The Shifty Shadow

On a 5th Birthday

2011-05-16T16:14:00.006+10:00

It's my daughter's birthday today.

Is it possible to feel like a bad mother even when your child is dead?

I feel bad that I haven't spent ages thinking and crying about her these last few days. The thing is, I've spent more time thinking and crying about the failed IVF's, chemicals, and the miscarriage earlier this year, then I have thinking about Maya. I can't bring myself to spend hours staring at photos that are another year older, and cry. I feel like a sucky mum.

I'm guessing the tears for my sweet girl will come on Friday. I always crash on Fridays.

But in honour of her dear little life, here is a photo of Her Sweetness.

Heart.

Sigh.

A story

2011-03-04T09:43:00.003+11:00

This one is for msfitzia, and also for me.

The Garden

Once there was a gardener who wanted to make a beautiful garden. She planted a tree and cared for it and the gardener’s family would watch it grow. As the tree grew, the neighbours came over to admire it. But it was soon clear that the tree was unwell.

The neighbours called on the name of The Great Gardner, claiming health and long life for the tree. The gardener also asked in her heart that the tree live. But the tree died anyway.

“Plant another there” called one neighbor.
“It’s for the best” said another.

But the gardener did not want another tree there. She left it standing, and built a small path around the base with a seat for her family to sit on. At Christmas, they put lights and an angel on it.

The gardener found a new patch of soil and planted another tree, but this one did not grow. She marked the spot where it had been planted with a large rock.

She tried again in a different spot, asking that this one may live. But it died as well. This time she built a pond where it had been.

“A crying shame” said the neighbours when they came round to visit. But they left quickly, feeling scared by the sight of the garden where trees died. “I know a tree will grow soon” they offered as they hurried out the door. And perhaps they believed the words they were saying.

The gardener continued to plant more trees. Each time, she tried something new, some extra food, a little more water, a sunnier spot. Each time, she pleaded that this one may live but each tree she planted died soon after. She watered the ground with her tears, and continued to mark the places where these little trees had been - a gravel courtyard, a box for birds to nest in, a dish for animals to drink from.

The neighbours did not come around much anymore. They had gardens of their own. Her heart ached when she saw their tall strong trees growing in the distance and she wondered why hers died.

Sometimes the neighbours discussed the garden with no trees. There was some disagreement over the gardener. “Surely she knows by now that she is just not a gardener! She should find something else to do” said one.
“She just needs to have more faith” the other disagreed, “then her trees would grow strong like ours”

But what the neighbours did not see was how precious this garden was to the gardener. They couldn’t understand why she spent so much time tending it. In the evenings, she would sit on the seat with her family, and feel sadness and longing, but she also felt peaceful there too.

One evening The Great Gardener went for a walk. He admired all the strong tall trees in the yards of the neighbours, and commented on their grace and health. But he stopped in front of our gardener’s place. He saw a little silver tree with no leaves. A path skirted around its base and the seat had also turned silver from the weather. A bird was darting in and out of the bird box and another was taking a bath in the dish. The gravel was raked into a pattern and there was a lizard sunning itself on the rock. Two water lilies were in bloom in the pond.

The Great Gardener smiled. “Beautiful” he said. And His heart felt warm because he knew this gardener shared his love.

Pop on over

2010-08-27T16:54:00.002+10:00

And see me at my new other place.

I'm going to document my kitchen adventures. Any comments or links would be most welcome and I will happily return the favour.

xo

http://foodonyafork.blogspot.com

A little miracle - the weedy sea dragon

2010-08-19T17:34:00.004+10:00

Aren't these the best little critters?

I was first interested in them when reading Gould's Book of Fish and saw this picture in it.

The whimsy..... and the abandoned look in its eyes........

and if that is not enough magic, last night I saw this in a David Attenborough doco which you should watch. I think it's all I need to believe in God.

They hang out in the waters around Sydney although i have never seen one in the wild (have seen them in an aquarium). My cousin though, he is a marine biologist and sometimes he gets paid to go diving and count weedy sea dragons.

Sigh.

Your 4th Birthday

2010-05-14T10:47:00.005+10:00

For your birthday, I made coconut ice for some of the people who loved you. I put it in a little origami paper box that I made, and wrapped it in bubble wrap and posted it to them.

It had a little note in it which read

" In memory of Maya, who would be four

and for all the others we have held in our hearts and hope"

And I am sorry that you have to carry all that weight. That somehow, the death of other little tiny sparks of hope get hitched onto your death. That your death becomes more than your death, it becomes a symbol for all the little deaths, and eventually, the death of hope.

