My posts have been so inconsistent lately. Part of this has been a complete lack of time, deadlines I can barely keep up with and a house move that required most of my attention for a while. But a large part of it has been the shift in focus my life has taken. As though to prepare me for a lifetime of thinking of someone else first, this little person growing inside me has monopolised my thoughts and emotions for the last four months now. I can't write about much else, because in my life currently everything points back to baby. And for some reason, I can't find the words to write about this baby.
Some of the things I have been feeling have been wonderful. That first moment when I saw my little bean in the ultra sound was like nothing I had ever felt before. There he (for the purposes of this blog) was; he had arms and legs and a heartbeat, he was dancing and moving around, he was alive. Just as my miscarriage introduced me to the pain of true and uncontrollable grief, that tiny picture of a twelve-week old embryo gave me my first encounter with true relief and joy. In my attempts to keep myself calm during moments of panic - those times when the cramps I felt didn't feel right, or when I was worried I wasn't sick enough - I talked to my baby. I told him how much I loved him already, how I couldn't wait to meet him. I promised him things I am not even sure I could ever provide, but that I was certain I would try harder than I have ever tried at anything before. I named him, I rubbed my belly to soothe him, I prayed for him and pleaded with him. This made me feel closer to him than I felt to most of the people around me - and yet he seemed so unreal and so far away.
The first time I heard his heartbeat, the first time I felt him moving around inside me, the first time I let it truly sink in that this baby may actually be real - all of these moments have left me moved and overwhelmed, frightened and exhilarated, in ways I have never experienced before and could never really articulate. I have felt grateful every single day since I saw that pink line on a pregnancy test in July. Genuinely, humbly and heartbreakingly grateful. I was almost prepared for the intensity of those emotions, nearly prepared for the joy I would feel given the weight of the grief my previous loss had filled me with. But there were many things for which I was unprepared - many things that no one told me to expect.
The loneliness came first. Ironic, isn't it? For the first time in my life I am technically never alone, and yet I feel so isolated from the people around me. Suddenly it is as though I can't relate to anyone. Friends planning vacations or talking about going out for drinks seem so distant from my new life, my new priorities. I am all at once bored by and jealous of their lives. Small jibes of "you're hardly the first woman to ever be pregnant" or rolled eyes if I have to leave a party early have left me feeling misunderstood and, if I'm honest, a little pissed off. There seems to be a general acceptance that because so many people experience pregnancy, those who are pregnant have no right to visibly feel sick/tired/overwhelmed/incontinent/irritable. Just sit there and look cute, glowing and bumpy. I have never been one who is able to sit quietly and not react, so withdrawal has been my immediate response. Most of the time I would just rather be alone, and yet I yearn for company.
Introspection has taken over these days. My head has filled up with questions - Will I be a good mother? Will I be able to breastfeed? Will my child love me when he becomes a teenager? Will he move far away and leave me here with the life I have set up almost solely for him? The darker questions are harder still. Will I resent my child for the life I am giving up in order to have him? Have I done this too soon? Will I be mean or abusive? Neglectful and inattentive as I focus on the career that has for so long been my baby? Will I be jealous of this child as I fight him for my husband's attention? Will my husband still love me when I no longer fit in to the image of youth and beauty he has attached to me?
In her book about pregnancy, Naomi Wolfe talks about grieving for the woman who inevitably ceases to be when you become a mother. This is not a feeling I anticipated, but I find it haunts me a little more every day. Reality starts to hit hard when you're pregnant. Gone are the days when I could trick myself into thinking that a baby would not interrupt my plans too much, not throw my life into a complete disarray. Already I have been utterly merged with this little being. People no longer ask how I am without prefacing it with a glance or reference to my abdomen. What they mean is how is the baby, the pregnancy. Even the gifts I received for my birthday today have revolved around the baby - maternity clothes, stretch mark cream, essential oils to help with the symptoms of pregnancy (would you give your friend cold medicine for his birthday because you knew he had a cold?). This baby and I are now one in the same. There is no me without him, no him without me. For someone so fiercely independent, attaching another person on to every part of my life and being is frightening and frustrating, alien and profound.
My body and my life are no longer my own. Near-strangers and acquaintances suddenly find it ok to ask me about my breasts, my urinary habits and my moods. They question my dietary choices and chastise me for ordering a coffee (before they realise it's decaf). Suddenly the most intimate decisions I have ever made (Will I breastfeed? Will I find out the sex? Will I stay at home or return to work? Do I want more than one?) are fair game for every Tom Dick and Harry. My belly is the property of everyone, and most people do not hesitate to put their hands on my lower abdomen in such a way that would have caused my husband to punch them four months ago. Now he glows with pride as they man-handle me, beaming the silly grin of a father-to-be.
In a nutshell, I feel as though I have ceased to be myself. And while I know that when this baby is born I will become a new, better, happier version of myself - I can't help but mourn for the person I was before I became some one's mother. This ambivalence is crazy-making. Never at any point to I wish to no longer be pregnant - nor do I cease to be grateful for this miracle that is taking place in and around me. I already love my child more than I love myself, would already die in his place, and I long for his arrival with each breath. Even as I write this I can feel him moving about, reassuring me that all of this uncertainty will wither in the face of his presence - the person I have waited for since before I knew who I was waiting for, the love of my life.
Even still, will you afford me this brief moment of silence to say goodbye to my life before him? To cry for my privacy, my independence, my marriage as I know it, my stomach and breasts? Will you all think me horrible if every day, just for a moment, I remember fondly a time when I was the only person in my own skin?
Wednesday, 22 October 2008
Tuesday, 7 October 2008
Love Song for my Sister
My sister is a marvel. Sometimes a charmer in every sense of the word, sometimes a torture hard to bear for more than ten minutes. She is all at once wildly funny and frightfully infuriating - stubborn as an ox but as overly sensitive as a small child. There are times when you would think she is the most street wise person you have ever met, and others when her naivety would shock and bewilder you. She is beautiful in the best way that a woman can be beautiful - in that quiet and unassuming way, as though she would never truly believe you thought her anything other than plain. In her twenty-six years on this planet, I have loved her and hated her more than any other person in my life. Lately her life is changing - or rather she has started to notice her life in a completely different way. It is weird and wonderful, and heartbreaking to watch her go through it. My mother said she is in a cocoon...I guess I can allow for my mother to be right on occasion.
