As I hung the ornaments on the Christmas tree this year, I reflected back on what a difference a year makes.
Last year Christmas was a difficult time. We had lost our twins eight months earlier. We had had some time to grieve, but each new holiday was hard. I watched (through facebook) as friends that I had been pregnant with were gearing up for their baby's first Christmas. I participated in all kinds of traditions that I had been looking forward to my babies experiencing with me. We knew before Thanksgiving that we were expecting again, which did help to dull the pain, but only a little.
As Christmas loomed, I had a conversation with a sales guy that made the season harder. In an effort to connect with me so that he'd have a better chance to get the sale, he started a conversation about kids at Christmas. He began by asking if I had any kids, a painful question in itself. When I said no, he asked if I wanted them. I really felt it was none of his business, but didn't feel I could say that to him, so I answered yes. Then he went on for probably five minutes about how magical Christmas is when you get to experience it with your children. In retrospect I wish that I had stopped him and explained that I was painfully aware of how magical Christmas should have been in 2011, with twins opening presents for the first time. At least then I wouldn't have suffered in silence.
Christmas time was also hard because in an effort to avoid upsetting me, many of my close family and friends didn't mention Caiden and Kaylie at all. It really reinforced for me the saying I had heard, "The name of my child may bring tears to my eyes, but it never fails to be music to my ears". Even when others didn't mention their names, they were still forefront on my mind.
In 2011, we received a number of "memory" Christmas ornaments, which we hung on the tree. My heart was so heavy as I hung those ornaments. Those ornaments meant a lot to me and I was glad to be able to incorporate Caiden and Kaylie in our Christmas traditions. However, those ornaments also reinforced all that we had lost and what we were missing out on. This year, they were still displayed prominently on our tree, but it was much easier to hang them. The whole Christmas spirit was very different this year. This year, Christmas was about celebration. We were thrilled to have Jordyn here to celebrate it with us. We were also grateful for a number of connections we had made because of our loss. We met some very good friends along our journey and found a cause that we could both pour our grief into.
Each year Christmas, and holidays in general, will be a time that we especially remember what we have lost. I hope that these reminders of our loss will also remind us to "never take one single breath for granted" because every moment is so precious.
Friday, February 22, 2013
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Happy Birthday to My Angels
Dear Caiden and Kaylie,
A year ago today I held you in my arms. We had so little time to spend with you. So many hopes and dreams were packed into those few fleeting hours. So many "I love yous" were left unsaid.
This last year has been a struggle. For the first six months we said that we would give anything to have you back in our arms. But then we conceived Jordyn. How could we say that we would give up this new precious life to have you back? We had to work through those feelings and realize that we still love you with all our hearts, even while we love this growing new life.
As part of our grieving process, we looked for an outlet. We found that in the March of Dimes. We were so pleased that in the first year we were able to raise over $1,800 with only about 3 weeks of fundraising. The walk, which took place less than a month after your birth, was very emotional, but a great culmination to a crazy month.
After the walk, I started making hats and blankets to donate back to the hospital to give other families the comfort that we had received from the hats and blankets we received for you. This lead to the formation of An Angel's Love. We made our first donation back to the hospital in September. We are making another donation today in your memory.
Since last year's March for Babies, Daddy and I have continued our involvement in the March of Dimes. We gave a speech at the Nurse of the Year Awards Gala, where we talked about the wonderful nurses who cared for us during our stay in the hospital. I was lucky enough to get to go back to the hospital and ask them to be the presenting sponsor for this year's walk. They accepted, which has made this year's walk so much more successful already.
Daddy has been planning a softball tournament in your names. We have put a lot of work into it and it is all finally starting to pay off. He has been spreading the word to anyone and everyone, making sure that your lives mean something and that we can make a difference for others in your names. Now, a month before this year's walk, we have already far surpassed last year's fundraising, and we are still going strong.