It is not fair of me to put this on you. But I am so sorrowful and I don't know where to put all these other little deaths. They break my heart too, just as your leaving did, but they go so silently, and unmarked. I want them known too, at least a little. So I let them hitch a ride with you. And I let others use your name as a short hand way of expressing all the grief and pain of these four years. I do it myself sometimes. I can barely tell where one sorrow ends and the others start.

But I am sorry for this. Because, it's not yours to bear. It swamps the memory of your sweetness, as if all you ever brought to us was sorrow, when in fact, what you brought was joy.

So I made coconut ice. It seemed fitting for a four year old girl, or the idea of such. Pink and sweet, a little old fashioned, nostalgic, a taste of childhood.

I will be dreaming of you this birthday. Aching, when I wake and loose you again.

Little girl

I love you.

Love your mum

You see

2010-02-23T16:53:00.002+11:00

The pee stick did have two lines on Friday, and again on Saturday. Which is what made me think that just maybe I could give up IF for lent. The "yeah right" was you know, being superstitious as we all are, me pretending that it wouldn't happen so that it would.

I thought it would.

I really did.

But on Monday you couldn't see the second line, only a shadow where the line might be if there was going to be one. And today my beta was a big fat 4.

Why does my body not hold on to my babies?

Why don't they stick?

Lent

2010-02-17T20:55:00.001+11:00

This year, I'm giving up infertility.

Ha. Yeah right.

(as long as I don't get it back after Easter).

A new decade

2010-02-05T09:13:00.003+11:00

I didn't really think much about the fact that it was a new decade until a friend left a message on the answering machine (a little trashed) saying good riddance to the last and aren't we all glad to see the back of it.

Yeah.

Mostly.

I mean it was the decade from hell but, damn it, it may contain the only five days of my life where I got to be a mum. That's so precious to me and I can't throw it out with all the other shit that surrounds it.

I'm trying to come to terms with that fact. To think about it without tears taking over. To not get consumed with anger at the injustice of watching so many, so so many of my friends and family have babies, and with such ease while I (to the surprise of all involved including my RE) have not managed to fall pregnant again, or did for so short a time that it barely registered. I can feel the anger turning into a type of bitterness. I don't want to become that person but I am struggling so hard not to. While it brings freedom, forgiveness is pricey. I have a long list of injustices that I perceive have been done to me, more so in this last few years rather than at the time of Maya's death. But I think the hardest thing for me to come to terms with is essentially, how unchanged, the people close to me seem by what I have been through. I feel like the universe is continually kicking me when I'm down, and feel betrayed when I don't see those close to me shake their fist at God on my behalf. Surely they would get angry if they saw someone beating me? It seems to me, that they carry on, thanking God for blessing them, and refusing to alter the view of how-the-world-works one tiny bit. I find that painful. I just wish my family would express the sentiment to me of standing beside me being angry at God about the amount of pain I have been in and am going through. They may well experience this and have just not shared it with me. Who knows. But I am finding it a hard not to judge some close people, for what feels like a failure to take up my cause.

And I don't know what to make of this. Obviously my view is skewed at the moment by the amount of pain I experience. Is there any truth in these feelings? or is it an excuse to keep people away and then get angry at them for it.

I feel a lot like my dog. His leg was broken in three places from being kicked when he arrived at our house. (not speculation, I know the house he came from). In fact, not only that, he was dehydrated as he was in so much pain he was unable to drink,. A series of operations, pins and extended vet visits and he was OK. Two years later he had another operation, this time on his front leg (same side), which took months and months to recover from. Being a needy dog, he wants to be close so always comes and sits at your feet. Being a dog with a history of trauma, he bites you when you move your feet too fast, or too close, to his left side. Which leads to a rather comical show of coming close to people and then biting them. But in a way that feels like me. I want the comfort of being close to people, and then I bite them if they say or do anything that comes near my pain, or memory of it. When I say "bite" what I really mean is judge, because I never actually say something to the person. I just get angry at their insensitivity. And when I say "judge" what I really mean is feel more pain. They don't understand. They are not even trying to understand. etc.

I have enough insight to realise this cycle does not serve me well. What I don't seem to have at the moment is the skill to break it. Or the wisdom to distinguish what is a genuine grievance that needs addressing, from my knee-jerk response at the pain of being around close family/friends and their babies/pregnancy etc. The same trauma response that my dog has. He nips my foot even if I haven't touched him, in anticipation of pain.

