cut, torn

well, the boy has arrived.

after days and days of talking to my sister about when and how and what the fuck regarding her impending labor and birth, it happened, but certainly NOT quite the way i expected. (NO SHIT, right? did i just say EXPECTED??? well, yeah, i kinda did expect it to go smoothly and normally...it wasn't ME, after all. don't i sound like a spoiled friggin brat?)

her water broke on sunday morning and i drove down there asap. i got her walking, walking, and more walking. nothing. after about 5 hours of dragging her sticky slimy self around town without a contraction to speak of, off we went to the hospital...where we learned that she was GBS+...ummmm...shouldn't the doctor told her that? shouldn't the covering doc have checked that when my sister called in when her water broke?? it was right in the chart at the hospital, yet the covering asked my sister whether she knew (no) and then told her to do whatever she wanted.

ummmmmmm...am i an asshole or isn't GBS with a broken water a cause of term stillbirth??? was the covering doc going to call us back if my sister's "whatever she wants" included NOT going to the hospital until contractions started (which would have meant, pretty much, not for a long, looooooong- maybe into days- time)? maybe i am just over-sensitive.

we arrived at the hospital at about 4pm and they started her on pitocin, the scary, labor-inducing, monster contractions drug.

nothing. nothing. noooooooooooope! no contractions.

NO LABOR.

they upped the pitocin all night and finally turned it off at 3am. they tried again at 7am, to no avail. c-section was called for 10.30.

words can't describe what was going through me. my mind and flesh were so confused...i was bracing for being present for this labor and delivery, bracing for the envy and the plain heaviness of it all and then...nothing.

i was relieved yet very, very sad about her having a c-section.

i have never minced words, i have never tried to perfume my shit thoughts and feelings. i've always been brutally honest here, so i admit i was relieved that i didn't have to be slapped in the face, AGAIN, by someone with the same parents as i have. i'm relieved i don't have to be the fucking family freak...again...alone.

i carried triplets and my cervix never shortened or softened or opened. after (still)birthing paige (by c-sec) on her due date, the doctor told me he didn't think i would have gone into labor spontaneously seeing as my cervix was not soft, shortened, or open at all. my sister didn't go into labor after her some bloody show, ruptured membranes, and hours of a shithouse full of pitocin. maybe i would have had problems from the beginning...without triplets...even with one baby. maybe i never would have had the birth i think i lost because i got pregnant with triplets and an automatic c-section. maybe my fantasies are just that. maybe i can't know shit about shit so why wait around for things to keep disproving my *poor me* theories?

really, why bother?

moving on, the baby boy is really quite adorable. i am certainly NOT the baby ohhhing-goooing type, but he is pushing me into a *want a baby* phase. luckily those phases are short-lived, you know, considering i'm all let-go-and-let-the-powers-of-the-universe about getting pregnant.

reproduction is NOT what it's cracked up to be.

the mirror has two faces

here i am, simultaneously anticipating my dead baby's first birthday and waiting for my sister to call and tell me she's in labor.

(are you kidding me?)

i really am excited for her to become a mother. i'm really glad that she will be more able to relate to my stupid mom stuff. i'm so excited to become an aunt! i am really, really happy about our growing family, especially in light of the fact that we've pushed my mother so close to the sidelines she's almost in the parking lot. we are creating this whole new universe; we are creating this close extended family life for our kids. and my sisters and i, we're the new matriarchs. it feels good.

i am going to be with her during her labor and birth. we've talked about it- what she's learned in lamaze, and what i've read about what could be helpful. it's been making me a bit, i don't know, uneven-feeling, talking about something i've always wanted to experience but probably NEVER can. also, there's that whole thing about WHAT THE FUCK DO I KNOW ABOUT IT? i've never been in labor. on the other hand, i want to be an OB nurse, and this is going to be my first real-live birth. i sometimes wonder how i will feel helping women in labor and not being able to totally relate, but then remember how many male OBs there are. i may even be better than a bitch OB nurse who had nine vaginal deliveries. the real issue, i think, is my envy.