AJ was the most beautiful baby I have ever seen, perfectly formed and immediately adorable - not like her wrinkled and alien-looking peers. My mother loves to tell me of how I used to carry her around and tell everyone she was "my baby," and barely a photo exists of the two of us in those first three years where I am not kissing or hugging her (although she is often seen resisting). If you asked me to tell the story of our lives from my perspective, I would use those photos as a visual depiction of our relationship throughout childhood and adolescence. A big sister who was desperate to love and cuddle and mother (but only in the way she wanted) - a little sister scrambling (fighting, kicking) to stand by herself.
I have written before about the problems I had with my sister. We were such polar opposites, so adamant that we would not be alike. While I donned a tutu and danced ballet recitals in the hallway with my hair trailing elegantly down my back, AJ chopped her hair off and donned a baseball cap - introducing herself to people as my brother. When I made my first communion I reveled in the white dress and gloves - AJ wore a suit and tie. My parents, in either an amazing act of insight or as a demonstration of their lack of knowing what else to do, chose to ignore her push towards all things masculine. They never passed comment on it or indicated that it was in any way different from the norm. For years I was convinced my sister had been going through some gender identity crisis - I realise now it was probably just an attempt to be the person in our family who was not me...and to do that as loudly as possible. Eventually AJ stopped playing with matchbox cars and GI Joes. She grew her hair out and stopped telling people that when she grew up she wanted to be a boy, but she did not cease to take every action possible to be the person in our family who was not me. While I people pleased, brought home impeccable report cards and danced in ballet recitals, AJ feigned apathy to her teachers and became a sporting legend. I gleaned attention by listing accomplishments and oozing politeness, AJ made everyone laugh and held an audience in the palm of her hand while telling stories. I followed every rule to the point of the ridiculous, AJ broke them whatever chance she got. Whether we knew it or not, we were determined to be different, and with that difference came a rocky and fragile relationship that would haunt us for years to come.
What AJ perhaps didn't realise during all of this was how much I wanted her to like me. How desperate I had been for her approval. While I grinned with pride at being called brainy, pretty or polite by others, from my sister I saw it as a barrier to our relationship. I wanted to braid her hair and tell her about boys, to sit up at night talking after our parents shut the lights out. I wanted to tell her deep dark secrets that I would normally only write in my diary, and to defend her honour to anyone who dared try to do her harm. I wanted to be a big sister, in that ridiculous and romantic "ya ya sisterhood" bullshit way that people have sisters. I remember when I was about 13 I watched the movie Beaches. It was glorious, the way these two women loved each other. I cried the whole way through, reassured that even if parents split up and lovers leave and people get divorced, there would always be that one woman who would love you forever and never leave you. I decided (perhaps before then) that AJ was the only woman fit for that job. Surely your own flesh and blood would be the only person capable for such a task. After all, who better to understand me than the girl who shared every part of my girlhood? Who had the same embarrassing parent stories, who knew what it was like to live in my skin? Yes, AJ was my forever friend. The wind beneath my naive, romantic, controlling, perfectionist little wings.
And therein lies perhaps the biggest problem with our relationship. I wanted my sister to fit into my idea of sisterhood. Braid hair, don't shoot hoops. Watch girlie movies, not slasher flicks. Hug and kiss to show affection, don't hi-five or punch arms. The more she didn't fit into my little "sister" box, the more resentful I grew of our fragmented relationship. I held AJ to the same ridiculous standards to which I held myself. And she just didn't live up to them.
Problem number two, and perhaps what AJ would see as our biggest problem, is that I just couldn't stop mothering her. I was so sure something horrible was awaiting us both out there, and I no longer trusted that my parents would keep it from us. I dubbed myself my sister's protector. Just as I would work hard to ensure I raised myself out of the life I hated, I would make damn sure she came with me. On my terms. Whether she liked it or not. Cue several years of a child, less than two years older than the younger child, telling said younger child what to do/not do/say/not say/etc ad infinitum. Who wouldn't understand her rebellion against me? After all I held her to standards far stricter and higher than my parents ever held her to. Instead I watched her drift further away from me. And to make matters worse, almost as if to prove she was capable of it with anyone but me, I watched her be that heroic friend I was waiting for to almost everyone she met. The low point for me was when she, at the age of 18, told me we should just make an agreement to not ask one another to be each other's maids of honour when we got married - because she already had someone else in mind for the job.
After I left home, distance provided a bit of relief from our fighting. Eventually we even started sending each other cards and notes, but I managed to blow that too. AJ would send me some beautifully written card about how much she loved me and how she always looked up to me, and in my overzealous excitement I would call her and insist we talk about our feelings. Once again I could not let her love me in the way she was able - I needed Barbara Hershey or nothing at all! My vision clouded by a romantic notion of what I expected her to be, I couldn't see the relationship that was growing right in front of me.
Two years ago I asked AJ to be my maid of honour in spite of our previous vow. She accepted, and I repaid her by making her feel bad about not doing enough for the wedding and answering "yes" when she asked if I would've chosen my friend Colleen if she had not been my sister. In reality, I could not have picked someone better for the moments leading up to my long walk down the aisle. In the months before the wedding, AJ slaved over a scrapbook full of pictures of childhood scenes and our family. When I was waiting for the limousine to take me to the church, AJ broke my nervous silence with ridiculous jokes and held my dress while I went to the bathroom. In the car, when my feet hurt, she and my father rubbed them and tried to stretch out my shoes. She did everything she should have done and more - and I ignored it because it wasn't the way I had pictured it in my head.
I don't know what has changed, but lately AJ and I have been becoming closer. The more I analyse it, the more I think it is because she is becoming more emotional and open. A bit more like me. I am both elated and guilt ridden by our new found friendship - and worried that it could end or change at any moment. Living without it before was difficult, living without it now that I realise how wonderful it is would be unbearable. I get giddy waiting for our Tuesday night phone calls, but try hard to rein myself in so she can't see my excitement. There are times when I feel exploitative, as though I am taking advantage of her vulnerability right now and using it to fulfill this happy little sister dream I always had. But then other times, when I can hear how genuine she sounds when she tells me how she hates to miss my calls or when she sends me notes to say she loves me for no reason, I think I can relax into this new found relationship for good.
