A letter to her child...

The following is from one of my readers - a beautiful letter to her child...

Dear baby,

I've wanted you for what seems like forever, I dream of holding you and feeling your warmth.

You have no idea how badly I want to create you. To be a mother, I want you more than I can take... more feeling than it is possibly to feel.

It's almost like a need, a need for you.

To feel you move like butterflies, to feel you kick inside me, to feel ethereal, dreamlike, unbelievable to thing I could grow life.

I want to feel the pain of you getting bigger inside me, the weight of you.

I want you to grow and grow like a butterfly in a cocoon.

To see the plus sign on a test, to squeal with glee, to hug my fiancé and see the amazed look in his eyes.

To cry over the joy, the adventure, the possibility that will be your life.

I can draw, paint, write and knit, but creating a painting is so much different to having a work of art, a pure creation made by two in love grow inside you.

I envision your tiny little legs, kicking and squirming, your chubby fingers tight around my thumb, your beautiful soft skin & perfect eyes.

We've talked about you for what feels like eternity, we read books, articles, watched videos about you.

We planned names like Damian or Hamish or Olive or Christine.

We planned out your early years, we planned out everything.

I felt so ready yet scared and excited, the ovulation tests, pregnancy tests, the baby books, my fiancé’s mothers handmade clothes, created for his baby. Special for his baby, our baby, our soon to be universe.

I couldn't wait for you, I was so excited, we were so excited.

I wanted to hear you, hold you... I wanted you to be mine, which you can never be.

I started becoming more tired, more stressed & in more pain. I wondered is fibromyalgia genetic? Could my mum have passed it to me and if so, what would happen to our dream?

I googled it, my heart didn't just sink, it fell, down & down & down. It spun down like a penny in a charity coin machine, until it hit the ground with a cold hard thunk.

My fiancé was broken, I was broken.

Months have passed, he's sold the baby books, hidden his mother’s baby clothes and I have hidden my pregnancy jumper & sold my ovulation tests.

I sold my pregnancy journal, the very happy mother to be messaged me urging delivery, so elated and excited at her pregnancy. I marker penned my name from the 'this book belongs to section' scrubbing it out, trying to clean to sadness away, the memories.

I stuck a neat white sticker over it, almost purifying it as if some omen, some sad, angry, heartbroken entity was being removed or set free.

My fiancé posted the book whilst I tried to forget. When I found out fibromyalgia is genetic and clusters in families.

My dream died, my never born baby died with it, I feel stupid to mourn a baby that has never existed & will never exist but I can't help it.

I used to brood over babies, seeing pregnant women's tummies & children pulled my heartstrings and made me excited and nervous.

Now when I see a child, a baby or a pregnant woman. It ruins my day, I see children’s clothes/socks/blankets & toys in shops & supermarkets.... it makes me feel sick to my stomach with loss.

Most days I can try not to think about it and it sort of works, but some days I cry about you, my never baby. Some nights I stay awake, like right now & I feel sad and broken.

I needed to write this letter to you my never baby, because as I know you won't ever be here I still love you, I still think of you & I still hold a piece of my heart just for you and I hope one day that mourning will heal & my heart won't be quite so fragmented.

Endless love,

A lady who dreams of being your mum.

Between awake and asleep...

He is in the realm between awake and asleep

Milky eyes try not to slip behind billowy lids

His gossamer hair plays upon my cheek

As I breathe in the smell of him

That precious newly born scent of him

I trace his face with my finger

Drawing his cheeks, his lips, his nose

Into a comfort for when I must yearn

I raise him up higher than I am

Bring him down to nestle at my breast

My heart beats for both of us

My soul is ever bound to his

It is then that they appear

Those angelic diaphanous beings

To gather him into themselves again

I cannot keep him

I beg for just one more moment

But he is already transforming

From the shape of my child

Into a being of dancing mist

I reach out for his tiny hand

Before it disappears

But he slips through my fingers

And back into their light

My own cry awakens me

My arms reaching out for our son

But he has stayed behind

In the realm between

Awake and asleep

Remembering dates…

Last week I was berating myself because I realized I had mixed up the dates of my three IVF cycles and the due dates of the babies from those cycles if they had been born.

I didn’t think that we had worked out when our baby would be due for the first cycle because the cycle was cancelled. I figured out that the baby from the second cycle would have been due on, or around, the 8^th of April (our wedding anniversary), and that the baby from the last cycle would have been due on, or around, the 14^th of September (my Dad’s birthday).

