Where I Am Right Now

I seem to have these half-day break downs after I finish a significant number of job applications. That's when I realize these (worthless?) applications are what is getting me through my life right now. Work hard on these aps! Your life will be better! You won't be in this place forever! Write your ticket out of this mess! Oh, why can't that be true?

When I finish the applications, I have to return to my dissertation. And as my brain switches from job materials to dissertation, when I allow even a moment for that transference, it hits me - I have lost two babies.

I went to go get blood drawn today, so they can figure out what might be wrong. They said the results should be back in an hour, so I'm sure we will hear back in a couple weeks after we've made over a dozen phone calls.

Today was suppose to be the day I went in for my first OB-GYN appointment of the second pregnancy. I called yesterday to cancel it. It took me that long to do it.

It struck me the other day that I really haven't told a lot of people the story of the second pregnancy. That was not a blissful week as it was with the first. There was a lot of drama and a lot of worry (and not just because we had already lost one). Nicole once told me, "I can't wait to meet your and Ben's children. They'll just be so...dramatic." That little sesame seed certainly lived up her prediction from day one. But I thought it would be okay. I approached his little life with equal parts fret and faith.

We were excited about that baby. I remember Ben dancing to something on the TV, and he asked, "Do you think the baby will like to dance?" I told him, "Yes, the baby will like to dance." He patted the baby for luck when I asked. And the day we found out we were pregnant, Sully would not leave me alone; he insisted that he keep his paw on my stomach while I laid down on the couch and watched TV. It freaked us out. "Do you think he knows?" Ben asked. "Yes, I do," I replied.

I've thought about giving you the rest of the story, but I really think that's all you need to know. It's nice to reflect on the happy parts of that week. And to remember that despite our worry, we were just so happy.

I didn't name this baby. I haven't reflect much on his life, or planted a tree, or thought about the possibility of a prayer service. I couldn't go to the places I went with the first pregnancy. I can just work on job materials. Sometimes I feel guilty for that, but it's just what it is and where I am.

And if I am honest, there is not much of me left. I've been on auto-pilot for quite some time now. Sometimes I wonder how my life can be so "normal" right now, but then I remember it really isn't normal for me to take over-the-counter sleeping aids every night.

Today I've been thinking a lot about Hanukkah, about how there wasn't enough oil to keep the light going, but miraculously, the light kept burning. I really think that this is the year I buy myself a menorah. I hope that this suggestion won't be offensive to the Jewish people in my life. I say this with nothing but respect for their faith tradition. It's just such a beautiful, hopeful story to me right now. And I will take any comfort I can get these days as I struggle to keep my own light burning.

I should end this Thanksgiving eve with some pretty paragraph about everything for which I'm grateful. I am grateful for so much. But pretty endings aren't really in me these days, so I will take my cue from this essay by Alice Bradley.