AJ hates it when I address her directly in this blog, in fact she hates it when I write about her at all. I just needed someone to know that while I never got my Beaches moment, never got to give her a facial or gossip with her about her first kiss, I really think what we have ended up with is so much better. We have both grown into ourselves on our own, and yet we still feel pulled to each other. I have always loved my sister because she was my sister, but I can't tell you how much better it is to be able to love her as a woman and a friend.
So with that said, and knowing that she will likely punish me for it later, I dedicate this song to my beautiful, strong, hilarious, intelligent, compassionate and loyal sister AJ. It's not Wind Beneath my Wings - that would be far too predictable and not at all you. I have already told you you're my hero - but there's a few things I have left out along the way. I promise to keep trying to fill in the gaps the best I can.
AJ was the most beautiful baby I have ever seen, perfectly formed and immediately adorable - not like her wrinkled and alien-looking peers. My mother loves to tell me of how I used to carry her around and tell everyone she was "my baby," and barely a photo exists of the two of us in those first three years where I am not kissing or hugging her (although she is often seen resisting). If you asked me to tell the story of our lives from my perspective, I would use those photos as a visual depiction of our relationship throughout childhood and adolescence. A big sister who was desperate to love and cuddle and mother (but only in the way she wanted) - a little sister scrambling (fighting, kicking) to stand by herself.
I have written before about the problems I had with my sister. We were such polar opposites, so adamant that we would not be alike. While I donned a tutu and danced ballet recitals in the hallway with my hair trailing elegantly down my back, AJ chopped her hair off and donned a baseball cap - introducing herself to people as my brother. When I made my first communion I reveled in the white dress and gloves - AJ wore a suit and tie. My parents, in either an amazing act of insight or as a demonstration of their lack of knowing what else to do, chose to ignore her push towards all things masculine. They never passed comment on it or indicated that it was in any way different from the norm. For years I was convinced my sister had been going through some gender identity crisis - I realise now it was probably just an attempt to be the person in our family who was not me...and to do that as loudly as possible. Eventually AJ stopped playing with matchbox cars and GI Joes. She grew her hair out and stopped telling people that when she grew up she wanted to be a boy, but she did not cease to take every action possible to be the person in our family who was not me. While I people pleased, brought home impeccable report cards and danced in ballet recitals, AJ feigned apathy to her teachers and became a sporting legend. I gleaned attention by listing accomplishments and oozing politeness, AJ made everyone laugh and held an audience in the palm of her hand while telling stories. I followed every rule to the point of the ridiculous, AJ broke them whatever chance she got. Whether we knew it or not, we were determined to be different, and with that difference came a rocky and fragile relationship that would haunt us for years to come.
What AJ perhaps didn't realise during all of this was how much I wanted her to like me. How desperate I had been for her approval. While I grinned with pride at being called brainy, pretty or polite by others, from my sister I saw it as a barrier to our relationship. I wanted to braid her hair and tell her about boys, to sit up at night talking after our parents shut the lights out. I wanted to tell her deep dark secrets that I would normally only write in my diary, and to defend her honour to anyone who dared try to do her harm. I wanted to be a big sister, in that ridiculous and romantic "ya ya sisterhood" bullshit way that people have sisters. I remember when I was about 13 I watched the movie Beaches. It was glorious, the way these two women loved each other. I cried the whole way through, reassured that even if parents split up and lovers leave and people get divorced, there would always be that one woman who would love you forever and never leave you. I decided (perhaps before then) that AJ was the only woman fit for that job. Surely your own flesh and blood would be the only person capable for such a task. After all, who better to understand me than the girl who shared every part of my girlhood? Who had the same embarrassing parent stories, who knew what it was like to live in my skin? Yes, AJ was my forever friend. The wind beneath my naive, romantic, controlling, perfectionist little wings.
And therein lies perhaps the biggest problem with our relationship. I wanted my sister to fit into my idea of sisterhood. Braid hair, don't shoot hoops. Watch girlie movies, not slasher flicks. Hug and kiss to show affection, don't hi-five or punch arms. The more she didn't fit into my little "sister" box, the more resentful I grew of our fragmented relationship. I held AJ to the same ridiculous standards to which I held myself. And she just didn't live up to them.
Problem number two, and perhaps what AJ would see as our biggest problem, is that I just couldn't stop mothering her. I was so sure something horrible was awaiting us both out there, and I no longer trusted that my parents would keep it from us. I dubbed myself my sister's protector. Just as I would work hard to ensure I raised myself out of the life I hated, I would make damn sure she came with me. On my terms. Whether she liked it or not. Cue several years of a child, less than two years older than the younger child, telling said younger child what to do/not do/say/not say/etc ad infinitum. Who wouldn't understand her rebellion against me? After all I held her to standards far stricter and higher than my parents ever held her to. Instead I watched her drift further away from me. And to make matters worse, almost as if to prove she was capable of it with anyone but me, I watched her be that heroic friend I was waiting for to almost everyone she met. The low point for me was when she, at the age of 18, told me we should just make an agreement to not ask one another to be each other's maids of honour when we got married - because she already had someone else in mind for the job.
After I left home, distance provided a bit of relief from our fighting. Eventually we even started sending each other cards and notes, but I managed to blow that too. AJ would send me some beautifully written card about how much she loved me and how she always looked up to me, and in my overzealous excitement I would call her and insist we talk about our feelings. Once again I could not let her love me in the way she was able - I needed Barbara Hershey or nothing at all! My vision clouded by a romantic notion of what I expected her to be, I couldn't see the relationship that was growing right in front of me.
Two years ago I asked AJ to be my maid of honour in spite of our previous vow. She accepted, and I repaid her by making her feel bad about not doing enough for the wedding and answering "yes" when she asked if I would've chosen my friend Colleen if she had not been my sister. In reality, I could not have picked someone better for the moments leading up to my long walk down the aisle. In the months before the wedding, AJ slaved over a scrapbook full of pictures of childhood scenes and our family. When I was waiting for the limousine to take me to the church, AJ broke my nervous silence with ridiculous jokes and held my dress while I went to the bathroom. In the car, when my feet hurt, she and my father rubbed them and tried to stretch out my shoes. She did everything she should have done and more - and I ignored it because it wasn't the way I had pictured it in my head.