All that we have done over the past year has been made possible because of you two. We wish for all the world that we could have you with us. But since that is not possible, we are grateful for what you have given us: a cause to pour all of our passion into.
We will continue to carry you in our hearts everywhere we go. We will often wonder what your lives would have been like: when would you have said your first word or taken your first step? would you have been an athlete? where would you have gone to college? who would you have married? what career would you have chosen? But through all these milestones, we will always remember what you have given us. I only hope that we can give back as much as we have received.
On this very special day, Happy Birthday to my twin angels. <3<3
Love,
Mommy
A year ago today I held you in my arms. We had so little time to spend with you. So many hopes and dreams were packed into those few fleeting hours. So many "I love yous" were left unsaid.
This last year has been a struggle. For the first six months we said that we would give anything to have you back in our arms. But then we conceived Jordyn. How could we say that we would give up this new precious life to have you back? We had to work through those feelings and realize that we still love you with all our hearts, even while we love this growing new life.
As part of our grieving process, we looked for an outlet. We found that in the March of Dimes. We were so pleased that in the first year we were able to raise over $1,800 with only about 3 weeks of fundraising. The walk, which took place less than a month after your birth, was very emotional, but a great culmination to a crazy month.
After the walk, I started making hats and blankets to donate back to the hospital to give other families the comfort that we had received from the hats and blankets we received for you. This lead to the formation of An Angel's Love. We made our first donation back to the hospital in September. We are making another donation today in your memory.
Since last year's March for Babies, Daddy and I have continued our involvement in the March of Dimes. We gave a speech at the Nurse of the Year Awards Gala, where we talked about the wonderful nurses who cared for us during our stay in the hospital. I was lucky enough to get to go back to the hospital and ask them to be the presenting sponsor for this year's walk. They accepted, which has made this year's walk so much more successful already.
Daddy has been planning a softball tournament in your names. We have put a lot of work into it and it is all finally starting to pay off. He has been spreading the word to anyone and everyone, making sure that your lives mean something and that we can make a difference for others in your names. Now, a month before this year's walk, we have already far surpassed last year's fundraising, and we are still going strong.
All that we have done over the past year has been made possible because of you two. We wish for all the world that we could have you with us. But since that is not possible, we are grateful for what you have given us: a cause to pour all of our passion into.
We will continue to carry you in our hearts everywhere we go. We will often wonder what your lives would have been like: when would you have said your first word or taken your first step? would you have been an athlete? where would you have gone to college? who would you have married? what career would you have chosen? But through all these milestones, we will always remember what you have given us. I only hope that we can give back as much as we have received.
On this very special day, Happy Birthday to my twin angels. <3<3
Love,
Mommy
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
The Cerclage
A cerclage is a procedure to place a stitch or stitches in the cervix of a pregnant woman to keep the cervix closed as long as possible. This can be done as an emergency procedure if a woman's cervix is found to be opening (or shortening) too early, as long as her water hasn't broken. This can also be done as a preventative measure when there is reason to believe that there may be a problem later in the pregnancy.
Although we don't have an answer as to what went wrong in our last pregnancy, we know that the cervix opened too early. That early opening may have perpetuated everything else that happened, or some other culprit may have caused the cervix to open early. Either way, my doctor recommended we have the procedure done. He said if we agreed, it would be done around 13 weeks, once the risk of spontaneous miscarriage was significantly decreased.
The benefits of the procedure include: strengthening the cervix, keeping the cervix closed beyond when it may have opened on its own, and providing piece of mind to couples who have experienced a previous loss. The risks include: all the normal risks that come with any surgery with anesthesia (infection, permanent injury, death, etc.), and also the risk of disrupting the pregnancy, causing miscarriage.
My husband was on board with the procedure from the beginning, but I was less sure. For one, I hated to admit that there might be something wrong with me that had caused our loss. Second, it made me nervous to interfere with nature, especially considering the risks. In the end, I decided that we could either worry about the procedure and, as long as it went well, be somewhat more relaxed for the rest of the pregnancy, or we could worry for the whole pregnancy. I decided the former would be a little easier.
