The Post After this is Sentimental and Nice. Really.

Now that “The Holidays” are over I can finally say it. Fuck Baby Jesus. My womb has felt gut-wrenchingly empty for about 34 weeks or so. I’ve been reading about other women who got pregnant over the summer at almost the same time as me on a chat room-type website that I used when I was pregnant with Ava. Why do I torture myself by doing that? It’s the only way I know it was real.

This morning I tried to log back in and it wouldn’t let me. Then I re signed up just so I could say hi to some of the women who are still trying to conceive after all this time or the ones that are about the same gestation as I would have been. Even still, the stupid website must have been down or just knew letting me in was a bad idea. Can’t post or blog on my profile without logging in.

I got rid of the positive pregnancy tests almost the moment the blood stopped flowing. I woke up early on the day of my daughter’s 3rd birthday miscarrying. Now, the due date looms just about a month away. It was a totally unplanned pregnancy. I had gotten Mirena just a few months before (99.9% protection for up to 5 years!). Right. The damn thing fell out. I went back to the doctor right before we left Oregon and swore something had to be wrong with it but he blew me off. Unfortunately, there’s nothing like getting pregnant that makes a woman wish she were having another baby.

Last time I lost a pregnancy, it was early on and we conceieved Ava 3-4 months later. (Hence, getting pregnant (accidentally) taught us we were ready. When the due date (which coincidentally was March as well) of the lost pregnancy came around, I remember just being frustrated. “I WOULD BE DONE BY NOW if that first one had stuck!” It’s hard to grieve the loss of a pregnancy when you can’t even see your shoes, round with a daughter who reminds you she’s okay with constant nudges.

The OB/GYN I saw a few weeks after my 2^nd miscarriage was so optimistic. I told him all the complications I had with my last pregnancy and he promised me that there were so many more options that just weren’t available or studied even just that many years ago and getting me through a pregnancy wouldn’t necessarily be easy, but possible. That kept me going for months. The possibility.

As an update to an earlier post, I am now doing self-catheterization (not nearly as bad as it sounds) when I need to so I’m not dragging a bag around. I really didn’t know how annoying it was until it was gone. I’m also awaiting some tests and hopefully explanation as to why I can’t pee. One explanation could come from an Ortho doctor who ordered an mri of my spine. Said doctor spent way too long looking at what he could see of my spine going back and forth on one frame from my hip mri whispering “right there”. I’m thinking “the possibility” is probably forever gone. Ava likely will never have a biological sibling and it doesn’t help that she asks all the time where are her brother and sister.

The Crickets are Chirping. At Twilight?

I am a delinquent blogger. It’s not that I don’t have the call to write, it’s that I haven’t felt like I have anything worthy of posting. All the time I have spent trying to think of the perfect post has kept me from writing what’s really on my mind. Sadly, my long-awaited debut was inspired by a mainstream teen movie. Guh.

I went to see New Moon the other day. A matinee with lots of other women my age sitting alone. The peace of only having to listen to my own thoughts was overwhelming. The joy of being alone doing something enjoyable carried me for so many days I’m even considering going again.

We have been in Tualatin for almost a year. Although our whole family is much, much happier here, almost six months of unemployment has definitely taken its toll. I am not cut out to be a full-time mom. Trying to keep a toddler entertained, enriched, and healthfully fed has come close to consuming me. As I write this I am waiting to hear about a potential job offer, and trying to figure out how I’m going to climb out of this hole and become a person again. She’s still in there; I know because I heard her while alone with thoughts of vampires and humans.

Years ago, I was introduced to vampires and werewolves and all other sorts of fairy-tale creatures. As much as my adult influences would try to stop it, I got closer and closer until I could touch them, these creatures from make-believe. They’re real. As real as you or I or anyone we know. The problem is, how to merge the outside pretend-real with what I know to be real? Who gets in on the secret? How do I find the others?

Sometimes I think I see one in the eyes of someone I’ve seen at both Portland PRIDE and the Portland Aids Walk. I toy with the idea that if I join this club or that I might find someone who wants to be in the same coven. The rest of my creatures are scattered about the country, centered in the Midwest, or buried in the earth. I have met new friends here, but it’s not the same. As I get older they seem harder to find.

I know we’re in the right place, and are lucky to have a few old friends nearby, but is there any place in the world that will feel like living in Urbana in 2002? I’m content for now, but still look to a future where many of us can gather close, circle the fire, and commune.

Accepting Ativan Donations...

Today was pretty bad. One of those days where you think about a possible worse-case scenario and it lives up to your expectations and then some. I'll spare most of the details, but recount just one example for good measure.

