in mostly different ways.  However, in terms of short-lived experiences that I can for the most part easily recover from, airplane turbulence has a lot of impact.

For twenty minutes, I hoped and prayed (in the “If you’re there and inclined to do something, this would be nice” sort of way in which I pray now) that I would make it safely to the ground, that N wouldn’t be left to struggle on alone.  For twenty minutes, I told myself I was foolish to take risks when N depended on me, that I should keep my feet on the ground where they belong and that the train was a lovely travel option I should take more advantage of.  I thought of how unfair it would be if we didn’t even get to try for another child.

I thought of how death wasn’t quite so scary to me now because when it comes to me, I get to go where Teddy is, wherever may be.

I thought, again, that N needs me more than Teddy does now, and that I really, really wanted to make it to the ground alive.

I finished reading my mystery novel, in spite of the lurching, because it gave me something I could do besides clutching at the armrests, and because if the plane went down I didn’t want to miss the ending.  And I was right in figuring out how the second victim died, if not the first.

And then the turbulence subsided, the plane descended, I ran through the rain to the gate, through the gate to where N was standing, and hugged him in a way that is probably most unseemly for a staid librarian returning from a conference, held him like my life depended on it.  I buried my face in his shoulder, and was home.

Away

Here I sit, on the floor of the convention center in Seattle, listening to librarians talk about online tools and resources in the distance, hoping I don’t return home to more roof annoyances.

I don’t like being away from N for days at a time. We did the long-distance thing for a few years of our pre-marriage relationship, and those days, when you know you have to leave, when everything seems gray and sad? Those days are worse now even though I know (assuming there’s no giant automobile or plane accident) that I’ll be home again soon.

The good news is that I’m staying with one of my very dearest friends, who is, unfortunately, going through a cruel divorce. The details of it aren’t mine to spill, but being here and spending time with her is making it very clear that while we are grieving the loss of very different people, we are both grieving.

I hate that she’s in pain, but I love having someone to share this with, in person.  We’ve also shared a 5-mile walk around her neighborhood, some very fine steamed clams, some champagne, and hopes and dreams for our futures, and this has been good, too.  Friends – online and IRL – are so necessary to this healing process.  I’m very lucky in mine.

Now, off to another presentation on library services, because that’s the sort of jet-setting and exciting conference this is.

On the lost world

There are days when things seem to be evening out, when I’m just grieving instead of racked with grief, when I look at the title of this blog, think of people who’ve lost much more than I have, and say to myself, Maybe you were a little too melodramatic with the title, there, E.

I Lost a World – is it overstatement, metaphor, or both?  Whatever it is, I can always partially blame Emily Dickinson, which is some consolation.

That was partly a rhetorical question.  I don’t feel as though it’s an overstatement, even though I started writing here at the height of my grief, which may not be the best time to name anything.  I wish I could just miss Teddy, but I miss so many parts of me, too.  I’ve lost the world I trusted, I’ve lost my trust in myself and in the very air I breathe.  You could tell me that the dirt I stand on is the same as it was this time last year, and on days like this, I would argue that it isn’t.  It’s treacherous dirt, now.

I was standing in a colleague’s office yesterday as he talked about how it would be fun to have a kid so that he could watch him (funny how he assumed his child would be a boy, a smaller version of himself) grow from helplessness into a person, so see human development firsthand.  As he talked and kept talking about this, I stood there, staring at him with what had to be amazement on my face.  My chin began to quaver, my eyes welled up, and I started thinking, panicked, about whether I should run for the door.  I was crying, Grief Girl provoked into showing herself, before he realized what he was saying and who he was saying it to.

I didn’t say, You only get that if you’re very lucky, or, You don’t always get to see them grow up, to learn who they would have been. I didn’t say, Sometimes they die.

I also didn’t say, My God, man.  You have to be the most self-absorbed, clueless person in all creation.  What the hell is wrong with you?

But I saw, very clearly, that my old world is gone, lost to me except for the memories.   It was a reminder, not that I needed one, that I am a stranger in a strange land.

I’ve been trying lately to revive my trust, to find solid ground, to tell myself that balance is possible again.  I stare at April on the calendar, thinking, we can try again in April.  How can we dare? I stand on the shore of a new world, eying the rocky clifts with skepticism, buffeted by cold winds.  Afraid, tired, off-balance, I hope that this place will have some joy in it.