After our trip to the ER the Sunday before the surgery, when I was convinced my cervix might be opening already (and everyone in the ER looked at us like we were crazy), it became clear that this was a very good idea. (The outcome of the ER visit was that everything was fine, and when we explained our history to the ER doctors and nurses, they were much more understanding of why we were so crazy).
We went in for the surgery on Wednesday, January 11th. We were very nervous. The nerves were made worse when, before the surgery, the nurse could not find the baby's heartbeat, nor could my doctor. After many nerve racking minutes, the nurse brought an ultrasound machine. The baby quickly appeared on the ultrasound screen, with a strong heartbeat (150bpm). Apparently the labor floor (which is where they performed the surgery) is not well equipped to hear tiny babies' hearts. The nurse assured us that their Doppler equipment was not as sophisticated as the equipment at my doctor's office. After the surgery, they again could not find the heartbeat with the Doppler, so they again used the ultrasound machine to confirm that the baby was fine.
Before the surgery, they gave me a spinal (like an epidural, but the medicine goes into the spinal space instead of the epidural space - that's how the nurse described it). I was already in the OR and couldn't hold my husband's hand as I had hoped, so my nurse held my hand. The nurse anesthetist had warned me that my blood pressure could drop which could cause me to vomit or faint. Plus I had heard that the needle for an epidural was painful. I was most concerned about the consequences of the anesthesia, rather than the surgery itself. The needle was painful, but not unbearable and I had no problems after the medicine went in. The hardest part after that was throwing modesty to the wind while wide awake in a room with about 10 people in it!
Once the surgery was over, I went to a recovery room for an hour and then back to a regular room until I could be released. The only hiccup in the recovery was that I couldn't pee until several hours after the surgery because the numbness had not subsided enough. While I was recovering, one of our wonderful nurses from our stay in April stopped in to say hello. She said she had tried to change her schedule when she heard that we would be there, but she wasn't able to make it work. However, she had to come in for a meeting, so she stopped in to say hello to us.
When I was finally able to leave, I went home to rest with my feet up for a few days. The doctor said everything went very well, and I got the thumbs up to return to normal activities at my follow up appointment the next week. Hopefully this procedure will give us the peace of mind we hoped for in this rollercoaster ride.
Although we don't have an answer as to what went wrong in our last pregnancy, we know that the cervix opened too early. That early opening may have perpetuated everything else that happened, or some other culprit may have caused the cervix to open early. Either way, my doctor recommended we have the procedure done. He said if we agreed, it would be done around 13 weeks, once the risk of spontaneous miscarriage was significantly decreased.
The benefits of the procedure include: strengthening the cervix, keeping the cervix closed beyond when it may have opened on its own, and providing piece of mind to couples who have experienced a previous loss. The risks include: all the normal risks that come with any surgery with anesthesia (infection, permanent injury, death, etc.), and also the risk of disrupting the pregnancy, causing miscarriage.
My husband was on board with the procedure from the beginning, but I was less sure. For one, I hated to admit that there might be something wrong with me that had caused our loss. Second, it made me nervous to interfere with nature, especially considering the risks. In the end, I decided that we could either worry about the procedure and, as long as it went well, be somewhat more relaxed for the rest of the pregnancy, or we could worry for the whole pregnancy. I decided the former would be a little easier.
After our trip to the ER the Sunday before the surgery, when I was convinced my cervix might be opening already (and everyone in the ER looked at us like we were crazy), it became clear that this was a very good idea. (The outcome of the ER visit was that everything was fine, and when we explained our history to the ER doctors and nurses, they were much more understanding of why we were so crazy).