I don't know what has changed, but lately AJ and I have been becoming closer. The more I analyse it, the more I think it is because she is becoming more emotional and open. A bit more like me. I am both elated and guilt ridden by our new found friendship - and worried that it could end or change at any moment. Living without it before was difficult, living without it now that I realise how wonderful it is would be unbearable. I get giddy waiting for our Tuesday night phone calls, but try hard to rein myself in so she can't see my excitement. There are times when I feel exploitative, as though I am taking advantage of her vulnerability right now and using it to fulfill this happy little sister dream I always had. But then other times, when I can hear how genuine she sounds when she tells me how she hates to miss my calls or when she sends me notes to say she loves me for no reason, I think I can relax into this new found relationship for good.
AJ hates it when I address her directly in this blog, in fact she hates it when I write about her at all. I just needed someone to know that while I never got my Beaches moment, never got to give her a facial or gossip with her about her first kiss, I really think what we have ended up with is so much better. We have both grown into ourselves on our own, and yet we still feel pulled to each other. I have always loved my sister because she was my sister, but I can't tell you how much better it is to be able to love her as a woman and a friend.
So with that said, and knowing that she will likely punish me for it later, I dedicate this song to my beautiful, strong, hilarious, intelligent, compassionate and loyal sister AJ. It's not Wind Beneath my Wings - that would be far too predictable and not at all you. I have already told you you're my hero - but there's a few things I have left out along the way. I promise to keep trying to fill in the gaps the best I can.
Tuesday, 16 September 2008
From this Blog to God's Ears?
Disclaimer: This blog is about religion. Maybe not religion, perhaps more about faith and power and families and all of the baggage that comes along with religion. I just think all things God need a warning these days. The fact that I believe the previous statement probably says more about how I feel about religion than this blog ever could...
I was baptised and raised Roman Catholic. The degree to which this was a factor in my life varied based on my mother's constantly changing attitude towards her faith. But regardless of whether my mother always adhered to the Catholic teachings, the power of the church was ever-present in our lives. My mother considered the family priest, Father Joe, one of her closest friends and confidants. When Father Joe told my mom to do something - she did it. When my mother and father(then 17 and 19, respectively) attended pre-marriage meetings with Father Joe he explained the evils of sex before marriage - my father was promptly cut off. When mom and dad could not decide on a name for me, Father Joe was enlisted and helped my mother choose a name. Father Joe baptised all three of my mother's children and both my sister and I made our first communions and reconciliations under his guidance. We were sent to Catholic school in spite of my parents having no realistic way of paying for it. My mother saw the church as her support, her beacon of hope. When she was feeling lost and vulnerable, we would visit Father Joe - sometimes staying for days at a time with him in the rectory. When my mother needed money, Father Joe sent her some. When my mother locked herself in the bathroom and took an overdose of prescription pain pills, she called Father Joe for her last rites.
Fortunately Father Joe called the ambulance instead.
Given my background, it was no real surprise to me that telling my mother we were not planning on Christening our unborn baby in the Catholic church would lead to a certain level of disappointment. It was the defensive, enraged and irrational reaction that I was more shocked by. My mother used all manner of emotional devices to convince me I was making a terrible mistake - including the implication that my faithless child might grow up to be a sociopath with no concept of right and wrong. She pleaded with me to recognise the good of the church in spite of its flaws, to remember that Catholicism had to be a good thing, because Father Joe had been sucha good man. She even insisted that she would have the baby christened in spite of me, that it was too important to leave to one of my whims. She suggested politely that I find some other way to be "defiant" against cultural norms, one with less significant repercussions for my family.
Being raised in the church myself, I know the power that the institution has over its followers. My mother has been told of purgatory - of the need to erase original sin that follows each of us into this world. I would be lying if I said the same nagging fear hadn't crept into my own mind at one moment or another. But instead of being led by that fear, I have been angered by it. Frustrated in a church that would imply that my child's soul could suffer at my failure to adhere to their rituals, furious at the emotional blackmail that seems to be behind the act - an attempt to ensure future generations of followers and patrons. In fact, there are a lot of things about the Catholic church I get angry about if I think about them too much.
I'll take this opportunity to say that this will NOT be a church bashing session. Catholicism has given me many great things in my life. There is no doubt that my strong sense of right and wrong was a product of my mother's religious belief. Father Joe, the man I describe above, instilled in me a great sense of hope and and love - and let's not forget that he saved my mother's life. Another priest, the University Chaplain and the man who married my husband and I - Father Rob - helped me regain a sense of self-worth when I was 20 years old that I otherwise may have taken years to find. He also gave me the words that acted as my greatest comfort during the miscarriage that nearly ate me alive 6 months ago. No, I would never claim that no good can come from Catholicism or from any organised faith.
But I can recognise the bad as well. I can tally up the things I think and feel - and know - and I can weigh them against what the church tries to enforce. And the majority of the time, I just can't balance them. I can't get past the church as a power structure, one that has grave potential to inhibit and exploit. The same girl that felt loved and cared for by a priest was also petrified of hell and the devil, afraid to even think "bad" thoughts in case divine retribution were to follow. Although Father Rob helped that young woman regain some sense of self-worth, much of that self-worth would not have been lost if it were not for the guilt she had amassed over not being perfect in they eyes of her family, and especially of God. I have listened to sermons and homilies which condemned the lifestyles of people I loved. I listened to my Grandmother (the most faithful person I have ever known) tell of her excommunication from the church after divorcing the man who abandoned her and their three children. I have watched my mother put money she could not afford to sacrifice into the collection basket, only to look around at the grandeur of the church and the size of the rectory. I have sat in silence while an institution I supported openly and unapolegetically discriminated against my gender, where abusers of children were covered for and excused.
Finally, after years of turning a blind (faithful) eye to these offences, I began to ask the questions which led me to my decision. Would I tolerate these abuses from anyone else? If I had a friend who was openly homophobic, who was bigoted against other faiths and harshly judgemental of those who did not adhere to the same moral codes as them - how long would I put up with such a friend? If a school hired teachers who went on to abuse children in their care, and then covered for and refused to fire those teachers - would I continue to send my children to that school? Would I not be demanding the punishment of all involved in that cover up? If a charity asked me for donations to help sustain itself, and then used my money to buy over-the-top, fancy new offices while calling for its patrons to live humble and simple lives - would I still give them money? If a company used scare tactics and manipulation of truth to convince me and my loved ones to buy their products, would I not boycott their goods and try to find another provider?
