On Trying Again

As the weeks and months slip by, I'm getting closer to a date of significance that I had expected to celebrate: the six-month mark.  Three doctors (high risk OB, loss specialist OB, and family doctor) agree emphatically that my body needs at least 6 months to recuperate from a full term baby loss.  They all sited depleted nutritional stores, pelvic toning, hormonal stabilization, and risk of preterm labor and miscarriage as real, hard, evidence-based reasons to respect this wait.  And respect it I have.

All doctors also added, off the record, that they believe my soul might need even more time than my body to heal, and that they personally don't recommend trying as soon as the 6-month gun fires.  No hurry.  The tell me.  You're young.  You've got time. 

I expected to brush off this kind advice.  I expected to thow away the birth control the moment that clock ticked over. 

Why do I even bother with expectations?

The closer that day gets, the bigger it looms, and the less ready I feel to be pregnant again.  I took some comfort in planning an additional month delay, because my family is going to be on vacation in December.  "I don't want to be pregnant on the trip."  I told hub.  "I want to enjoy this one, and I won't if I'm pregnant." 

Phew.  One more month.

"Are you ready for me to start throwing pots and pans again?"  I joke to him.  Because that really happens.  In my first trimester I really get so angry that I throw things.  "And to have a wife who falls asleep at 5:00 pm and can't get out of bed in the morning?  Are you ready to be a single dad for a while?"  He smiles, and rolls his eyes in a way that tells me he hates that bit of pregnancy, but understands it is part of a bigger goal. 

At some point I realized, I don't care if Hub is ready for be to be throwing plates around the kitchen.  It doesn't really matter so much if he's ready for his spouse to be under the influence of nausea and exhaustion 24-7... I'm not ready. 

There are parts of being pregnant that just plain suck.  It feels sick and it feels tired and it lasts FOREVER and you can't eat the things you normally like (even if you ignore rules like me) and your joints come painfully apart and sometimes you wake up in your sleep every 20 minutes all night long and your moods are so alien to you that you hardly know yourself anymore and you can't do the things that matter to you and you sometimes really yell at the people whom you love and OMFG why would I ever do that to myself again?

Nope.  Not ready!  Certainly not ready for another loss, but also not ready for another pregnancy or even another healthy baby.  Not yet.  Not soon.  Maybe not ever.

Such a simple realization shouldn't be the end of the world.  Anyone on the outside can see it.  I'm young.  I have time.  I absolutely don't have to decide anything today, or this December.  I could wait 10 years if I wanted to.  Why on earth torture myself with deadlines and expectations? 

Because old habits die hard.  Try picturing a future for yourself that drops all your current expectations of situation and family.  Just try it for 5 minutes.  Deconstructing expectations takes at least that long.  See if you're able to relinquish all control and leap off the solid ground you so firmly (and erroneously) believe you stand on to exist without a framework for later. 

It isn't so easy, but that's what I'm working on.  In the moments I go there, it's not so scary.  This is freedom.