We went in for the surgery on Wednesday, January 11th. We were very nervous. The nerves were made worse when, before the surgery, the nurse could not find the baby's heartbeat, nor could my doctor. After many nerve racking minutes, the nurse brought an ultrasound machine. The baby quickly appeared on the ultrasound screen, with a strong heartbeat (150bpm). Apparently the labor floor (which is where they performed the surgery) is not well equipped to hear tiny babies' hearts. The nurse assured us that their Doppler equipment was not as sophisticated as the equipment at my doctor's office. After the surgery, they again could not find the heartbeat with the Doppler, so they again used the ultrasound machine to confirm that the baby was fine.
Before the surgery, they gave me a spinal (like an epidural, but the medicine goes into the spinal space instead of the epidural space - that's how the nurse described it). I was already in the OR and couldn't hold my husband's hand as I had hoped, so my nurse held my hand. The nurse anesthetist had warned me that my blood pressure could drop which could cause me to vomit or faint. Plus I had heard that the needle for an epidural was painful. I was most concerned about the consequences of the anesthesia, rather than the surgery itself. The needle was painful, but not unbearable and I had no problems after the medicine went in. The hardest part after that was throwing modesty to the wind while wide awake in a room with about 10 people in it!
Once the surgery was over, I went to a recovery room for an hour and then back to a regular room until I could be released. The only hiccup in the recovery was that I couldn't pee until several hours after the surgery because the numbness had not subsided enough. While I was recovering, one of our wonderful nurses from our stay in April stopped in to say hello. She said she had tried to change her schedule when she heard that we would be there, but she wasn't able to make it work. However, she had to come in for a meeting, so she stopped in to say hello to us.
When I was finally able to leave, I went home to rest with my feet up for a few days. The doctor said everything went very well, and I got the thumbs up to return to normal activities at my follow up appointment the next week. Hopefully this procedure will give us the peace of mind we hoped for in this rollercoaster ride.
Friday, January 13, 2012
The Birth Certificate
Until a new bill recently passed, New York State did not acknowledge the birth of any baby born still (birth certificates are called "Certificate of Live Birth", not applicable if the baby was born still). In addition, the parents do not receive a copy of the fetal death certificate, unless they request it (not exactly something you are thinking to ask for in the hospital). You can request the certificate after the fact, but must have the request notarized. There is no need for a name of the baby on the death certificate, so they baby remains unacknowledged. As far as New York State is concerned, the baby was never born, so therefore, a baby never actually died; they only acknowledge the termination of the pregnancy.
Thanks to some very dedicated mothers, this will soon change. Beginning in March, New York State will offer Certificates of Stillbirth. The law is retroactive, so anyone who has had a stillbirth (at more than 20 weeks gestation) can request a birth certificate for their baby. (Our stillbirth was at 20 weeks and 4 days, so we cross the required threshold to qualify.)
After coming home from the hospital, it took a while to sink in that we would not receive birth certificates. Once it did, we were very upset, but poured our energy into the March of Dimes. We were so grateful to these wonderfully dedicated mothers for making this happen. We are very excited for March, when we can request the certificates for our babies. We will proudly display them as proof that our babies were, in fact, born.
Thanks to some very dedicated mothers, this will soon change. Beginning in March, New York State will offer Certificates of Stillbirth. The law is retroactive, so anyone who has had a stillbirth (at more than 20 weeks gestation) can request a birth certificate for their baby. (Our stillbirth was at 20 weeks and 4 days, so we cross the required threshold to qualify.)
After coming home from the hospital, it took a while to sink in that we would not receive birth certificates. Once it did, we were very upset, but poured our energy into the March of Dimes. We were so grateful to these wonderfully dedicated mothers for making this happen. We are very excited for March, when we can request the certificates for our babies. We will proudly display them as proof that our babies were, in fact, born.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Trying Again
In an effort to cope with the loss of our twins, my husband announced (to anyone who would listen) that we would be trying again as soon as the doctor gave us the okay. I wasn't sure that I would be ready right away, but I was devastated when the doctor told us at our follow up appointment that he recommended we wait six months before trying again. Our grief over the loss of the twins was three-fold: (1) the loss of Caiden and Kaylie - a pain that would dull with time, but could never go away completely, no matter how many more children we have, (2) the loss of the excitement of twins - this part could be relieved if we have twins again in the future, but my doctor assured me that in all likelihood we will never conceive twins again (what he perceived to be good news, but I took as another devastating blow), and (3) the loss of having a baby, especially while all of our friends were bringing home healthy babies. The last, at least, was something that we could fix by starting to try again. So, although I didn't want to start trying the next week, I thought a month or two would be a good waiting period.
