A Bump in the Road (or at least on my belly)

“Having spent my life avoiding commitment and running away from jobs and relationships when the going got tough, I wondered how on earth I would ever cope with the enormity of the life-long task ahead of me.”

~Lucy Taylor (Pregnant and Terrified)

Not wanting to admit it to myself or anyone else for that matter. Not wanting to be anything but what you’re supposed to be when pregnant – glowing and blissful. Excited about the endless possibilities this new life will bring to the world. But at close to twenty-five weeks pregnant, it would be silly for me to not accept responsibility for what I am feeling…feelings that are anything but blissful. Feelings that are complex and contradictory. I’m scared. I’m questioning if I’m doing the right thing. What makes me think I am going to be capable of this? And where the hell is my pregnancy glow?

I don’t know if I fully understood what was going on inside until about a month ago and have since been trying to figure out how to work with whatever it is. It was triggered by a little road trip we took to visit my husband’s family in Eastern Colorado.

To get to where his family lives, we had to drive past the airport. The airport is already far enough east of the city that there is rarely a need to go past it. In my very biased opinion, the state line ends just beyond the airport. Sorry Eastern Colorado. Park the car and get on a plane if you want to go any further to the east.

But we kept going this time.

As I watched the planes take off, I couldn’t help but feel as though I wanted to jump from the moving car and grab hold of their wings. I don’t think I could have spoken, feeling so choked up inside. But I wanted to yell, “take me with you! Don’t leave me behind. I’m not ready to let go.”

But what am I not ready to let go of? Not able to accept that everything is constantly changing and that change is neither good nor bad? Not being able to be in the present moment, this present place with people I love and care about, and be perfectly ok with it?

I thought about it a lot during that car ride and for weeks after. I’m still thinking about it. The best way I can put it is that I’m grieving a previous life – a pre-pregnancy, carefree one. Was I the happiest I could possibly be? No. But it was different.

How could it not be? In that life I could wake up, having rolled onto my back somewhere in the middle of the night, and not be concerned that I’ve just spent minutes or maybe hours cutting off blood supply to my unborn baby. Worried that this child might have some deformity all because I couldn’t stay in one position all night.

I’m already feeling like a bad mom and he’s not born yet. But maybe that’s what I get for reading all the blogs, sites and books that tell you how what you’re doing (or not doing) simply isn’t good enough.

And so I think back to the planes. I very selfishly wonder when I might fly again. When I might get to see somewhere other than the Denver skyline.

After that last flight with the child who screamed for the full two hours we were in the air, I decided I wouldn’t subject anyone, including myself, to that until I felt confident I could either calm them, or they’d be able to calm themselves. How long that will be, I’m not sure.

And then I felt incredibly shameful and guilty for even asking these questions. Millions of people never travel. Never been on an airplane. Are content being right where they’re at. No, not just content, but happy. Here I am feeling this incredible sense of loss having not lost, well, anything. All because I don’t have an impending plane trip planned and I’ve imposed a travel restriction on myself.

Ok, then just stop the grieving already. You haven’t lost anything and you’re about to gain a whole heck of a lot. Should be easy, right? But what about the ambivalence I feel?

While I was hoping that once I decided I was ready to have children I’d be able to with no problem, there was also this part of me that thought ‘what if I can’t?’ Maybe not being able to wouldn’t really be such a bad thing.

And so, at the same time as trying to have a child, I was planning for not being able to have one. Maybe we’d pick up and move across the globe. Do something spontaneous and adventurous. Pursue other passions. Life without a child would be just as ok as life with one. It would be just as rich and fulfilling. Wouldn’t it?

There was relief in seeing my monthly visitor come, knowing I could go out on Friday and indulge in a glass or two of wine with no concern. Yet, that relief shared the same space of sadness in thinking my body was rejecting being able to procreate. It wasn’t ready. When would it be ready? Would it ever be ready? What if I really do want this to happen and it’s not meant to?

