The Womb

I had another OB appointment today and things are looking good! Sonogram in a week. It amazes me that even with my advanced maternal age, these appointments are quick five minute pee in a cup affairs. Everything just looks so...fine.

That's not to say that the pregnancy has been a walk in the park. You have been with me through morning sickness, 2 stomach bugs, shingles, heartburn from hell, a month-long chest cold, insomnia, hemorrhoids and a vein swelling that should be unmentionable, but have you ever known me NOT to mention something? But all of these ailments have had to do with me, not the baby, and I just can't believe it! I am so grateful, and I'm not taking any of it for granted.

As uncomfortable as I am at 32 weeks, I feel so much more secure with the baby inside rather than outside. He gets to roll and twist, hiccup and sleep, and do whatever he needs to do to keep growing.

Going from that loving, liquid, warm environment into the cold world must be a shock. Bright lights, loud noises, blood tests, vaccinations, learning how to eat, and perhaps even losing your foreskin, all within days of leaving the coziness of the womb? What could be more jarring than that?

It makes me think of the early days after losing Jack. The world seemed unfamiliar and foreign, bearing no resemblance to anything I'd known before. The sun was too bright. Noises too loud. Everything hurt. I couldn't understand what people were saying. The vocabulary of grief might as well have been in another language: police, dead, morgue, burial, memorial.

All I wanted to do was go back to the way things had been before. If there had been a swaddling blanket big enough for me, I would have wanted someone to wrap me so tightly I couldn't thrash about and repeatedly be startled into each new realization of loss and pain. I would have liked to have slept forever.

I know I can't protect this baby boy from hardship: danger, disasters, illness, bullies, addiction, disappointment, heartbreak, and death. He needs the chance to experience life. And cutting myself off after losing Jack could have numbed the pain, perhaps, but would  have kept me from learning to trust the life I've been given, and navigate a new way to live it.

It's not a life free from pain, certainly, but one of pain and much joy intermingled.