Showered With Miracles

On the way to Hermione's shower, which should have been mine, my mom was having none of it.  This isn't about you.  This is your niece.  These are all people who love her, nothing is going to be about you, and this is going to be fun.

We drove past my babies in the freezer.  And then it was a very long drive.  And then I was at a giant Mexican baby shower with a TON of people and so much going on.  Why had I been worried?  This wasn't about me at all.  HA. I hate it when mom is right.  Besides, if I talked to everyone, it would be 90 seconds of conversation.

I had crafted a onesie with an inside joke, it was pretty funny.  Everyone loved it in the gift opening, more than the ridiculous $200 present.  And to think I literally got tears on it when I was making it last night.  Ridiculous.  This is happy, this isn't about me.   It was wonderful.  It was fun to be around so much family and with so much love.

My mom had to leave, and I got a ride from Fancypants to her evening shower, hosted by one of my dear friends at night.  I knew this one would be rowdier.  I wasn't even invited to this one, they were being kind to me.  (Her family shower was a week before).  Fancypants seemed glad I was going, and you know what, it was fun.

They had some dumb game where everyone, including men, put a balloon under their shirt, held a quarter between their knees, raced someone across the room, and tried to get the quarter in a bowl on the floor.  It was hilarious and stupid.  One of the balloons popped, and there were some distasteful miscarriage jokes.  That was the only moment the whole night I felt that sting of loss.  Otherwise, the whole night, I had a fantastic time.

It would be unthinkable to me a few days ago that I would have spent all day at two baby showers and had a delightful time.  It was great.  My time will come, or maybe it won't.  But the world is full of love, and if you are open, you can see it and feel it and receive it where you think it's impossible.

No Zen for the Shower

My anxiety is increasing about this baby shower this weekend, the one that was supposed to be mine.  In the mail, I got a note to get a mammogram.  That means it has been a year since I escalated this journey to IVF.  A year, two pregnancies, three dead embryos.  Oh and the years dicking around almost dying before that.  My baby would be almost three years old.

I hate this.  I hate this for both of us.  I wish I could be what I should be, but I can't.

I'm tempted to send the damn gift and say I can't attend, because it's true.  I feel like I can't.  Over this journey, I've learned to remove myself from situations that will be too much to handle.  One year old's birthday parties.  Conversations about breast pumps.  Facebook.  Life.  I haven't been to a baby shower in two years, except work ones I couldn't skip, with acquantainces.

This will be the first time I am staring down my husband's gossipy, awful family in this context.  I want to hide.  My friend texted me that I am strong and brave and that I can do this.  But maybe I can't?  I can't even run in the back room and hide if it gets rough, because this is an awful relative hosting this at a place I've never been.  It's easier to handle kids than pregnant women for me.  Well, kids, then babies, then pregnant women.

I've been to a lot of yoga this week to try to center and zen or something.  But I keep going back to this mental image that she is hugely pregnant.  And I'm still here.

Cheese Still Alone

I got an email about the wedding (yes the same wedding) from another friend.  It was a heads up that she's pregnant also.  I already knew that, I guess, remember I am infertile, not stupid.  This means she got pregnant a month or two after her wedding.  I mean, we're in our early-mid-ish thirties, what did I expect?

And that colleague I saw at the IVF clinic way back in December 2014 when I bravely tucked my tail and hid in the bathroom.  His Facebook is covered with his new baby.  That means while I was in beta hell with my chemical pregnancy, they were getting joyous Christmas news about what would be their son in the next ultrasound room.  FML.  This works for everyone but me.

I haven't heard anyone even tell me about a miscarriage.  No one has sent over their friend going through IVF.  Nope.  Everyone gets pregnant on the second try and it's all sunshine and rainbows.  For everyone but me.  For fuck sake, the stats say miscarriages and even advanced REs and stuff are fairly common, but I don't feel that now.  I don't know anyone in real life going through anything close to what I am.

Everyone is going to be fucking pregnant at this wedding.  This wedding I have flown to two different cities for and clearly don't belong at because of my failure to execute the basic mission everyone seems to be going for.  Even the guys at this wedding, four, maybe more will have pregnant wives.  Does anyone talk about anything but their goddamn babies?  And I will again be the cheese standing alone.  Good thing this wedding is in a recreational marijuana state.

I don't have a good way to explain this feeling.  I would not wish it on anyone.  Physically, the closest analogue I have is grief, which just overwhelms your whole body with physically sobbing and chest pain and shows you no way out.  It physically takes you to the ground.  That has gotten worse as the world has closed in on me.  But this is now more overriding.  It has infiltrated every aspect of my life.  I live as a failure, and as a sad, pathetic cautionary tail.  The truth is, I might never get what I want.  And I do not know how it is possible for me to continue the rest of my life feeling like this.

Skipping the Shower?

Hermione's shower is in two weeks.  I bought her some ridiculous $200 present.  I have plans to make some crafty stupid bow with the baby's name.  I ordered a silly knit hat for a newborn photo op.  I ordered some newborn booties with her sports team on them.

Looking at that present feels like looking at someone laughing at me.  I moved it in the closet, and I can still hear it laughing at me.  I can see the silly games with melted candy bar in a diaper, I know the questions.

I am filled with ANXIETY when I think about this.  Anxiety with all caps.  Because I don't share my grief with people I barely know, and even if I did, someone else's baby shower is not right.  I know the questions are coming from a good place.  And, hell, maybe I won't get them.  I know at least some of this struggle has been in the gossip mill for a long time.

I feel this urge to RUN AWAY and not go to this shower.  It just so unfair.  I don't want to face it, I don't want to talk about it.  I am already freaking out at the concept of people cooing and gushing over her pregnancy, at what should have been our joint shower.  HA.  I should have known better than to tempt the universe with that one.  Of course that will never happen for me.

Everyone is going to think I'm a total bitch for leaving early, but I don't care.  To survive, this one is going to have to be quick.