Baby Blues?

I guess I will just write about how I have been feeling lately. In a word - obsessed. I am obsessed with this pregnancy. Every time I feel a pain or movement or wave of nausea, I analyse it. I am doing my damnedest to stay positive here, I swear I am. But I just can't relax. Monday I went for an early scan (ultrasound). They call it a "reassurance scan" to appease women who have miscarried before - let them see the heartbeat, know that everything is fine and they don't have some horrible toothed creature where there womb should be that just devours little babies up and leaves you void of the chance of carrying to term forever. Because that is what it feels like when you lose a baby - like you are some freak that can't do the one thing that every other woman on the planet can do. Like your body is betraying you, fighting against you at every turn.

Anyway, we saw the baby (I am calling it the baby, not the embryo or fetus. This is part of my positivity - get over it). It was tiny. 4.6mm long, barely any shape at all that we could see, just a little round blob next to another round blob. The silence in the room petrified me, I held my breath as I waited for someone to tell me there was no heartbeat, that the pregnancy was not viable, that my baby was lost again. But then the midwife pointed to the first little blob, the little 4.6mm long dot. It was flashing, expanding and contracting. It's heart was beating. I wept. I couldn't stop weeping so they kept having to wait until I could see again to show me the screen properly. For the first time in two weeks - no, if I am honest, it was the first time in four months - I could breathe. Baby was ok. I was ok. Everything was going to be ok.

I walked around on a high, untouchable. There was nothing anyone could do or say that could possibly take away the joy that Max and I felt on Monday afternoon. We stared at our little scan picture for hours, refusing to put it down for more than five minutes in case it suddenly ceased to exist. We were going to be parents, really. Nothing was going to take that away from us this time. Monday and Tuesday nights were free from nightmares and panic attacks (the first of their kind in more than two weeks). I smiled to myself as I sat on the bathroom floor feeling like I was going to puke, because I knew that it would all be worth it now that I had a healthy baby with a healthy heartbeat.

Then this morning, as I went on to one of those silly little baby websites for expecting mums, I read a story of a woman who had a scan at 6 weeks - healthy, scan at 8 weeks - no heartbeat. I told myself it was one woman, and that one woman was not me. I listed all of the statistics back to myself - the vast majority of women who miscarry once have healthy second pregnancies, if you hear a heartbeat at 6 weeks you are 85% sure to carry the pregnancy to term. But then the other information sunk in. The family history - my Gram's string of miscarriages. My constant problems with my reproductive system since the age of 11. Some weird notion that I am just not meant to be happy or have the things in my life that I want - so why should this be any different?

What the hell is wrong with me? Can't I just be happy and relax? If I am going to carry this baby to term, I will do it regardless of statistics or family history or my bizarre obsession with failure. I will have this baby in spite of my tendency towards stress and panic, in spite of my absent-minded consumption of cream cheese three days ago or the fact that I got my hair coloured before I knew I was pregnant. And I will do it without having to worry every moment of every day about something going terribly wrong.

I'm just not sure how, yet.

New beginnings

I have had a little trouble with blogging lately. Not sure if it is to do with my new found love of crochet, patchwork and jewellery making (my god, I am turning into a middle-aged housewife) or the mood swings that have been smacking me (and poor Max) over the head for the last two weeks. Maybe it was just because I didn't have anything very interesting to report. Unlike many of you, I am no good at making the ordinary interesting. My crazy life is the key to any writing of mine that can be deemed entertaining in any form, and frankly my life has ceased to be terribly crazy lately.

For which I am very grateful, believe me.

I've been getting along with my family, with my in-laws, and with Max. My recent workplace successes mean I can relax for a while and focus on the good times ahead in PhD land. I've been offered the opportunity to go on a funded research trip to Italy in October, so that takes care of my holiday for the year. The house is nearly finished and soon I'll be sleeping in my own bed again. Life is good. And when life is good, I am dull. It is perhaps all this positivity in my life that has led to what I will tell you next.

I'm pregnant again.

Am I shitting myself? Yes. Does my pulse quicken every time I feel the slightest twinge below the belly button? Yup. Do I relentlessly check the toilet roll for any visible trace of anything that may possibly look like blood every time I use the bathroom ? You betcha!

Am I possibly one of the happiest, most relieved, and most grateful women on the planet right now? Absolutely.

I can't write anymore today, I am full of baby mush and it is pretty much all I can think about. I'll save my baby-bore status for at least a few more weeks. So wish me luck, although that positive part of me says I am not going to need it. This peanut is a sticker, and I plan to see it through to the other side.

I do, however, want to take this opportunity to send all of my positive baby energy out to Xbox and MaybeBaby. Each time I open your blog I do it with bated breath and a sincere hope I'll be reading wonderful news. All the baby-making luck in the world to you. And positive energy in general to Maria, who I just know is going to come out the other side, whatever the problem.

In Good Company

I have been busy, so please excuse the long absence. The past few weeks have been wrought with stress and panic as I prepared for a seminar I knew I would pass, but could not bring myself to relax about. On the Monday morning I made it through my confirmation with flying colours, which set me up for my trip to the Netherlands with high spirits (and a bit more of that elusive confidence). I boarded the plane and arrived in a foreign country full to the brim with fear and anxiety, unsure of what to expect from a congress of seasoned academics and a city I had never even heard of.

What a fool I was.

The conference was a wonder - like summer camp for grown-ups. Imagine traveling to a foreign country and spending a week listening to people from all over the world talk about the subject you find most interesting. What a joy! And in between the sessions there were espressos at quaint canal-side cafes and three course meals on boats. I loved every moment of it.

I fell equally in love with the wondrous city of Leiden.


Full of cyclists, canals, trees, museums, windmills, fantastic architecture, and best of all - the friendliest townfolk I ever did meet. I have never been one to enjoy my own company, but in Leiden I was happy to saunter around by myself and take in the picturesque setting.


It's not Paris or Rome. There are no grand buildings or wonders of the world. But there is just something about it that feels like - for lack of a better word - home. It's beautiful and inviting, simple and elegant. It's odd, I can't even describe now what I loved about it. Perhaps those of you who have been there before can help me find the words. Those of you who have not - go. Go now! Flights into Schipol Airport are not too expensive, and it only takes 5 Euros and twenty minutes on a [very clean and efficient] train to get there.



Perhaps one of the things that made this trip so special was not the setting, or the conference, but the fact that for the very first time in my 27 years, I was alone with myself and I enjoyed it. I spent five days in mainly my own company. Sure I had the other conference delegates, and I really enjoyed my time with some of them, but I spent an awful lot more time with me. I read books, wrote an outline for a short story (which I haven't done in years), listened to music, went on a boat ride, made pitiful attempts at speaking Dutch. It was liberating.

If only it hadn't taken me 27 years to figure out that I can do things by myself.