The Reading #2

The day after our BFN, I called Walter. I needed to know what happened with our spirit baby. I needed to know if she left. I needed to know what I did wrong. It's been almost three months, and we finally had our reading.

Our spirit baby is still with us, but she has been laying low. She is grieving too. Walter said that all of my feelings of sadness may not be my own. Sometimes, she is hanging off our necks and crying. Unfortunately, he did not get much information from her about why she did not come. From the answers to the questions I asked, I got the impression that it didn't have anything to do with Magic or I.

At first, I felt happy after the reading because at least she is still around. But I also feel hopeless, which makes me feel incredibly sad. The reading made me feel as if there is nothing I can do at this point. Alternatively, I feel I have so much to do and I fear that if I put that much energy into it again, I'll just end up heartbroken once more. I worry that she will not believe me when I tell her that I love her and that I really want her to come. All I can do is try to move through the grief and depression. I also have to try to keep my fertility up for a few more months, a feat that is not easy at my age, especially when you feel the situation is hopeless. The reading confirmed that the grief and depression are not doing anything for my fertility, which I already knew. We can not rush this. The earliest we will try again is fall, if that is still an option for us.

Choosing Life

This has been my motto since Friday, "chose life". What point would it be to go around moping about my bad statistics? What spirit baby is going to want to come into my life if I just think about offing it because I can't get pregnant. What illusion am I buying into? No matter what, I am going to chose life.

Friday morning after the bad news, I didn't feel like eating. I went into the basement and dug out my juicer. I grabbed whatever vegetables I had in the frig and juiced up a big glass of veggie juice. I also got so mad that none of the "Sea of Supplements" helped me, that I took a supplement holiday. And you know what? I feel great. The juice really seems to be helping me. I've been juicing now twice a day since Friday. I can't eat enough vegetables in the day, so this makes sense to me to get more veggies in liquid form. My body likes it.

The real reason I started juicing is because somewhere in the back of my head, I remembered Julia_Indichova's book "Inconceivable" and how she started sucking down the juice to get pregnant with her high FSH. I actually went to one of Julia's workshops between IVF #1 and IVF #2. While I think she is a bit dramatic and very opinionated about IVF (did you miss the part where I said we had no choice because my husband had a vasectomy?!), I like her basic message that is to be your own authority. I pulled out her second book again, "The_Fertile_Female; How the Power of Longing for a Child Can Save Your Life and Change the World". It's a tall order, but I want to see just how far this longing will take me. I put all my confidence in my acupuncturists, and I didn't listen to my body. I didn't pay attention to all the stress I had been under with Fluffernutter passing away. Grief is so physically exhausting. I had my schedule, and I was sticking to it. Death is so inconvenient.

In a way, I am glad I got the bad news. It was a wake up call. I don't know if I can turn the tide of time against me anymore. I did pull it off for awhile, though I have not given up yet. Sure, I spent a day wallowing in self pity, but I needed a swift kick in the pants to wake up. This is not going to be easy at age 42 and I'll probably be 43 by the time I do IVF again (if they let me). I have to up the ante. I also have to listen to pay attention to myself better and try try try to get out of my head. Giving grief its space wasn't in the plan, but I see that I should have respected that. Another hard lesson learned. I hope to post more soon about my recent overhaul.

Psycho PMS Bitch meets Grief Beast

The uncontrollable crying started yesterday. The tip off I had that this was PMS related was that I had the same thing happen last month; the sobbing while not really sure where it was coming from - from nowhere and everything at once. The other tip off was that I started spotting this morning. Why is it that PMS magnifies any sad feelings you are having a hundred times?

I was doing laundry today, and it reminded me of Fluffernutter. What cat doesn't like sleeping in the dirty laundry? That made me cry. I cried again for those who never were and were lost. With every new loss, the past losses feel as if they are happening fresh all over again.

I asked Magic to make dinner tonight. I smell something burning from downstairs and come up to see the kitchen filled with smoke. He left to go to his office and thought I would somehow magically intuit that I need to watch the soup. I was in such a rage. It was a good thing neither he nor Fluff were here. Screaming like that really does not make me feel better. It makes me feel psychotic and gives me a sore throat.

I can bear this knowing that it is transitory and will only last a day, the PMS that is. I wish there was an antidepressant I could take for a day or two only for PMS. Should I have known that if I suffer severe and sometimes suicidal mood swings during PMS that I would have pre-natal suicidal depression? Not even the neurotransmitter precursors I am taking as a supplement help with this type of hormone crash. I suppose I should be happy that I have any hormones to crash. I'm hoping that is the silver lining in all of this.

I had a couple of disturbing dreams the other night. I dreamt that Fluff was alive and healthy. I said to Magic in the dream, "how is this possible? She was dead?!" He said, "I need to give you and explanation." My mind was frantic, thinking, "did I take her to be cremated and she was actually still alive??!" I never got an answer, as that was where the dream ended. The next dream was about a cat who had markings like Fluff, but was not as fluffy. She came to me, as many of my cats do, and had a long stitched up scar along her body. She was someone else's cat, because she had a collar with tags on, but I didn't want to know who she belonged to. I wanted to keep her. Grief has a funny way of working its way out in your dreams.

I've had moments of feeling exhausted over the past couple of days. It's that monster, grief again. When I let the exhaustion really overcome me, the tears soon follow. I know grief is crushing me and I need to let it out. I guess I haven't really let it sink in how much of a hole in my heart has been exposed by Fluffernutter's passing. My super-ego says, "she was just a cat, get over it." I come home and look for her, but she's not here. She's not in the laundry. She's not anywhere. I can't even hold onto her in my dreams.