Basically, if the Catholic church had been anything other than the Catholic church, I would have held it to account. I don't support people, politicians, businesses or organisations whose practices are at odds with my morals and beliefs - why do I continue to be a member of a church whose practices are at odds with my morals and beliefs? When my children are born, I like to think I will go out of my way to keep those kind of negative influences out of their lives. Why then should one of my first acts as a parent be to commit them to a life of serving a church which may well be that same kind of influence? It no longer makes sense to me, and I can no longer justify it as a rational act.
I am not saying that I don't want to teach my children to have faith in something greater than themselves and other human beings. I remember very well that believing in God and Heaven was a great comfort to me as a child. My mother once told me that God has a plan for everyone. I loved believing this, feeling like I had some great purpose to fulfill. I felt safer with the idea that God was looking out for me and my family, reassured that those who I loved were not lost forever when they left this Earth. Praying gave me a sense of control over things against which I felt powerless, and faith gave me strength and confidence at so many times in my life. I have not ever been ready or willing to let go of those things, nor have I ever felt I had evidence against the existence of God - whatever form he/she/it might take. I want my children to know those comforts, I want them to have faith and hope.
I just can't allow them to be made to feel like that faith and hope is dependent on their conformity to a rigid set of man-made rules and regulations.
So you see my dilemma. A modern dilemma, I suppose, and one which I assume is not new or surprising to any of you. How do you raise hopeful and faithful children outside the confines of a church community? How do you find a faith community that works for you and your family? Or is this all the same as telling my children there is an Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy or Santa Clause? Should I let them learn the realities of life without the safety net of God and Heaven and all things hopeful?
When it was just me, I was happy to take a lifetime to answer this question. Now I feel like I need a five month crash course.
Monday, 8 September 2008
They F***k You Up... But By God You Help Them Sometimes
Please pardon the absence. Life lately has been a mess of family visits, catching up at work, and trying to get through the day without at least one nap. And frankly, after my last post (you remember, my declaration of hope for family relations?), I was embarrassed to have to chronicle the reality of my mother's trip to Ireland. It was a visit that raised within me questions I had asked before so many times, but been afraid to answer for fear of knowing the truth.
Do people have the capacity for real change? And if they do, can the people they are closest to ever recognise and accept that change?
I often pride myself on the changes I have made over the years. Once obsessed with traditional success at any cost, I have begun to recognise the value of non-material things in life and to seek those successes instead. Once the owner of a short fuse that could be ignited with little more than an awkward glance - I now work hard to maintain a cool and calm demeanor when dealing with difficult situations. There are many more, just as there were once so many things I hated about myself. Slowly, and deliberately (and frankly, not without help from some unlikely sources) I have begun to weed out those parts of me of which I had been ashamed - the ultimate goal of "better person-hood" looming there in front of me, my carrot on a stick.
Max, my husband, once made the argument that perhaps I had not changed anything other than the way I looked at myself - that maybe I wasn't so bad to begin with. I love him for the suggestion that I might have been less flawed than I had thought, but at the same time resented his failure to acknowledge my hard work. But with my family, it is a different story. I regularly accuse them (both verbally and otherwise) of not seeing me as I am now, of refusing to look past that emotionally unstable 16 year-old who hated herself and most others around her. They regularly accuse me of being ashamed of them and of where I came from. Is this the penalty for self-improvement? Am I actually ashamed of the people who produced the person I have tried to hard to change?
It is a mess of unanswerable questions, and sometimes I think I should get some real problems so I would have less time to think about such tosh. I mean, the fact that a leading psychologist wrote a book about parents entitled They Fuck You Up, inspired by a Larkin poem of the same subject is an indicator that I am not alone in my boo-hooing about the life I was given and the people who gave it to me. But here is where I implore you, just as I spent a week imploring my mother, to understand that is NOT what I am concerned with.
My life was my life, it has made me who I am. I am not a boring person, I am not a cruel person, I am not a stupid person, I am not a lonely or socially incapable person. I have a roof over my head, a life-partner I love, and a family on the way. What I need now is to somehow make this horrible cycle of fighting and resentment stop once and for all, to make my family see that I don't hate them and make my mother see that I don't carry around a big ball of angry because she screwed up occasionally when I was younger.
What I DO need her to acknowledge is that sometimes she screws up NOW. When I see her, I need her to see past all of the traits she hates about herself that she inadvertently handed on to me - and to instead see the things she managed to spare me in spite of suffering them herself for so many years. I need her to stop expecting me to hate her, to blame her and to fight against her regardless of what my actual responses might be. Why do we need to stay trapped in this cycle of who did what to who, or who hates who more? Why can't the decisions I have made be about me, and not be some rebellion against her?
When I saw my mother in the airport on that first day, the first thing I thought to myself was that she was more beautiful than I had remembered. I was watching her sitting there talking to my brother, oblivious to the approaching audience, and I thought "I can't believe I had forgotten how pretty she is." When I hugged her I smelled that familiar smell of cigarettes and original flavour chewing gum, and marveled for the millionth time at the softness of her hair and face in spite of years of dying her locks and refusing to invest in proper face cream. I reveled in her laugh, the way I often do, surprised that even now I could be startled by the loudness of her cackle juxtaposed with the tiny-ness of her voice. Standing in front her, nearly 28 years old and soon to be a mother myself, I was amazed by my own mother's youth - by her green corduroys and trendy brown Keds. It was so easy to forget in that moment that this 5'4" woman, with wrists and hands as small as a child's, had been through so much. Even harder to remember how much she had frightened me, and how large and overpowering she had seemed for so many years. But most of all I was surprised that after years of noticing only how many wrinkles she had gained, or her neglectful lack of make-up, or the fillings in her teeth, I could finally see how beautiful she was - and had always been.
