Unending Cycle

It’s Sunday. A day of football and relaxing. Time to reset for the week and enjoy your time off before starting over again on Monday.

It’s Sunday and here I sit in an apron, smelling strongly of bleach and cleaning supplies, sipping a mild tea meant to help boost my ability to conceive this month.

This month marks a year and a half of trying to have a baby. That’s 19 months or about 82 weeks. Roughly about 575 days of the same thing each cycle: hoping, wishing, trying, logging, monitoring, and then nothing.

My job changed recently. I left the high stress job sitting at a desk Monday through Friday, 7:30-4:30 to a little less pay but a much larger reward. I’m stressing less and I’m home more. Plus I’m doing what I love and have passion for. I’m in the classroom teaching and touching lives.

Even with this change, each month is the same. We try and hope, crossing our fingers for a positive. Then nothing but the silence of one single pink line and another month gone.

We’ve done a lot on our own. We’ve changed our lifestyles, we’re keeping healthy (as we can) and we’re adding natural supplements to help boost our chances. But I’ve got to be real and accept that we may need the help of a doctor.

It feels silly to need help. Jake came into my life so easily and without even trying. But this struggle after having had a healthy pregnancy years ago is real and painful. I feel I’m failing and that something is wrong with me. And in some dark corner of my mind I also feel that I’ve done something wrong and this is my punishment.

Thanks Catholic upbringing.

We’ve been open when people ask about our goal to have more kids and we’ve been even more open about the fact that we’ve been trying for some time. This tends to be met with incredulous stares and confusion. They look at me and ask “But you’ve been pregnant already” like I don’t remember or that the thought hasn’t crossed my own mind, too. I know they don’t mean harm but it sucks to hear.

Oddly, as open as we can be, we don’t share much without being prompted first. I doubt more than a handful of people close to us know we’re trying and have been for over a year now. It’s kept close to our vest and if asked, we’ll chat. Otherwise, it’s a battle we fight alone.

Here we start another year, 2015. Another year, another month, another day to try again.

Letter To My Child: Aching For You

Dear Peanut,

The other day your big brother Jake asked me if you could be born on his birthday. I looked down at him, his big eyes gleaming back at me while he waited patiently to hear my answer. My heart heaved with a sigh and my soul ached for him.

Oh how I wished I could say yes. How I wished I could grant him this wish. I hated to tell him that no, at this moment you wouldn’t be here in time. His 8th birthday was only a few months away and you were not ready yet. We had not been blessed with any news of your coming. Instead we were waiting, again, for another cycle of trying. A cycle of hoping and crossing fingers for that faint second line.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and told him soon, hopefully sooner than later, we’ll tell him that he was going to be a big brother. Maybe not now but soon.

We are all very ready to find out that you will be joining our family. That you will make us a family of four. We can’t wait to read the pink lines, to celebrate, to hear your first heartbeat, then to begin the long process of growing along with you.

Your dad can’t wait. Your brother can’t wait. Without words and with only looks, I can read their thoughts and wishes and hopes. Their hearts opened on their sleeves and beating for you to come along and join us.

And my heart breaks a little each time the tests tell me no, not this month. No not this time. One more month. One more cycle. A little more waiting. I ache a little more each time I have to say to your dad and your brother “Not yet…”.

Peanut, we are all waiting, rather impatiently, for you to be here. The dreamy look in your dad’s eyes as we talk about future plans and try to imagine what your eyes will look like and whether you’ll have his nose or mine. And you brother, well, he can’t wait to hold you, to kiss you and to teach you all the things a big brother should.

And I can’t wait to hear your cries for the first time telling me that my waiting is over.

Impatiently yours,

Mama

Your family awaits…