He will leave work once a week for the next few months to keep doing the same.
My life will come to revolve around the check-ups, as if they don't already.
We have been and will be sitting with each other. Unable to express feelings, unable to comfort one another. All we can do is be, and that is such a hard thing to do while so much is left unfixed.
In less than two weeks I'll be in my third trimester of pregnancy. It's all gone by so quickly, and now it is going by too fast.
While we should be attending baby showers, completing her nursery, stocking up on diapers... we will simply be walking past the vacant room that was already filling with gifts and DIY projects for her, trying not to linger too long next to the infant section in stores, avoiding conversations about parenting children past a day old.
The probability that our daughter won't come home with us is a hard thing we've had to admit to ourselves. We shared with our family, with our friends, with our entire village... and we still can't understand any of it. It's not like learning science or grammar- how if you repeat something enough it becomes knowledge. It's more like waking up every morning wondering what kind of nightmare you had, realizing that it was no nightmare and this is your life and you're one day closer to it blowing you away for real.
Out of order death is intolerable. Knowing that it's coming does not make it more tolerable- there is no "at least..." even though we know those who offer one only mean well. There just is not any *at least* when it comes to losing a child- whether it be at 4 weeks gestation or 20 weeks gestation or right out of the womb or 5 years old or 20 years old... so I encourage any friends reading this to try and find different comfort tactics, as this one does not really work.
As you can imagine, all of this makes our love complicated. It is no longer something that can be simplified into romance, or friendship, or even familiar love. It's all three of them at the same time, sometimes none of them at any time. It is happy and it is sad and we are in love but our hearts are also broken... and then we are trying to remember our love started all of this in the first place, and then we are mad at our love.
Hope is surely born of our suffering and there is not one piece of us that's given up, and we will not give up until it is all over. However, we cannot prepare for the most unlikely. Parenthood in a few months is the most unlikely. Miracles happen, we see them every day. But while we'd love to bring her home, we're not praying for any miracle. Eden is the miracle. Babies are miracles. We cannot pray to change one thing about her. We are praying for peace, understanding, and comfort in God's plan for our lives and our family. We are praying for our hearts while preparing for the likely. We are praying for the courage to make the best decision we can for her delivery and the moments we have with her. Therefore, our conversations are not those that we'd expect to have when moving into the final months of pregnancy.
Instead, our conversations are questions, "What are we going to do?"
Quiet and fun, like we're keeping secrets, "Feel her move. She loves your voice."
Reminders, "This is who called today. And we have cards from the mailbox."
Whispers, "Will this tear us apart?"
We talk about her. We want to talk about her, and we have to talk about her. She is not an elephant in the room, she is the human in my body. She shows us her personality so often already. She is shy, but when comfortable she is feisty. She loves us, we love her. She likes my singing and she likes hearing about her father's day. We enjoy her.
There is plenty of this that is sad and there's no use pretending it isn't. She has made a big mess of our otherwise easy marriage. BUT, I can say that she is making us more honest, more real, and more present for each other as we talk about her.
And along with all that there's the "What can I make you for lunch?"
The "All of the bills have come out of the account."
The "When was the last time the dogs had a bath?"
The "I looked at a few more properties in Washington."
The "Let's go to Redbox after we pick up a pizza."
It's only been a few weeks, of course, and we are not through the hardest part. But so far, our lives have not stopped. There are still things to be done and our life together does have to be respected enough to carry on. That does not mean we aren't sad... We are beautifully broken together but still have to find moments to be mundane and just eat regular supper or finish another season of Hart of Dixie on Netflix, mostly for sanity. We don't flirt too long with the sadness. We are trying to celebrate and enjoy the fact that we are growing a baby together, the fact that we can have a family and we love each other enough to do it. We still have normal married couple conversations.
But in-between the conversations about her and the conversations about life, there are the words that require no response.
There are the conversations that are not really conversations at all- as we are sitting with each other.
The words we speak knowing our love is a mess, the words we need to hear most inside the waiting room, the exam room, the living room, the bedroom:
"I love you."
"I need you."