Maybe I’m experiencing a little of what psychologists call antenatal or prenatal depression. Not given as much attention, or even acceptance, as post partum depression, I’m betting there’s a lot more women out there who feel this than are willing to step forward and admit it.

And while it would be easy to use this label as a scapegoat, just another condition in a long line of many and that maybe I should go see someone about it, I’m not convinced that’s the best approach.

I recognize these feelings as happening, but I also know I’m creating the stories that keep them circulating around and around in my head. No one is forcing me to stay in this space. Those planes aren’t leaving me behind. This isn’t personal. No part of me has died.

I don’t have nine lives. It’s not like one has been taken away and now I’m living another. It’s the same life, and I feel foolish in not appreciating its impermanence with every single moment changing.

I’m scared. Of course I am. I’m terrified of being a bad mom, responsible for someone else, not loving every minute of it. Can I handle giving birth, breastfeeding, sleepless nights, and eventually having to discipline (something that is not my strong suit)?

But maybe by being honest with myself and with the lovely little boy inside who will be making an appearance in three months or so, we will both have a richer, more fulfilling experience. A mommy who is far from perfect but wants to give him a happy and peaceful life in the face of anything thrown his way by doing my best to teach him that he doesn’t have to choose suffering.

I’m hopeful that being conflicted is normal, during each stage of this pregnancy and motherhood, and the more I try to deny that any of those negative, scared feelings exist, the more depressed I am thinking I’ll feel through blaming and shaming.

The lesson I am still learning is in not reacting to the negative risings. They will come. I have to choose to let them go.

I recently read about something called the sky mind in the book Mindful Motherhood by Cassandra Vieten. Thoughts, feelings and sensations are a lot like the weather. Sometimes the weather is awesome. Sometimes it just plain sucks. Like how this year’s May felt as though the incessant string of bad weather days would never end? But then they do. And the sky is blue again.

That’s because weather takes place in the larger sky; the sky that is always there. The sky that contains a bunch of different weather patterns, but remains inherently clear. We tend to attach to the weather patterns asking when is the next day of bad (or good) weather coming? How long will it stick around? When will it finally go away? Kind of like how I’m attached to the weather app on my phone. Maybe it’s time to delete it.

Putting a ton of energy into trying to change or control what I’m experiencing while pregnant, or any other time in the life I have left, is as futile as trying to change or control the weather.

The ultimate goal then is getting myself to realize that either the experience (this pregnancy, motherhood, my next flight with baby in tow, and on and on) will have me or maybe I can just have an experience and simply be aware of it.

“The lightning is what you’ll never get back. Watching these storms is like spending the night in life and death. A strike of lightning is a moment in time. We get thousands of moments, but the lightning reminds us that they’re all temporary.” ~ From  Phenomenal by Leigh Ann Henion.

Day 24: Could’ve, Would’ve, Should’ve

I’m going to take a moment to sincerely apologize for my lack of commitment to this project. I should have completed Day 30 sometime last week, and now am just getting to Day 24’s entry. It’s not that I don’t want to see through what I’ve started and would feel undeniably guilty for not keeping a goal that has been so publicly shared. It’s that life gets complicated.

I started last week with the intent of getting through as many entries as I could before a brief planned break for an out-of-town wedding. It didn’t happen.

I had been thinking a lot, as I often do, about visiting my grandma. She is the only living grandparent I have and will be turning 92 in a little over a month. She lives in an assisted living home not that far from me, and yet it is so easy to let time, sometimes months go by, without going to visit her. I make excuses and then feel badly I don’t go. Even though she has been a huge part of my life, I struggle to make the time. I am aware of how selfish it is.

She has never been much of what I would consider to be independent lady. After moving in with my parents in early 2000, she left her familiar surroundings, gave up the few friends she was in contact with, discontinued her activities and stopped driving. I always thought it was too early. She wasn’t even 80 yet. But this was her choice. I worried she had already decided to give up and wondered how much longer she had.