This paragraph may seem oddly placed, but my perceptions of beauty have always been a tell-tale sign of my emotions. I have never been able to look at someone whose behaviour upset me and see them as beautiful. Likewise, many people in my life have grown more and more beautiful to me as we have grown closer. When I first met Max, I shrugged off his advances at first because I simply did not find him attractive. I find that almost impossible to believe now, nearly seven years later, as when I look at him I can't believe my luck that someone so handsome and kind wasn't snapped up before I came around. When I was a child I thought my mother was the most beautiful woman alive. My beliefs were not based on maternal adoration alone - no, my mother was a stunningly beautiful woman. My father, who can barely stand to be in the same room as my mother, would still say that my mother's beauty was unrivaled when they met. During the worst of my mother's temper, I would never have seen the tiny bird-like frame she actually possessed. She seemed larger than life, her teeth a bit sharper and her eyes a bit wilder. But after my mother left, I began to notice my mother's diminutive stature more and more. I did not as cute, as many of her male suitors did, but as meek and frail. While others insisted she had the face of a teenager, I thought she had too many wrinkles for her age. I thought her lips were too thin and that she looked almost pitiable when she walked into a room. I dreaded being told I looked like her, for I was far more proud of my tall frame and strong jawline which I had inherited from my father. I couldn't see her as beautiful, delicate or enviable, because I couldn't afford to see her that way. I needed her to be weak, or cruel, or pitiful, or unkind, or crazy - because then it would be OK for me to resent her the way I did.
So when I saw her in the airport and thought she was beautiful, I knew I had forgiven her. I knew I was ready to see her as a person, better still as a person who I would want to be around. I thought that maybe, just maybe, all those years of going to her and wishing that she would be the mother I needed and getting rebuffed were over. Now we could understand each other, respect each other, like each other.
But life is life, and not a feelgood summer flick.
We danced around each other for a while, me restraining my "tone" as much as possible, attempting to bite my tongue when she said something critical or interrupted what I was saying to point out the nearest floral display. If she were writing this I am sure she could tell you of many things she bit her tongue about, or many annoying habits which I possess that she had to ignore politely. But it wasn't long before the facade was broken, and frustrations became outbursts. I became convinced that she was trying to turn my brother against me, she became convinced that my husband hated her because I told him to. There were tears, mostly mine (as my mother rarely cries publicly), there was pleading for her to see my point of view. There were harsh words and condemnations of personality traits - blame allocated to each other for our failure to get along. There was even an implication or two that I would undoubtedly not be the best mother I could if I didn't change certain things about myself. We smoothed things over enough to get through the trip, but in spite of my several attempts at long and honest heart-to-hearts, no resolution was reached.
So at the end of her visit I was left feeling the way I often feel after seeing my mother. Drained. Sad. Relieved that she's gone. Guilty. Ungrateful. Emotionally unstable. Etc. It's not entirely her fault. It's not entirely my fault. It's not her mother's fault or her father's fault, or my father's fault or my father's mother's fault. We're just human, and I just don't know if either of us is ever going to be willing to change enough to be the person the other one needs us to be - or to accept each other for who we are.
Any pointers, sane people?
Do people have the capacity for real change? And if they do, can the people they are closest to ever recognise and accept that change?
I often pride myself on the changes I have made over the years. Once obsessed with traditional success at any cost, I have begun to recognise the value of non-material things in life and to seek those successes instead. Once the owner of a short fuse that could be ignited with little more than an awkward glance - I now work hard to maintain a cool and calm demeanor when dealing with difficult situations. There are many more, just as there were once so many things I hated about myself. Slowly, and deliberately (and frankly, not without help from some unlikely sources) I have begun to weed out those parts of me of which I had been ashamed - the ultimate goal of "better person-hood" looming there in front of me, my carrot on a stick.
Max, my husband, once made the argument that perhaps I had not changed anything other than the way I looked at myself - that maybe I wasn't so bad to begin with. I love him for the suggestion that I might have been less flawed than I had thought, but at the same time resented his failure to acknowledge my hard work. But with my family, it is a different story. I regularly accuse them (both verbally and otherwise) of not seeing me as I am now, of refusing to look past that emotionally unstable 16 year-old who hated herself and most others around her. They regularly accuse me of being ashamed of them and of where I came from. Is this the penalty for self-improvement? Am I actually ashamed of the people who produced the person I have tried to hard to change?
It is a mess of unanswerable questions, and sometimes I think I should get some real problems so I would have less time to think about such tosh. I mean, the fact that a leading psychologist wrote a book about parents entitled They Fuck You Up, inspired by a Larkin poem of the same subject is an indicator that I am not alone in my boo-hooing about the life I was given and the people who gave it to me. But here is where I implore you, just as I spent a week imploring my mother, to understand that is NOT what I am concerned with.
My life was my life, it has made me who I am. I am not a boring person, I am not a cruel person, I am not a stupid person, I am not a lonely or socially incapable person. I have a roof over my head, a life-partner I love, and a family on the way. What I need now is to somehow make this horrible cycle of fighting and resentment stop once and for all, to make my family see that I don't hate them and make my mother see that I don't carry around a big ball of angry because she screwed up occasionally when I was younger.
What I DO need her to acknowledge is that sometimes she screws up NOW. When I see her, I need her to see past all of the traits she hates about herself that she inadvertently handed on to me - and to instead see the things she managed to spare me in spite of suffering them herself for so many years. I need her to stop expecting me to hate her, to blame her and to fight against her regardless of what my actual responses might be. Why do we need to stay trapped in this cycle of who did what to who, or who hates who more? Why can't the decisions I have made be about me, and not be some rebellion against her?
When I saw my mother in the airport on that first day, the first thing I thought to myself was that she was more beautiful than I had remembered. I was watching her sitting there talking to my brother, oblivious to the approaching audience, and I thought "I can't believe I had forgotten how pretty she is." When I hugged her I smelled that familiar smell of cigarettes and original flavour chewing gum, and marveled for the millionth time at the softness of her hair and face in spite of years of dying her locks and refusing to invest in proper face cream. I reveled in her laugh, the way I often do, surprised that even now I could be startled by the loudness of her cackle juxtaposed with the tiny-ness of her voice. Standing in front her, nearly 28 years old and soon to be a mother myself, I was amazed by my own mother's youth - by her green corduroys and trendy brown Keds. It was so easy to forget in that moment that this 5'4" woman, with wrists and hands as small as a child's, had been through so much. Even harder to remember how much she had frightened me, and how large and overpowering she had seemed for so many years. But most of all I was surprised that after years of noticing only how many wrinkles she had gained, or her neglectful lack of make-up, or the fillings in her teeth, I could finally see how beautiful she was - and had always been.