(don't worry- i realize that once those babies come out dead, i'll be star OB nurse of the fucking century...i wonder if i'll feel like i'm just doing the necessary until my REAL job presents itself (a dead baby)...like batman...haha)

talking to her waiting to go into labor...it's also sucking me right back into that huge pregnant body i had one year ago to the week...that whole WAITING to go into labor. the waiting. the wondering. the fucking anti-climactic WAAAAAAAITING. this morning i thought about how sometimes, when my insides start gurgling and kicking about, i'm still pregnant. i think i'll feel pregnant forever, in those moments before my brain kicks in and starts screaming, "YOU HAD A DEAD BABY YOU FUCKING IDIOT AND YOU CAN'T GET PREGNANT AGAIN SO JUST KEEP TELLING YOURSELF YOU DON'T WANT TO BE!!" i get sad for myself that she will (most probably) wait and wait and then begin labor but i will continue to wait. i get sad about it. i get sad about how my waiting ended in a silent ultrasound in the ER. i get sad about still waiting, in those moments when i'll be pregnant forever and ever.

i've been trying not to anticipate the actual birthday. i know that these weeks and days leading up to it are worse, but maybe the anticipatory grief is it's own player. i imagine the things i want to do that day. i can barely think about it without losing it. i didn't think i would feel this way, but i do. i can't believe i will think about having a one, two, ten, seventeen, twenty-three, forty-five year old daughter who is missing every year of my life on september the 9th. i can't believe my flesh will feel that torrential mourning when it feels and smells the summer warmth turn chilly. (fuck. fuck. fuck. FUCKKKKKKKKK.)

this year, i think i want to make a cake. it is a birthday. she was born that day, even though dead. i think i want to make a cake every year. i think i feel like she's not here, but i still appreciate her and everything i've become since she became a part of me. this all sounds really zen and accepting and big of me, but for real, when i think about that cake i feel like i want to die. to me, that might mean i'm on to something...

it's over...the dreaded convo

i hadn't told my daughters (or son) that my sister was going to have a baby. i didn't want to tell them someone else had a baby in their belly. there were many reasons, as you can imagine.

here's how the conversation went, on the drive to her baby shower:

me: "girls, i have to tell you something. auntie j is going to have a baby. IT'S A BOY. the baby is in her belly right now."

(i thought to stress it was a boy so they wouldn't think...i don't know...about my girl.)

a: "like your baby, mommy...but you have a girl in your belly!"

me: "no, honey, mommy doesn't have a baby in my belly anymore. she died."

e: "oh. can i have cake at the party?"

i've read it over and over in deadbabyland. the conversation will cut you like a knife and then be over with the most flippant of requests.

but they remember.

my mother's day gift

my dead daughter gave me my father back.

in the months since i realized my mother has narc1ss1st1c pers0nal1ty d1s0rder, we've learned that she's lied about incest, tried to convince all of us that we were molested a la munchhausen by proxy, and last but not least told my entire father's family that if they didn't cut off my father after the divorce, they could not continue relationships with us (the kids).

i saw my father this past monday, after about 10 years (if not more). he's scared shitless of my mother. he is so different than she is...he's exactly like us- my sisters and i. it makes me so sad that we've missed so many years; it makes me so sad that we've been mentally and emotionally abused by my mother all this time and had not even known it.

i'm sad that i would have let my father go to his grave without having a relationship with him without the shit goggles my mother put on all of us...and i'm REALLY sad that i got my dad back because my baby is dead. because, really, that's what happened. that's how this all went down.

how do i reconcile it all? happy, sad. my baby has given me so much, yet there's nothing i can do for her. except realize that i am her. she is me. and i'm gonna take these gifts, goddamn it.

do i even want to?

my sister is 19 weeks pregnant.

two weeks ago, they informed her that her blood serum indicated an increased chance of spin@ bifid@. last thursday, i went to the genetic counselor with her because her husband couldn't make it. it turned out to be a good thing, since i had to answer so many questions; my infertility and stillbirth increases her chances of problems...from their chart's point of view, anyway.

two days ago, she had her ultrasound. (i'm still fucking shocked at how long they made her wait to find out. i would have NEVER been able to wait that long, but then again, i'm totally batshit crazy at this point.)

the baby is fine, as far as they can see. it's also a boy, which i'm thrilled to death about. i'm really glad i don't have to worry about having another baby girl around to remind me of anything. A BOY. a totally different species. thank the good lord above.