At my follow up appointment to the D&C, the doctor had changed his mind. He said that it was good to wait six months to allow my body to return to normal before getting pregnant again, but since we didn't know that we would be successful on our first try, he thought it was okay for us to start trying sooner. I was ecstatic! Much sooner than I had originally anticipated, I would be able to do something to relieve some of our grief.
However, I did not anticipate the emotional roller coaster that was to come. I knew that when I was pregnant again it would be the craziest roller coaster ride we had ever been on, but I didn't expect the effort to get us there would also be a roller coaster. Over several agonizing months, we experienced the roller coaster - the raw emotions of "moving forward" after our loss (not that we were forgetting or minimizing our loss, but working to move forward nonetheless), the tears with every negative pregnancy test from sadness that we were unsuccessful yet again and frustration about the unfairness that we had to go through the roller coaster again the next month. During this time, I lived my life two weeks at a time: two weeks of doing whatever I wanted: drinking, eating raw cookie dough, getting tattoos (okay only one), and two weeks of being on my best behavior in case we had been successful.
However, thankfully, after these agonizing months, we had a positive pregnancy test! I had expected to be filled with mixed emotions and most likely more scared than happy at the sight of those two little pink lines, but just the opposite happened. I was over the moon! Scared, of course, but that was secondary to my excitement. I took the test on a Sunday morning. I was the lector at church later that morning. At my church, the lector sits all by themselves, to the side of the Altar. It was a good thing I was alone, because during the quiet prayer times, I could barely keep the tears of excitement out of my eyes.
One additional exciting note is that the due date is our wedding anniversary! I fully expect a roller coaster of emotions until then (or whenever the baby decides to arrive), but I hope that I can enjoy every crazy minute of it. I know all too well that things can go terribly wrong in a heartbeat, and then all you have to look back on are the pictures and memories. So my goal is to get as many pictures, videos, audio files of our baby as possible and make as many memories as one small family can manage over the next several months. If anything goes wrong, at least we will have these things to remind us of happier times, and if we end up with a healthy baby, we will have even more to treasure.
At my follow up appointment to the D&C, the doctor had changed his mind. He said that it was good to wait six months to allow my body to return to normal before getting pregnant again, but since we didn't know that we would be successful on our first try, he thought it was okay for us to start trying sooner. I was ecstatic! Much sooner than I had originally anticipated, I would be able to do something to relieve some of our grief.
However, I did not anticipate the emotional roller coaster that was to come. I knew that when I was pregnant again it would be the craziest roller coaster ride we had ever been on, but I didn't expect the effort to get us there would also be a roller coaster. Over several agonizing months, we experienced the roller coaster - the raw emotions of "moving forward" after our loss (not that we were forgetting or minimizing our loss, but working to move forward nonetheless), the tears with every negative pregnancy test from sadness that we were unsuccessful yet again and frustration about the unfairness that we had to go through the roller coaster again the next month. During this time, I lived my life two weeks at a time: two weeks of doing whatever I wanted: drinking, eating raw cookie dough, getting tattoos (okay only one), and two weeks of being on my best behavior in case we had been successful.