This paragraph may seem oddly placed, but my perceptions of beauty have always been a tell-tale sign of my emotions. I have never been able to look at someone whose behaviour upset me and see them as beautiful. Likewise, many people in my life have grown more and more beautiful to me as we have grown closer. When I first met Max, I shrugged off his advances at first because I simply did not find him attractive. I find that almost impossible to believe now, nearly seven years later, as when I look at him I can't believe my luck that someone so handsome and kind wasn't snapped up before I came around. When I was a child I thought my mother was the most beautiful woman alive. My beliefs were not based on maternal adoration alone - no, my mother was a stunningly beautiful woman. My father, who can barely stand to be in the same room as my mother, would still say that my mother's beauty was unrivaled when they met. During the worst of my mother's temper, I would never have seen the tiny bird-like frame she actually possessed. She seemed larger than life, her teeth a bit sharper and her eyes a bit wilder. But after my mother left, I began to notice my mother's diminutive stature more and more. I did not as cute, as many of her male suitors did, but as meek and frail. While others insisted she had the face of a teenager, I thought she had too many wrinkles for her age. I thought her lips were too thin and that she looked almost pitiable when she walked into a room. I dreaded being told I looked like her, for I was far more proud of my tall frame and strong jawline which I had inherited from my father. I couldn't see her as beautiful, delicate or enviable, because I couldn't afford to see her that way. I needed her to be weak, or cruel, or pitiful, or unkind, or crazy - because then it would be OK for me to resent her the way I did.
So when I saw her in the airport and thought she was beautiful, I knew I had forgiven her. I knew I was ready to see her as a person, better still as a person who I would want to be around. I thought that maybe, just maybe, all those years of going to her and wishing that she would be the mother I needed and getting rebuffed were over. Now we could understand each other, respect each other, like each other.
But life is life, and not a feelgood summer flick.
We danced around each other for a while, me restraining my "tone" as much as possible, attempting to bite my tongue when she said something critical or interrupted what I was saying to point out the nearest floral display. If she were writing this I am sure she could tell you of many things she bit her tongue about, or many annoying habits which I possess that she had to ignore politely. But it wasn't long before the facade was broken, and frustrations became outbursts. I became convinced that she was trying to turn my brother against me, she became convinced that my husband hated her because I told him to. There were tears, mostly mine (as my mother rarely cries publicly), there was pleading for her to see my point of view. There were harsh words and condemnations of personality traits - blame allocated to each other for our failure to get along. There was even an implication or two that I would undoubtedly not be the best mother I could if I didn't change certain things about myself. We smoothed things over enough to get through the trip, but in spite of my several attempts at long and honest heart-to-hearts, no resolution was reached.
So at the end of her visit I was left feeling the way I often feel after seeing my mother. Drained. Sad. Relieved that she's gone. Guilty. Ungrateful. Emotionally unstable. Etc. It's not entirely her fault. It's not entirely my fault. It's not her mother's fault or her father's fault, or my father's fault or my father's mother's fault. We're just human, and I just don't know if either of us is ever going to be willing to change enough to be the person the other one needs us to be - or to accept each other for who we are.
Any pointers, sane people?
Wednesday, 6 August 2008
Repressed Memories
Do you trust your memory? I don't mean trust your memory in the sense of trusting that you'll not forget to pick up milk on the way home - I mean trust that the things you remember are true? That they actually happened the way you see them replayed in your mind? I have often wondered if I am a revisionist, if I simply remember things the way I want or need to remember them in order to justify this behaviour or that fear in my life. So many of the major events in my life are surrounded by contradictory viewpoints - my mother remembers it one way, my sister another way, both of them the opposite of what I remember. Historically I have been quick to doubt myself (although quietly, and without showing them I have any skepticism about my version of events), but now I wonder if it is simply something we all do. Are none of us completely right? Is the truth somewhere in between our individual versions? Do we simply shut out the things we cannot face?
My memory is long and detailed, full of sensory images that queue the vision each time I encounter that smell/sight/sound again. The first memory I have is from when I was two years old. I was sitting in a tiny bedroom on my Aunt's knee. I had a fever, I was eating a bag of potato chips. Mum and Dad were fighting - just out of sight but within earshot. Mom is angry because I was sick and Dad wants to take me to his mother's house to fix it. My mother wants to know why Dad doesn't trust her judgement, Dad thinks she is silly and just wants a second opinion. Eventually an ultimatum of some kind is handed out, and Dad leaves. It occurs to me that Dad is gone forever, and that this fight is all my fault. My mother comes in and shouts at my Aunt for giving me chips.
I have always remembered this day. Years later, when I was thirteen, I would ask my Aunt about that night. I told her the story and she was shocked at how much I knew. It turns out this was the fight that eventually ended my parents marriage, they were divorced within a year. There were things I left out - my sister was there too, only six months old and laying in a bassinet nearby. There were things I added in - I always remembered it taking place in a house we didn't live in until several years later. I am fairly certain the emotions I "experienced" in the memory were ones I inserted later in life, once I had a greater understanding of what that moment in time had meant. None the less it taught me to trust my memory, to count it as one of my strengths.
I leaned on that confidence in years to come, when the many battles between my mother and I raged on into a full blown war. She countered every memory I threw at her, challenging my interpretation of every argument and event down to what I had for breakfast that morning. I remained steadfast in my self-belief. I would threaten her with tape-recorders, convinced that if I taped these conversations and played them back to her I would be vindicated and she would be shamed into confession. "I don't remember that" became my mother's defense, the weapon of choice in her arsenal. Because if she couldn't remember it, it never happened. Eventually she started to break me.
After all, I lied all the time.
My days at school were filled with elaborate stories, little exaggerations to cover the absence of normality occurring within my home life. Why don't I have to pay for school lunches? [Because my family was poor and we got free lunches] Because I am so silly with money that my mother comes in every week and pre-pays my lunches, of course! What does my mom do for a living? [Cleans houses and waits tables] She runs her own business, but I don't really understand what she does. What's that? My mother cleans your parents' house? [Of course she does, this is a small fucking town and all of you rich kids have parents who hire housekeepers] Oh she was helping out a friend who was sick for a while, she is really nice like that.
As I got older, and the problems at home became more serious (and more embarrassing for a teenager), the lies became more elaborate. After all, I was now covering for a suicidal mother, daily panic attacks and a burgeoning eating disorder. I could barely keep up with the fibs myself anymore. How could I trust my memory now?