After a particularly frustrating outing, we got back just in time for me to call about the student loan consolidation I had been waiting to hear about for so long I've lost track. I had already called twice before, asking what was taking so long. (My original application was received on October 25.) At the time, they said they would re-do the request to my lenders for the pay-off amounts for my loans because it had already been two months. Then the evil woman on the other end of the phone asked me if I knew I would lose the forgiveness benefits of Loans X and Y if I consolidated. (X and Y are currently under cancellation, and get paid off little by little for every year I work a certain number of hours as an RN.) Bastards.

I had no intention of consolidating X and Y. But, the application said that under penalty of death by nuclear fallout I must report EVERY student loan I have even if I don't want it included in the consolidation. I remember typing in the account number for Loan X and thinking about how livid I would be when they screwed up and added it even though I checked the "No, do not f&cking include this in my consolidation" box.

Of course, because of the curse that I have always carried, which has been somehow exponentially increased after taking my wedding vows, they screwed up. It will be another 60 days before they "review" my case and "see if they can fix it". 

The silver lining to this day is that I had this wonderful memory of one of the first friends I made in college. I remember having a day like this one has been. I stormed out of the underground library in no mood to talk to anyone, and there he was. We lived in the same dorm, which had a church attached to it, and he said, "No matter how busy you are, sit in the church for ten minutes before you go up to your room".

I remember that sense of peace that I could find in the chapel of St. John's. A aesthetically pleasing place to sit and think in silence with other people who were also sitting (or kneeling) and thinking. Maybe it's time I found a nearby church that's pretty on the inside. Otherwise, I think I need an Ativan prescription. Either way.

**************

At the end of the horrible day, I was driving in our new town and saw a sign that looked like a squiggly line next to a large tree. A few feet ahead was an area where an actual large tree trunk was spilling onto the place where the road should have gone. Instead, the curb curved to make room for life. I heard the voice of Mr. Rogers asking if I had learned my lesson for the day.

Out of My Discomfort Zone

As I type this, I am awaiting a phone call from a potential employer. I am being seriously considered for a full-time hospice position in a town about 30 miles away. What shall I hope for? I’m not sure I can commit to a new job, a daily commute, or a new town. Conversely, can I turn down a job that would help steer my career in the direction I’ve always been curious about?  Although I no longer consider myself Catholic, or traditionally religious for that matter, I still have a sense that tells me to “let go and let god”. Or let fate, destiny, karma, or something larger than myself intervene. This job found me; does that mean I have an obligation to it, like the abandoned kitten on my doorstep earlier this summer, parched?

Longitude and I would not be together now if we hadn’t just relaxed, let go of expectation, and waited for our relationship to play out. In the beginning, it was sex and talking to the wee hours of the morning. Our separate daily lives slowly merged until moving in together was an evolution, not a choice. Neither one of us struggled with commitment, because we didn’t have to. We only promised to love each other fairly, and always be willing to give our relationship the chance it deserves, the chance we gave it over six years ago.

Why is it then, that I now feel the need to play out every potential consequence of every decision, instead of just letting life happen? Has age taken away this ability? Or having a child? We have not headed back to Illinois because things didn’t fall into place, yet. I have made peace with that, and I suppose I will make peace with whatever the outcome this day will bring. I just wish I were at peace now, in the waiting, like before.

"Homer, you took a BAPTIZING for me!"

Remember the episode of The Simpsons where the Flanders try to baptize the Simpson kids? Marge and Homer are seriously concerned about the damage it could do to their children and eventually rescue them from the horror, but Homer's two hairs get singed from the drops of holy water.

There are many benefits to living away from family, and I just realized how great it has been to be able to get away. We have a built in excuse to not have to spend hours with the extended family when all we really want to do on our Saturday afternoon is have sex and then eat ice cream before dinner. (Not that we've had an actual Saturday off together since Ava was conceived, anyway, but you get the point.) Spending the dreaded holidays out of town was wonderful last year. Even though I was in the hospital for Christmas and puking most of the time, I can't say how nice it was to be able to sleep as much as I wanted. Tell me again why we are thinking of moving back?

I can't think of the answer right now, but I can think of one of the reasons we left. Neither Longitude or I respond well to pressure. Usually pressure from family members is not enough to convince us to change our behavior, but it is enough to annoy us. Lately we have been getting hints, suggestions, and in some cases demands related to Ava's baptism. The possibility (probability?) of moving back ruins our ability to shrug it off and say we'll get to it sooner or later.

