6

Warning: this post is very "same song one millionth verse." I'm sorry for that, because if I could sing a new song I would-- in a heartbeat.


Today my little girl turns six months old.

So make that six months of her life that I have missed, save five precious days back in March. Our little boy is six and a half months old.

I have so many posts roiling around in my head but most of them are so depressing, or so raw, and I want to put them out there but sometimes when I overspeak my mind I get into trouble so I need to tread carefully.

There is another reason the number six is significant to me but I'll leave it at that.

We started this process over two years ago. I remember telling my parents about it, in the neuroICU at the Texas Medical Center, where my Dad lay suffering from his massive stroke. I told them to bring something good into the space, into a room that was so heavy with despair. His stroke happened two years ago on June 10th. He's a sliver of his former self.

I am, too.

How many ways can you feel foolish?
Why did I wash their little crib sheets a month ago? Why did we race out and buy diapers a month ago, thinking that at any day we'd get the call to travel and wouldn't want to be purchasing last minute items? Do you know how many clothes I have that say 6 months? That they will not even get the chance to wear?

I guess there are a million ways to feel foolish in this process.

The Embassy is already closed in Ethiopia so we won't get any news today.
Which means we go into another weekend with nothing. No news. No frenzied travel plans to make. Nothing.

We get to lace up our shoes and go for a long trail run. For weeks we had been saying the words "We should do this now while we still can..." but the last time I started to say it Mr. MTL interrupted and said "Stop. Please don't say that anymore. It's just too hard."

He's right. I don't give a fuck about being able to go on a long trail run, about being to sleep late (even though I don't/can't), being able to lazily watch the day slip by. I don't care. June was not supposed to arrive without my family on the same continent.
Sometimes when I hurt so deeply I can only exercise so hard I think I'm going to die of a heart attack. Because when you can barely breathe, when each step brings searing pain in your lungs and chest, at least your brain can't think about the issues that really are breaking your heart.

But that only lasts so long.

And then you're right back to the empty nursery, the birth announcements, the daily tasks of existing, the volunteer duties, the pregnant coworkers and their birth stories, the sinking into exhausted sleep only to be awakened with dreams that they are here. And then to realize in a fog that no, they are not.

Infertility was hard.
Three surgeries was hard.
Five IVF cycles was excruciating.
Dealing with others' pregnancies and babies during infertility was hard.
Filling out paperwork for adoption was hard.
Being interviewed and prodded and investigated and fingerprinted....all hard.
But this wait...this wait is the hardest by far.

See? I told you it was the same verse again.