My sister has always used her memory differently - by ignoring it, pretending it doesn't exist. For years she managed to shut out an entire portion of her youth and teenage life. The times I looked to her for back up were riddled with her parroting my mother's "I don't remembers" as though they were in on this great scheme together. It maddened me, pushed a distance between us that I couldn't (wouldn't) explain for many years. Soon my "memory" became a liability, the thing the family could cling to in order to prove I was negative, that I thought I was better than them. My falsification of childhood events were simply the result of some emotional defect, an odd need to justify the cold space between me and my loved-ones.
That's how I saw it, anyway.
But recently, the tides have been turning. My most recent confrontation with my mother resulted in an apology - her first apology (as far as I can remember). For the first time she acknowledged the wrongs, admitted to them, and admitted the effect they must have had on me. It was liberating, frightening, confusing. Next, AJ began to accept my versions of events. Once again I was left standing, mouth agape, wondering whether I had won or lost - or why and when I started fighting in the first place.
This validation is a double edged sword - I feel relieved that I can trust myself again, hopeful for the future of these relationships in my life. Yet at the same time there is this guilt. Why couldn't I have just let it go? My new and infantile experience with motherhood has opened my eyes to the panic and scope for disaster that being a parent brings. My poor mother - just a child when I was born, sick for most of her adult life, abandoned by everyone she loved - why couldn't I have just forgiven her without making her admit to all those mistakes? And AJ - why did I need her to re-live all that pain with me? Why could I not just be happy that she couldn't remember the things I had tried my whole life to forget?
I never anticipated the day when my family would see me as right, as having figured it out before them. I had grown accustomed to my role as the drama-queen, the black sheep. But now that time is here, where do we go with it? How do we start to climb over that vast chasm I have worked so hard to widen over the years?
I don't know, really. What I do know is that standing here, looking out to them from this precipice, I am petrified. But I am also excited, eager, and ready to embrace the family that I have always loved so much but have been too afraid to let love me.
My memory is long and detailed, full of sensory images that queue the vision each time I encounter that smell/sight/sound again. The first memory I have is from when I was two years old. I was sitting in a tiny bedroom on my Aunt's knee. I had a fever, I was eating a bag of potato chips. Mum and Dad were fighting - just out of sight but within earshot. Mom is angry because I was sick and Dad wants to take me to his mother's house to fix it. My mother wants to know why Dad doesn't trust her judgement, Dad thinks she is silly and just wants a second opinion. Eventually an ultimatum of some kind is handed out, and Dad leaves. It occurs to me that Dad is gone forever, and that this fight is all my fault. My mother comes in and shouts at my Aunt for giving me chips.
I have always remembered this day. Years later, when I was thirteen, I would ask my Aunt about that night. I told her the story and she was shocked at how much I knew. It turns out this was the fight that eventually ended my parents marriage, they were divorced within a year. There were things I left out - my sister was there too, only six months old and laying in a bassinet nearby. There were things I added in - I always remembered it taking place in a house we didn't live in until several years later. I am fairly certain the emotions I "experienced" in the memory were ones I inserted later in life, once I had a greater understanding of what that moment in time had meant. None the less it taught me to trust my memory, to count it as one of my strengths.
I leaned on that confidence in years to come, when the many battles between my mother and I raged on into a full blown war. She countered every memory I threw at her, challenging my interpretation of every argument and event down to what I had for breakfast that morning. I remained steadfast in my self-belief. I would threaten her with tape-recorders, convinced that if I taped these conversations and played them back to her I would be vindicated and she would be shamed into confession. "I don't remember that" became my mother's defense, the weapon of choice in her arsenal. Because if she couldn't remember it, it never happened. Eventually she started to break me.
After all, I lied all the time.
My days at school were filled with elaborate stories, little exaggerations to cover the absence of normality occurring within my home life. Why don't I have to pay for school lunches? [Because my family was poor and we got free lunches] Because I am so silly with money that my mother comes in every week and pre-pays my lunches, of course! What does my mom do for a living? [Cleans houses and waits tables] She runs her own business, but I don't really understand what she does. What's that? My mother cleans your parents' house? [Of course she does, this is a small fucking town and all of you rich kids have parents who hire housekeepers] Oh she was helping out a friend who was sick for a while, she is really nice like that.
As I got older, and the problems at home became more serious (and more embarrassing for a teenager), the lies became more elaborate. After all, I was now covering for a suicidal mother, daily panic attacks and a burgeoning eating disorder. I could barely keep up with the fibs myself anymore. How could I trust my memory now?
My sister has always used her memory differently - by ignoring it, pretending it doesn't exist. For years she managed to shut out an entire portion of her youth and teenage life. The times I looked to her for back up were riddled with her parroting my mother's "I don't remembers" as though they were in on this great scheme together. It maddened me, pushed a distance between us that I couldn't (wouldn't) explain for many years. Soon my "memory" became a liability, the thing the family could cling to in order to prove I was negative, that I thought I was better than them. My falsification of childhood events were simply the result of some emotional defect, an odd need to justify the cold space between me and my loved-ones.
That's how I saw it, anyway.
But recently, the tides have been turning. My most recent confrontation with my mother resulted in an apology - her first apology (as far as I can remember). For the first time she acknowledged the wrongs, admitted to them, and admitted the effect they must have had on me. It was liberating, frightening, confusing. Next, AJ began to accept my versions of events. Once again I was left standing, mouth agape, wondering whether I had won or lost - or why and when I started fighting in the first place.
This validation is a double edged sword - I feel relieved that I can trust myself again, hopeful for the future of these relationships in my life. Yet at the same time there is this guilt. Why couldn't I have just let it go? My new and infantile experience with motherhood has opened my eyes to the panic and scope for disaster that being a parent brings. My poor mother - just a child when I was born, sick for most of her adult life, abandoned by everyone she loved - why couldn't I have just forgiven her without making her admit to all those mistakes? And AJ - why did I need her to re-live all that pain with me? Why could I not just be happy that she couldn't remember the things I had tried my whole life to forget?
I never anticipated the day when my family would see me as right, as having figured it out before them. I had grown accustomed to my role as the drama-queen, the black sheep. But now that time is here, where do we go with it? How do we start to climb over that vast chasm I have worked so hard to widen over the years?
I don't know, really. What I do know is that standing here, looking out to them from this precipice, I am petrified. But I am also excited, eager, and ready to embrace the family that I have always loved so much but have been too afraid to let love me.
Wednesday, 30 July 2008
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.
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.
Wednesday, 16 July 2008
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.
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.
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