I was certain about those dates, especially over the past few years. I remembered and even celebrated my children based on those dates. We have photos the two embryos that we created and I had one close by me on the 8^th of April and the other on the 14^th of September.  I reflected on what ages our children would be and what they might be like.

I recently obtained my clinical records from when we did IVF. They were rather confusing to read, but what was clear were the dates of the cycles we did, and they differed from my recollections.

The baby from the first cycle, had the cycle not been cancelled, would have been due around the 8^th of April. The baby from the second cycle would have been due on or around the 5^th of June. I did have the date of the final round of IVF correct and the baby would have been due around my Dad’s birthday.

I was upset at myself last week, but I am not anymore for the following reasons.

Going through IVF is incredibly stressful. It consumes your life. Everything is put into trying to have a baby. There are injections and medications to keep up with, regular appointments with doctors and nurses, and everything has to fit in amongst keeping a regular life. There are massive fluctuations in hormones that are a side effect of the medications. Wave upon wave of emotions such as hope, despair, anger, and excitement can flatten or elate you. It is one of the hardest experiences we have ever gone through. Is it any wonder I might have mixed up the dates? I didn’t have any records until recently and had to rely on my memory. I hadn’t kept a journal for the entire experience as I initially thought I would. At times, when we were doing IVF, I didn’t know what day it was or what I was doing or even how I was feeling.  Much of the time was just a confusing blur.

I can’t berate myself for mixing up the dates during the most stressful time I have had in my life. It is not fair on me to do so.

To me intention is important. If someone says or does something that upsets me or I don’t agree with I will consider what their intention was. If their intention was good hearted then I focus on that rather than the words said or the actions taken. Of course, this is always to a point and sometimes I will let the person concerned know if I am hurt by their words or actions, but mostly I let it go.

My intention has always been to remember our children. I don’t want them to fade away to nothing, but to stay in my memory. I got the dates wrong, but my intention was based on my love for my children. I can’t berate myself for that. I remember them regularly and I have had specific dates during the year that I take extra time to reflect on them and wear my star of remembrance. My kids know that I love them.

Now I know the actual dates of our IVF cycles I can change the dates during the year that I especially reflect upon my children. If there had been a baby created from the first cycle of IVF it would have been due on the 8^th of April, but there was not even a spark of life created. This date has returned to being our wedding anniversary only.

I now have the 5^th of June to reflect on our second cycle and the embryo that was created then. And, the 14^th of September remains as the day for reflection for the embryo from the third cycle.

I have changed the dates, my children know I have kept on loving them and will always love them, and there is no need, and never was, any reason to berate myself. 

Anniversaries...

Eight years ago I was having a breakfast of croissants, juice, and coffee with my Mum and Dad and three of my closest friends at the old house Kirby and I used to own. After our breakfast we were going to the hairdresser where my friends and I would have our hair and make-up done.

After that we would come back home and I would put on my beautiful white dress which reminded me of autumn, and my friends would put on their stunning pale green dresses.

Dad and I would then get into a 1957 Bentley and my friends would get into a Royal Daimler Limousine which would take us to the Adelaide Town Hall where Kirby and I would be married in front of our family and friends.

I can’t believe it has been eight years already, but at the same time when I think of everything that has happened it couldn’t possibly be less than eight years because there wouldn’t have been time for it all.

Our anniversary is always a strange kind of day. A celebration mixed with tinges of wistfulness. I love Kirby so much and the 8^th of April is a celebration of that love and the day that we committed to each other for exactly who we were and who we were to become. But there are two shades of wistfulness that come about as well, and one of them I’ve only realized exists in the past year or two.

The most obvious source of wistfulness is that if we had been successful with our very first round of IVF our baby would have been due on about the 8^th of April 2009. We did not get to the stage of egg collection and there was no embryo transfer, but nevertheless I think about the “what if”. It would have been awesome to be celebrating the fifth birthday of our child as we celebrate the eighth anniversary of our marriage.

The other font of wistfulness, which I have only realized in the past few years, is that our anniversary is cause to look back at a time when we were certain about what our lives would be like today.