This is like some modern day horror movie, Psycho PMS Bitch meet Grief Beast. I wish it were entertaining like the cheesey Godzilla meets King Kong. I wish it was a movie, but it's all too real. All I can do is hold on and hope tomorrow is a better day. I'm still waiting to be happy again, someday.

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.

The Stages of Grief

1. Sadness:
It is interesting that in the usual stages of grief, sadness is not mentioned. Depression instead is one of the stages. I am not depressed (yet). I am sad. I am deeply sad that our spirit_baby did not come. Why did she not come? I fell in love with her and now I feel that she has left. I visualized her in my uterus so much that I felt like I was carrying her. It is a loss. My heart aches.

I do come home after work and immediately get into bed and lay there all night. I've been lying on the couch a lot today, but I'm reading a good book. Ok, maybe I'm a little depressed.

2. Anger:
I am angry with our spirit_baby. I gave her so much love, and she gave me nothing back in return. Is she being picky about the embryo she chooses? Doesn't she know how much I have sacrificed for her? How much money I have spent? I don't have time for her to wait. I am already well past the fertility-dropping-off-the-edge-of-a-cliff age. I try not to be angry with her, but until I know the reason why she did not come, I can't help but act out in anger.

I was also angry with Magic initially. I blamed him for scaring away our spirit_baby. He was so grumpy and unsupportive when we moved the embryos. He is afraid of having more children. I know he has acted out of fear. Why won't he have a reverse-vasectomy? Why can't he share in some of the physical agony? I can resolve my anger with Magic more easily than our spirit_baby because he is much easier to talk to.

3. Denial:
Well, I have not gotten my period yet, so maybe I could be pregnant? Pee-on-a-stick cuz what the heck and I have one left. I could still have my miracle, couldn't I? Negative. Start the grief process over again with sadness.

4. Bargaining:
This is one step of the grief process I refuse to submit to. I will not be the desperate barren woman. I will not beg for a child. I will not sell my soul for this quest. I have done that and paid the price. I told myself before I got my beta and knew for sure that I would not let this define my life. I am more than my ability or non-ability to have a child. No, I will not reduce myself to bargaining.

Perhaps the one bit of bargaining I have done is that I have told myself, if only I could know why our spirit_baby did not come, then I would be alright. I have tried to contact her again, but I been unsuccessful in getting anything back. Maybe if I could reach her, then she will come the next time we try. Ok, I am bargaining. Fuck.

5. Acceptance:
I felt a twang of acceptance this morning. I had been through all the other stages of grief. Then, as I felt this bit of acceptance, I cycled through all the other stages of grief again, but more deeply this time. I suppose this is how it will be, for awhile yet.

Expecto Patronum!

I've been seeing my patronus around lately. I saw them this morning and again this evening. I wasn't feeling particularly happy when I saw them, quite the opposite. Maybe it's an encouraging sign for me, to "buck" up, your patronus is here to keep the Dementors away. Those Dementors have been circling me lately, sucking the happiness out of me. I can feel them draining my life spirit. I can use all the encouragement I can get right now. I'm still grieving. It's been three months.

Don't know what your patronus is? Take this quiz to find out which patronus you would create. It's kinda silly, but what the heck?!

Bury My Heart

After I read the book "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee", I felt pretty depressed. After I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., I was bummed out for two days. But this is personal. This is one of the hardest losses I've ever had to deal with. It's been four weeks, and I'm still crying everyday. It's the first time I've ever taken anti-depressants. The anti-depressants allow me to function, so I don't wallow in depression, but they do not numb the pain. I still have my feelings, and I still have my sadness. Sometimes I just feel like I want to bury my broken heart.

I can't tell you how many times I've listened to Tracy Chapman's song "Remember the Tinman" over the last couple of weeks. I've been really resonating with the whole theme of losing your heart. Yesterday, I paused to reflect on these two lines at the end of the song that caught my attention:

"And remember the Tin Man
found he had what he thought he lacked.
Remember the Tin Man,
Go find your heart and take it back!"

A part of me looks at having a baby as fulfilling a part of my life that is empty. I feel deficient for not having children. Maybe the part of me that feels empty will still feel empty even after I have a child? Or maybe what I am seeking in having a child I have already? I know it's my ego telling me that I'm deficient and that I must have a child to make my life whole, but intellectual knowing and feeling like crap are two different things.

The repetitive negative thoughts get in the way of my grieving process. When the thoughts keep rolling over and over like the hamster on the wheel, I have to consciously stop them, take a deep breath, feel my heart, and that is when the tears come, again and again.

Shell Shocked

It's been less than a month. Why do I feel this way? I realized that I'm shell shocked. I keep waiting for things to get better. I keep waiting for the pain to go away. It comes and goes in different waves of different emotions. Sadness, guilt, anger, doubt...I keep going back to "why did this happen to me?". The Wizards tell me it's too soon to think about anything else but grieving.

We were told by our clinic that what had happened to us was 0.4% of their last 750 cycles. How do you plan for 0.4%?

I can't help but think about trying again, but I also am too terrified to go there, too traumatized to even think about it. I know I need to sink into the sadness, to allow the grieving. But sometimes, it feels like too much. It wasn't supposed to be this way. How much more can I let my heart break?