"This will not tear us apart."
My life will come to revolve around the check-ups, as if they don't already.
We have been and will be sitting with each other. Unable to express feelings, unable to comfort one another. All we can do is be, and that is such a hard thing to do while so much is left unfixed.
In less than two weeks I'll be in my third trimester of pregnancy. It's all gone by so quickly, and now it is going by too fast.
While we should be attending baby showers, completing her nursery, stocking up on diapers... we will simply be walking past the vacant room that was already filling with gifts and DIY projects for her, trying not to linger too long next to the infant section in stores, avoiding conversations about parenting children past a day old.
The probability that our daughter won't come home with us is a hard thing we've had to admit to ourselves. We shared with our family, with our friends, with our entire village... and we still can't understand any of it. It's not like learning science or grammar- how if you repeat something enough it becomes knowledge. It's more like waking up every morning wondering what kind of nightmare you had, realizing that it was no nightmare and this is your life and you're one day closer to it blowing you away for real.
Out of order death is intolerable. Knowing that it's coming does not make it more tolerable- there is no "at least..." even though we know those who offer one only mean well. There just is not any *at least* when it comes to losing a child- whether it be at 4 weeks gestation or 20 weeks gestation or right out of the womb or 5 years old or 20 years old... so I encourage any friends reading this to try and find different comfort tactics, as this one does not really work.
As you can imagine, all of this makes our love complicated. It is no longer something that can be simplified into romance, or friendship, or even familiar love. It's all three of them at the same time, sometimes none of them at any time. It is happy and it is sad and we are in love but our hearts are also broken... and then we are trying to remember our love started all of this in the first place, and then we are mad at our love.
Hope is surely born of our suffering and there is not one piece of us that's given up, and we will not give up until it is all over. However, we cannot prepare for the most unlikely. Parenthood in a few months is the most unlikely. Miracles happen, we see them every day. But while we'd love to bring her home, we're not praying for any miracle. Eden is the miracle. Babies are miracles. We cannot pray to change one thing about her. We are praying for peace, understanding, and comfort in God's plan for our lives and our family. We are praying for our hearts while preparing for the likely. We are praying for the courage to make the best decision we can for her delivery and the moments we have with her. Therefore, our conversations are not those that we'd expect to have when moving into the final months of pregnancy.
Instead, our conversations are questions, "What are we going to do?"
Quiet and fun, like we're keeping secrets, "Feel her move. She loves your voice."
Reminders, "This is who called today. And we have cards from the mailbox."
Whispers, "Will this tear us apart?"
We talk about her. We want to talk about her, and we have to talk about her. She is not an elephant in the room, she is the human in my body. She shows us her personality so often already. She is shy, but when comfortable she is feisty. She loves us, we love her. She likes my singing and she likes hearing about her father's day. We enjoy her.
There is plenty of this that is sad and there's no use pretending it isn't. She has made a big mess of our otherwise easy marriage. BUT, I can say that she is making us more honest, more real, and more present for each other as we talk about her.
And along with all that there's the "What can I make you for lunch?"
The "All of the bills have come out of the account."
The "When was the last time the dogs had a bath?"
The "I looked at a few more properties in Washington."
The "Let's go to Redbox after we pick up a pizza."
It's only been a few weeks, of course, and we are not through the hardest part. But so far, our lives have not stopped. There are still things to be done and our life together does have to be respected enough to carry on. That does not mean we aren't sad... We are beautifully broken together but still have to find moments to be mundane and just eat regular supper or finish another season of Hart of Dixie on Netflix, mostly for sanity. We don't flirt too long with the sadness. We are trying to celebrate and enjoy the fact that we are growing a baby together, the fact that we can have a family and we love each other enough to do it. We still have normal married couple conversations.
But in-between the conversations about her and the conversations about life, there are the words that require no response.
There are the conversations that are not really conversations at all- as we are sitting with each other.
The words we speak knowing our love is a mess, the words we need to hear most inside the waiting room, the exam room, the living room, the bedroom:
"I love you."
"I need you."
"This will not tear us apart."