We were sure that by now we would have children, that we would still be in our old house and have renovated it, and that we would both have satisfying careers (I thought at the time that I could be working in human resources) which would also give us a work/life balance for our kids. We saw family holidays, children’s birthday parties, kindergarten, mess, finger paintings on the fridge, little tiny beds and teddy bears, and toys everywhere.

Sometimes I think we were very naïve when we got married, but we weren’t really. There was no reason for us to think that we wouldn’t have children. We actually still have no reason as to why we couldn’t have children. We assumed that it would happen, just like it had for so many couples we knew.

We really had a fairy tale romance during those first two years. After so much time searching we had found each other. We bought a house together within three months, were engaged two months after that, and we were married within eighteen months of meeting each other. Our families got along so well, and I felt I belonged with Kirby’s friends immediately, as did he with mine.

Why would we even dream, when everything was so amazing and we knew we were soul mates, that we wouldn’t be able to have children?

Yet, here we are. Eight years later and we don’t have the children and the life we thought we would have.

We are happy with our lot. We have an honest, trusting, and loving relationship. We have wonderfully supportive family and friends. We have new dreams and plans. We have our crazy fur and fin kids. We have our nephews and nieces. We have our friends’ children. We have a lovely home, live in a beautiful area, and we have food on the table. Life, compared with those of so many, is good.

Still, I think it is okay to feel happy for our anniversary and wistful for our children every year on the 8^th of April.

I will be writing two more blog entries this week as there are two other topics I want to talk about. One will be about dates and the other will be about stars.

Before I end this blog entry I want to share something beautiful that happened in this past week. My friend was over with her three year old daughter. Out of nowhere the little girl threw her arms around my neck and said “I love you”. This is what makes life good.

You don’t know unless you have kids…

I get quite frustrated and upset when people say or write this statement followed by whatever it is that they think people who don’t have kids don’t know.

Okay – it’s true that because I don’t have children I can’t possibly know exactly what it is like to parent a child 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I know that. But I’m not totally ignorant about children either.

These kinds of all or nothing statements completely disregard the knowledge I do have about children and the feelings I have for the children, and other people, in my life.

There are many things people who don’t have children supposedly don’t know.  I want to mention a few of them:

Kids are gross and dirty. Trust me – I know. While changing my three week old niece’s diaper she did an almighty, runny, smelly poo and then stuck her foot in it. It’s not the only time I’ve changed pooey or wet diapers, or cleaned up snot, or wiped up vomit (sometimes all three substances end up on me…) And, oh my goodness, the smell of poo when children are teething! Nothing else quite like it…

Kids take their time. When you’ve sat with a child for an hour trying to get them to take a few more mouthfuls of their dinner, it’s not that far of a leap to realise this is a regular occurrence.

Kids need you. On many occasions when I’ve looked after children there have been times when whatever I was doing was put aside to hold a crying child, a child having a tantrum, a child who wants a cuddle, a child who is tired, or a child that really needs me to play with them right now.

Kids are too honest – meaning they may say things that hurt feelings. I’ve been told that I didn’t need that extra biscuit by one of my nieces. I ate it anyway - it was chocolate...

Kids break stuff and hurt themselves. Yep – we’ve lost ornaments and dishes to the hands of children, and the kids we love have taken tumbles and falls while we were looking after them. That’s why we have children’s paracetamol, Disney character band aids, sunscreen and insect repellent for children, cough medicine for children, and a dust pan and broom at the ready, in our own home.

As a parent you would put your life before theirs – you would plead that your life be taken in place of theirs. You would put yourself in danger to make them safe. I would do anything to make our nieces and nephews safe, even risking my own life – and I would do that for our friends’ children too.  I don’t have to be a parent to have that level of protective instinct and love.

Speaking of love – one of my least favourite sayings is “You don’t know what real love is until you’ve had children.” Seriously? So my love for Kirby, my love for my family and friends is not real? I actually find this offensive. I love my nieces and nephews with a love that is so tremendous that I sometimes feel like I must be shining with a boundless happiness. That is real love as far as I’m concerned. And, let’s face it; there are parents who don’t love their children. Parenthood isn’t a guaranteed path to knowing what real love is.

Nobody can know what it is like to live anybody else’s life. I get it that I don’t know what being a twenty four hour, seven day a week parent is like – but I do have knowledge and feelings and fears about the children in my life. These are real and I will not let them be disregarded. My experiences and feelings are mine. I feel deeply, I care deeply, I love deeply, and I know stuff.