However, thankfully, after these agonizing months, we had a positive pregnancy test! I had expected to be filled with mixed emotions and most likely more scared than happy at the sight of those two little pink lines, but just the opposite happened. I was over the moon! Scared, of course, but that was secondary to my excitement. I took the test on a Sunday morning. I was the lector at church later that morning. At my church, the lector sits all by themselves, to the side of the Altar. It was a good thing I was alone, because during the quiet prayer times, I could barely keep the tears of excitement out of my eyes.
One additional exciting note is that the due date is our wedding anniversary! I fully expect a roller coaster of emotions until then (or whenever the baby decides to arrive), but I hope that I can enjoy every crazy minute of it. I know all too well that things can go terribly wrong in a heartbeat, and then all you have to look back on are the pictures and memories. So my goal is to get as many pictures, videos, audio files of our baby as possible and make as many memories as one small family can manage over the next several months. If anything goes wrong, at least we will have these things to remind us of happier times, and if we end up with a healthy baby, we will have even more to treasure.
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Halloween
When Caiden and Kaylie were born so early, I had not yet started to plan much of their future. I hadn't even found a doctor or daycare for them yet. I hadn't started to dream of their weddings or them becoming a doctor or lawyer (although we had talked about them becoming professional athletes). I hadn't designed the nursery yet. I hadn't put much thought into their Christmas presents. But I had started to plan for Halloween.
Every year we go a little more over the top with costumes for our animals. I enjoy dressing them up. I even enjoy all the eye rolling that I get from family and friends about the fact that we are dressing up our animals. Everyone has told us "If you do all this for your animals, I can't wait until you have kids to see how you dress them up!" With a challenge like that I had to start planning early! I was excited with all the fun possibilities for twin costumes. We had only known for a couple weeks that we were having a boy and a girl, so I had only started to think about costumes, but I had planned that there would be many!
Now that all of those hopes are dashed, I am having a hard time with the impending holiday. I bought a couple of figurines of teddy bears dressed in costumes - one boy (frankenstein) and one girl (a witch) and brought them to the cemetery. They are perched on the gravestone. But I really don't want to participate in Halloween this year. We have been invited to a number of parties, but I don't feel like dressing up and partying. I also don't want to invite trick-or-treaters to my house and give out candy. I just want to hibernate until the holiday is over. Maybe this is me avoiding my grief and it is unhealthy, but who wants to go trick-or-treating at the crazy crying lady's house anyway?
Perhaps I will get some last minute costumes for our animals and we can have our own private Halloween celebration. That way I won't look like a crazy lady if I cry, but I'm also not avoiding my grief.
Every year we go a little more over the top with costumes for our animals. I enjoy dressing them up. I even enjoy all the eye rolling that I get from family and friends about the fact that we are dressing up our animals. Everyone has told us "If you do all this for your animals, I can't wait until you have kids to see how you dress them up!" With a challenge like that I had to start planning early! I was excited with all the fun possibilities for twin costumes. We had only known for a couple weeks that we were having a boy and a girl, so I had only started to think about costumes, but I had planned that there would be many!
Now that all of those hopes are dashed, I am having a hard time with the impending holiday. I bought a couple of figurines of teddy bears dressed in costumes - one boy (frankenstein) and one girl (a witch) and brought them to the cemetery. They are perched on the gravestone. But I really don't want to participate in Halloween this year. We have been invited to a number of parties, but I don't feel like dressing up and partying. I also don't want to invite trick-or-treaters to my house and give out candy. I just want to hibernate until the holiday is over. Maybe this is me avoiding my grief and it is unhealthy, but who wants to go trick-or-treating at the crazy crying lady's house anyway?
Perhaps I will get some last minute costumes for our animals and we can have our own private Halloween celebration. That way I won't look like a crazy lady if I cry, but I'm also not avoiding my grief.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
I am fine*.
