Monday, April 6, 2009

Missing

I have heard of others having this feeling, but it is new to me. Someone is missing from our family. I feel that. I get it now, but I don't know how to get her here. I have grandiose ideas, but I have neither the money nor the will to make it happen right now. I know it's still early. I'll give myself another day before I start making appointments. Or maybe the day after that, or the day after that. I don't know if it's the spirit_baby we had been communicating with before or a different one, but she is missing.

I was in the grocery store yesterday, when all of the sudden I was overwhelmed with emotion. Watching parents shop with their babies or toddlers made me sad. I can not sit in a meeting without identifying the participants by their pregnancies I have watched them go through and their children. It's all I can do to hold back the tears. I am obsessed, but still, I can not find her.

I feel frustrated by how long this process takes. When I was in the 2ww, I realized, this is not two weeks or even nine days. It represents the three and a half years I have been working on this. All the surgeries, procedures, doctors visits, acupuncture sessions and all the waiting in between, all condensed into that wait-till-beta limbo. Now, it's like I'm in the 2ww without anything to look forward to. No appointments scheduled. No plan. Just this void in my heart.

I know why women feel they are lost at this point. Because it feels like nothing is there.

15 comments:

Nadine said...

Oh Pheobe, I really feel for you right now, it's such a hard time, I'm sorry that she's lost, and I must say that is exactly how I would have described how I felt when we had our lost if I had the eloquent way with words that you have.
here for you.

Muser Grace said...

Oh, Phoebe...oh I can't even imagine the grief you must be feeling. When I realized earlier this year that I will probably not get pregnant again, that my one awful experience of pregnancy and the post-partum period are probably my only experience of that, when i realized that I will probably never know this child I often think I can feel as close as my own breath...oh, it was awful. And I have a child. So I have some little sense of your pain and yet know it must be so much bigger than I can imagine. And I ache for you. And hope for you. And believe that you are a mother and you will find a way, some way, somehow, to love yourself, to heal, to nurture yourself, and to help your little one come into being...some way, some how. Prayers and love. And, BTW, I am amazed that you are still reading my blog. Don't ever feel bad about commenting. I totally understand if you need to disappear...

onwardandsideways said...

Very well said, Phoebe. I think it's posts like these that help other women to get through this.

I read a beautiful quote on another blog before we started our DE adventure about your child being 'out there', waiting for you to find him/her. And that it didn't matter how they came to be part of your family. They are your child in spirit and they are waiting for you to find them. I found that very comforting and it really helped me accept the whole DE process much better.

I never really felt like I was part of my family, in many respects. My brother's ex-wife (who is a psychic) told me that she thought I was a changeling because I was so different from the rest of my family. Or some being that came from somewhere else. I used to laugh at that, but maybe there's something to it.

I think you will find your child and complete your family. I wish you strength and courage along the way.

the misfit said...

I think I understand that. I don't have the sense that I'm missing a person exactly - well, unless that person is me - but that I'm missing my life. Like I was packing and it got lost in the move. I think we have to be willing to sit around and be lost for a time - but also ready to take the next step off into the darkness when it comes up. I just don't know when it's coming...

Emily said...

After almost 4 years of this, the pain that smacks me in the gut at the most ordinary moments still takes my breath away. It is such a terrible feeling - so filled with longing and feeling incomplete.

One thing that has always kept me going is having a plan & I can't imagine how lost you must be feeling without one right now. A never ending 2ww hell would probably accurately describe it...

Keep fighting, keep searching - she will be back!

Lost in Space said...

You said it all so perfectly, Phoebe. I can feel every word, the void, the lost "nothing".

You are so right in that it is not just the 2ww, but the many years leading up to the verdict at the end of that wait.

I wish I had an answer or some funding to help start your next plan. The best I can give are some hugs, understanding, and the promise to stay by your side...

luna said...

so tough to dal with the grief of failed cycles. and the longing for what is not. wishing you some strength and peace.

Anonymous said...

I am so sad. I have just read all your latest news and it's heart wrenching. maybe S_B is tired too and is off in bed with the covers over her head also wondering what her next step is.

The void and the emptiness of that missing piece... I had never felt anything like it before in my life and it is a frightening abyss.

Big hugs from far away. take your time. the next step will present itself someday.

Rela Pantaleon said...

I'm praying for comfort and wisdom for you and Magic...

Arpee @ The Saga of Becoming Fruitful

Duffy said...

Phoebe, I am so very sorry. I am grieving for you and with you. What a terrible sense of loss you must be experiencing. Be gentle with yourself as you travel through this.


I hesitate to share this, but I always had this very real sense of our son (I didn't know he was a "he" though) before and during our process of ttc. I knew there was a baby, our baby, a spirit meant to be a part of our family. Someone once said to me, "If your child was here and was trapped somewhere away from you, wouldn't you do everything possible to get to them?" And her words gave me this strange hope and acceptance that all that I was going through was worth it and warranted. But what I wanted to share, very carefully, is that the sense of our baby being near often completely disappeared for periods, especially around the time of our successful IVF. I told myself maybe he had gone away to gain the wisdom he was needing to bring to us somehow. My Cherokee friend would say he was "communing with the elders".

Maybe your spirit baby is communing with the elders. I believe she will return to you and be with you, some way, somehow.

In the meantime, may you find some peace and healing in the midst of this.

Mo said...

Phoebe,

thinking of you. wishing this didn't suck so much.

Mo

Cara said...

Oh yeah, the tangibility of empty space is very real - but most people never experience it.

I just pray that you will experience the extreme joy of fillin that space - for you will truly experience that!

((hugs))

loribeth said...

You absolutely nailed it -- it's not just two weeks, it's everything that went before those two weeks too. (((hugs)))

Josée Martens said...

Wow, spicy sisters response to your emotional, sad, and beautiful post was great. i am reading about and learning to connect with my spirit_baby. I wish you and your baby to meet soon out in this physical world.

Anonymous said...

I have the same sense that there is a baby out there that belongs to me and that I just need to find her. I don't know where she is or how to get to her. With all my bad ART mojo I am starting to believe this child may not be of my flesh and I have to start looking elsewhere. I just know I feel incomplete. I'm so sorry you are hurting.