(it's seven months today since my baby died. i am running out of steam. i am running out of care. it's inside me, but i don't want to acknowledge it.)

i'm still not pregnant. HOLY SHIT!! big surprise, right? the whole thing just seems so ridiculous. i'm trying to get pregnant again. the longer it takes to happen, the more times a day i will go back and forth on whether or not i really want it to happen. i am so fucking angry. and sad.

i don't want to do this anymore. i don't know what i want. i just hope i keep caring less and less.

blood

my sister called yesterday and told me she had a spot of blood. she pushed the paper in a little and there it was.

last time that happened, i was about 7 months pregnant and encouraged her to think positively until she got an ultrasound. she miscarried at 8 weeks.

when she got pregnant this time, i assured her that the mother-fucked timing of her due date (p@ige's one-year anniversary) would most certainly mean a safe arrival; isn't that how it usually works??

this time, i could hardly say anything at all except i'm sorry. i thought she would be someone who has that one "common" early miscarriage and then goes on without a problem. maybe she is, and she pushed that paper in a little too hard. maybe she isn't.

her pregnancy has been hard on me, as short as it's been so far. it really made me secretly want to get pregnant again. i think i still do. i'm a little jealous of her fertility; envious that she can get pregnant so easily. but i'm also looking forward to her baby...maybe even thinking that her baby can distract me from wanting my own. and i'm not beating myself up about the envy, it just is what it is, you know?

if she has a miscarriage, she's going to seriously lose it. she is a very, very sensitive girl. i don't even want to think about her traveling the road of miscarriage after miscarriage. when i was going through my infertile years, i was so very grateful that i just wasn't getting pregnant at all. i read many blogs of women who had miscarriages and really felt for them; the hope, the chance, that then was ripped away, time after time. i felt lucky in that respect.

please, please, please stay, little tiny thing. i can't take any more of this.
please, no more baby death.

where the fuck do i start??

i thought i would try denial for xmas. it was working, it really was. i was shopping, wrapping, cooking, planning, playing xmas music all the while.

deadbaby? WHERE? i'm no dead baby mama!

there were times i felt it, but i pushed it back. i just didn't want to be that person, upset for the holidays. and i was ok! i really was. for the most part. except i started thinking of her face alot. it's almost like the more i pushed it out, the more realistic it became.

then, today. my sister took a pregnancy test (at my urging; what? i need to knowwwww thingsssssss). she's pregnant. due date?

september 12th. 3 days after the anniversary. 1 day after the cremation.

am i going to lose it now? am i going to lose it next year?

HOLY SHIT.


ps- i missed all of you so much. i'll be trying to get to you all very soon, but husband is home and gets antsy if i'm on here too long...but i hope you all are holding up...i'm thinking of you!!!!!

ornaments FOUND

i knew i didn't want anything obvious. there were a couple of times i picked up something girlie, once even a funky hot pink one, which would have been cool, because i felt she was going to be a feisty one. but none of them were right. i just kept thinking i would know when i saw it.

the little acorn behind p@ige's is a gift for my sister, who lost her pregnancy at about 8 weeks this past summer. i'm not sure how much she's allowed to show her sadness about it; it's almost six months past and people have pretty much dismissed it already. but i know she's scarred badly. she is scared shitless to get pregnant again, even though it's the thing she most wants. she decided out of the blue to go to graduate school in january, and i think it's because it will naturally put off questions of when she'll try again.

our acorns. eerily relevant, yet totally mysterious.

perfect.