It has been almost six months since Caiden and Kaylie were born. Every day is a struggle, but I am fine*. I think that I am coping relatively well. There is not an hour that goes by that I don't think about them. Sometimes I cry for all that we lost. Sometimes I laugh to myself about the good times (our reaction when we saw two heads on the monitor, our families' reactions when we told them the news). I re-live different events every day. Sometimes the good, sometimes the bad. I don't cry every day anymore, but I do still cry often. I have good times when I can accomplish a lot, and bad times when all I can do is put all my energy into a cause that will alleviate someone else's pain (i.e. knitting for An Angel's Love or planning next year's March of Dimes walk events).
I say "I am fine" with an asterisk because all of the above is true only in my little bubble. Anytime my bubble bursts, my "fine-ness" falls apart. My bubble isolates me from all of the happiness of babies. I have "unsubscribed" on Facebook from all of my friends who are pregnant or who had babies after Caiden and Kaylie were born (surprisingly it doesn't bother me too much to see the babies who were born before Caiden and Kaylie - I guess because those were better times). I have distanced myself from all of my friends who have recently had babies. I avoid stores as much as possible (apparently shopping is good free entertainment for young kids because they are everywhere at the malls and grocery stores).
Unfortunately, these measures are not entirely successful and not without cost. I can't figure out how to hide Facebook posts all together, so if another friend, who is not unsubscribed, comments on a photo of someone who is, the photo will still appear in my news feed. And Facebook is so "smart" that it thinks I would like to see ads about babies. I feel terrible about distancing myself from my friends. I want them to be happy for me when my time finally comes and I feel like I need to be happy for them now if I expect them to return the favor, but when I think about how happy they are (or even how sleep deprived and frazzled they are), it reminds me of how not-happy I am. I believe that they are understanding and will still be happy for me when my time comes even if I can't show them now how happy I am for them, but I still feel guilty.
In addition, my bubble has recently been weakening. My workplace is now full of men adding children to their families (thank God there are no women currently expecting). Soon I will have an empty newsfeed when I log into Facebook because I will have unsubscribed from everyone at the rate new announcements are coming. I can't avoid shopping forever; eventually I will have to get back into a regular shopping schedule. But I am fighting as hard as I can to keep my bubble in tact at least a little longer.
I am sure that this bubble will become unnecessary once I have held our next (healthy) baby in my arms, and hopefully long before that. But I am not there yet. For now, I am fine*.
I say "I am fine" with an asterisk because all of the above is true only in my little bubble. Anytime my bubble bursts, my "fine-ness" falls apart. My bubble isolates me from all of the happiness of babies. I have "unsubscribed" on Facebook from all of my friends who are pregnant or who had babies after Caiden and Kaylie were born (surprisingly it doesn't bother me too much to see the babies who were born before Caiden and Kaylie - I guess because those were better times). I have distanced myself from all of my friends who have recently had babies. I avoid stores as much as possible (apparently shopping is good free entertainment for young kids because they are everywhere at the malls and grocery stores).
Unfortunately, these measures are not entirely successful and not without cost. I can't figure out how to hide Facebook posts all together, so if another friend, who is not unsubscribed, comments on a photo of someone who is, the photo will still appear in my news feed. And Facebook is so "smart" that it thinks I would like to see ads about babies. I feel terrible about distancing myself from my friends. I want them to be happy for me when my time finally comes and I feel like I need to be happy for them now if I expect them to return the favor, but when I think about how happy they are (or even how sleep deprived and frazzled they are), it reminds me of how not-happy I am. I believe that they are understanding and will still be happy for me when my time comes even if I can't show them now how happy I am for them, but I still feel guilty.
In addition, my bubble has recently been weakening. My workplace is now full of men adding children to their families (thank God there are no women currently expecting). Soon I will have an empty newsfeed when I log into Facebook because I will have unsubscribed from everyone at the rate new announcements are coming. I can't avoid shopping forever; eventually I will have to get back into a regular shopping schedule. But I am fighting as hard as I can to keep my bubble in tact at least a little longer.
I am sure that this bubble will become unnecessary once I have held our next (healthy) baby in my arms, and hopefully long before that. But I am not there yet. For now, I am fine*.
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