Over the next few years, life changed for everyone in the family with marriages, divorces, kids, and new jobs. Dementia was developing. I still get confused on the differences between dementia and Alzheimer’s. She has never been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, which has been a blessing. Doctors say that dementia is a symptom and Alzheimer’s is the cause of that symptom (but not always, in this case). Regardless, her short-term memory went from bad to worse and she had trouble recognizing people she had been the most close to.

When she went to assisted living, she was still relatively capable of taking care of herself. Then, she fell and broke her wrist. She was going to need more help. Still in assisted living, she is rarely left alone and is no longer cooking for herself.

Keeping track of when her fall happened or even how long she has been under assisted care is a blur to me. She has been one of those women who, despite the feelings of wanting to give up from time to time, muscles through and lives on. It’s remarkable really.

She is a little woman. Fragile and frail. We knew if she were to fall again, it would be bad. It could mean the end of her quality of life.

And so, as soon as last Monday, I was making my promise that I would go visit her when I got back from vacation. I needed to be better about it. On Tuesday, my mom called to let me know she was in the ER with a broken hip. I was too late on my promise.

Below the blankets in the hospital room, I swear I couldn’t even tell she had legs. It looked like her body was part of the bed. She has become so skinny I don’t know how her organs can pull her through this even though the doctors determine she is strong enough for surgery. But, she recognizes me. She says my name. I feel an overwhelming sense of guilt knowing I haven’t seen her most of the summer, but have to let it go realizing she doesn’t care, she is just glad to see me. I want to be strong for my mom. I know this is very hard on her.

Statistics state that about 25% of patients who go through breaking a hip in their advanced years are gone within a year. Even though she had the surgery, she will need to be able to recover. To move freely. To walk. If she cannot, it is difficult to know what will happen. Inevitably, it could mean that I will never again visit her in the place she was living. She will have to go to a nursing home. And then what?

I don’t know how to handle aging. I don’t think I’m afraid of death, but at some point, I seem to tell myself I can’t deal with it. That I don’t know how to deal with it. I’ll just close my eyes until it’s all over. If it’s part of the cycle of life that everyone goes through, why is it so hard for me to see? For me to accept?

I remember how excited we would get knowing grandma was coming when living overseas as kids. It was awesome to have any visitors from the U.S., but there was always something special about her visits. I remember her townhouse, her pool, how she would let us pick out a toy at the grocery store, trips to Disney and other fun destinations, her peaches and sugar dish, cobblers of every kind, how she was the only other person in the world I would allow to sleep with my stuffed dog Baxter when she’d come to stay overnight, and her support of me no matter what it was I wanted to be. Soft spoken and kind, it’s always difficult to see what something like dementia can do to the mind.

The beauty of the symptom, if there can be a silver lining? Long-term memory is crystal clear even if she cannot recall two hours ago. It would be a shame for me to let her slip away without getting to hear everything she may have to say. I have to believe I will get to do this. I will not sit idly by waiting for the call.

Before surgery last week, I sat by her bedside with my mom and aunt in the room. For as weak as I thought she looked, her grip on my hand was stronger than I thought it could be. Not being as big on physical contact other than the hug here and there, I could not remember the last time we had sat like this holding hands. She told me she loved me and I told her I loved her. I kissed her on the forehead before leaving. From this moment forward, things would be different.

She told me on her birthday last year that she hoped she would not see this year’s birthday. I explained to her how much she has to live for and how loved she is. She is so strong, she’ll be around for a long time. But I am not her. I cannot know what is going through her mind. Her soul. She has lived a remarkable life and if she could think through even the most recent years, would not be disappointed with all she has done and how much she means to so many people. But I do understand that, at some point, you decide enough is enough. You want to go out on a good note leaving a legacy of happiness and goodness. I know this is what she wants.

Even though I keep hoping she is not right in what she said to me last year, I know only she can make that decision. When God says it’s time, it’s time.

Could’ve, would’ve, should’ve. I hate that. I hate that I do that. It’s never too late, right? Until one day, it is.