Neither of us feel that the pouring of water over her head will damage or repair any part of her. I don't believe there is a god who will send her to a fiery hell or children's limbo if she's not baptized. On the other hand, if there are members of our families who do genuinely worry about her well being should she not go through with it, fine. It would be a great excuse to have cake. My biggest concern for her is that she learns that she was born the way she is already meant to be, and doesn't need to do anything to become acceptable.

Little Dinosaur, I wish i could pack you up into a tiny egg and put you back inside me for safe keeping, and let you out, exactly as you are today, when it will be enough to just be you. For us, your parents, it is enough.

Spirituality, or lack thereof?

So I came to my computer while Ava (aka. The Dinosaur) naps with the intention of finally typing out her birthstory. I've been meaning to do it for a long time (well, since about 9 weeks ago, to be exact) but of course I checked my gmail first and changed my mind completely. 

Hang in there, I swear the connections from one thing to another will make sense. Right? I make sense. Yeah.

The email I received was one of those stupid forwards from a family member (actually from one of Longitude's family members...HA!) that I usually just delete. Which is a big deal, because having gmail, I archive EVERYTHING except stupid forwards. Anyway, the email was basically saying that the majority of people in America like that "In God We Trust" is on our currency and that our nation is "Under God" every morning in classrooms across the country. The email failed to mention the source of this information, but asked: why cater to the small minority who wants the god crap removed? (Okay, not a direct quote, but I think well summarized.) I was then instructed to forward the email if I agreed with it or delete it if I don't. Well, I was going to anyway, stupid Forward!!

I obviously don't agree with this, and think that this subject has nothing to do with what the majority of people are thinking, but it's unconstiutionality. That's the way America works, right? If we did what the majority of people wanted this would be a completely different (and probably much better) place. But this is all beside the point.

I am constantly being subjected to Christian culture in my daily life. God is everywhere. He even appeared talking in my ear as I was pushing my daughter out in the hospital, in the form of an obnoxious nurse's aid. At this point of the process, I was extremely focused and confident and just wanted everyone to shut up and let me concentrate. Happily, my nurse and husband figured this out just by being in the same room with me. I was almost unable to speak or really communicate anything, so they must have figured it out by body language or ESP. Unfortunately, my nurse had a back problem so she asked the nurse's aid to come hold my leg up. (No easy task, I'll give her that; I pushed for two and a half hours.) She was good at it, and this was the only reason I did not scream at her and kick her out of the room.

Her "encouragement" went something like this:

(contraction starts)

Her: You can do this because god will help you do you want me to pray for you I've gotten people who didn't believe in him to go church just by praying for him I could tell you lots of stories when this is all over...

(contraction ends)

Me: (barely audible) I don't think that's going to help right now. 

Her: (sad sigh) Don't worry, prayer will help you, I promise! 

Me: I just need someone to tell me when the contraction starts because I hurt so much I can't always feel the beginning and I don't want to miss out on any pushing time. (This might have come out completely unintelligible or only in my own head.)

(contraction starts)

Husband: Can you get out of the way of the monitor so I can see when the contraction is?

Me: Is it starting? Can I push now? I'm going to anyway.

Her: Believe in the power! Me, in head: (Of Philo) Believe in him! (my dog Philo) He knows you can do this! (Philo the dog)

(contraction ends)

Me: I really just need someone to tell me when the contraction is starting. I'm fine.

Her: (completely oblivious to my actual needs, but fulfilling her own quite well) I bet the doctor is praying for you right now, he prays for all his patients.

and so on.

I couldn't believe that I was being bombarded with this. It was the first time in my life when I felt completely unable to get away from religious crap. Even after 8 years of Catholic school with forced Mass every week, at least then I knew that I could run out the door if I had to. (Although I never would have done this because I probably would have been in big trouble.) I was practically tied down, unable to walk or control anything that was happening to me and this woman was trying to convert me! I actually felt more violated by this than by all the vagina prodding and such.

So what I say to you, supposed majority of people who want god to be on our money: you can get your own trinket of any size or shape that says "In God We Trust", even with your favorite bible verse, your name on it, what have you, and keep it in your pocket, purse, or wallet. I don't want to be forced to do so.

**************************

This is another area where I feel that I just don't fit in. I actually feel quite at home in a Catholic church. Comfortable, even. But, I don't actually believe what I would have to believe to be an acceptable member, and I never will. Sometimes I think that maybe we could find some sort of church that actually values what we do, but most of the time I'm just glad to find spirituality in other things. 

The only problem is that church is where many people find their closest friends, do most of their socializing, and even networking. Crap. We don't fit anywhere.