And seeing that in myself pisses me right off. Broken things can be patched up, but the scars are always there, and scar tissue (whilst amazing and miraculous) just doesn't work as well as normal tissue.

Which is a way of saying I don't want to be a broken thing, on the defense against things that might hurt me, always ready for the pre-emptive strike, angry at people who seem essentially, indifferent, no-different, for having witnessed my suffering. But a part of me feels that to just give up that anger might be betraying myself at some level. And that is the thing I am finding difficult to resolve.

In happier news. I am pleased to say that I had an excellent non-pregnant holiday in Tasmania in which I drank lots of lovely pinot, and ate piles of oysters, prawns, lobster, locally smoked products (the trout was amazing and it was bacon like I've never had it before) and unpasturised soft cheese. We camped, cooked (check this out), hiked, ate, and drank our way around a small part of this small island. It rocked. And it went for three whole weeks, so when we had finished camping at one lovely pace we got a little sad about leaving and then moved on to a fabulous eco stay in the Wilderness, then to another delightful campsite or bnb. I could feel the knots in my back slowly undoing themselves, I got hungry, slept well (things I hadn't felt in a long while) and had a lot of fun to boot.

And I will post some photos of the happy (and a little fatter) Barbara enjoying her holidays. And if you need any tips for travel in Australia, I'm the girl to come to. I think I rock at holiday itineraries.

Christmas

2009-12-23T13:59:00.002+11:00

It's hard facing this time of year again.

for me, it's my birthday, Christmas and New Year in three weeks.

The marking of time scares me. It says each time that it's another year. Another year older. Another year without a child. Another year of grief, depression and sadness. Another year that I will start with "maybe this year......." as i have started the last 3.

One time , someone asked me if I felt any closer to becoming a parent while doing IVF. And the answer is no. With each failed cycle, each birthday, Christmas and New Year, I feel a little further away. There is more distance between me and my little girl. The memories blur slightly, I can't remember the name of her NICU Dr, the pain of missing her is less, which is a relief and a sadness.

The future?

I did another cycle, hot on the heels of the last one. It was all fine but I overstimmed and was unable to transfer due to high hormones. I was collecting a lot of water in my body cavity and not peeing enough compared to what i was drinking. I missed a few days of work (again). Felt bad - again. On the bright side, at the end of the PGD testing we froze four healthy embryos and I can have a drink and I didn't have to do the 2ww over Christmas

Which sets the New Year up for a run of frozen cycles, which I can stand. Damn it I can do a fresh one these days without raising a sweat. The physical holds no fear for me. But recovering again from the heart break of a failed cycle..... That terrifies me. I hate it so much. And of course it always co-incides with a pg or birth announcement. I try not to carry too much self pity in this regard but 4 nieces and 5 kids between my two best friends (for a start) in 3 years has hurt me more than I care to admit. Because no matter how I try and think about it, I can't seem to shake the feeling when I am with them, or, more accurately, when I come home, that I am standing in the darkness staring through a lighted window.

So. it's off on another holiday. I know I haven't been posting often but I do try to follow your stories and comment, so please forgive if I miss something over January. The holiday plan started as a trip to Bhutan and has ended as 3 weeks in Tasmania. The whole - what if I'm pg? thing - yeah right! But I'm not complaining about 3 weeks in Tassie. It'll be about food, camping and music. In that order. We have our priorities right.

If your Christmas can't be merry, may it at least be peaceful.

Much love

Thanks

2009-11-30T17:43:00.005+11:00

For your caring support.

I was touched and uplifted by you dear people leaving thoughtful messages.

Of course - I'm both completely alone, and with a crowd of many in that experience. As we all are - as some of you pointed out.

I guess what makes a difference for me is having someone know. I've given up expecting people in my life to understand this experience. I have found that expectation to be unhelpful as it leads to an intense anger as they inevitably fail at doing that. It's not fair to expect people with living kids to imagine their babies dying in their arms. To imagine their family not existing...... Because they do exist, and to ask them to imagine otherwise is, at some level, a betrayal of what is. And yet, it is the experience many of us live each day, and, 3 years later, it can still knock the breath out of me. So, I have given up telling people (who I can see) what is happening for me, I've shared some of the practical details, but where I am at emotionally, what I'm feeling.......... by and large I keep it to myself (apart from my husband, and even sometimes from him).

It's kind of sad but kind of OK. I am learning to be my own support. To hold myself - so to speak - to check in on my inside people and have compassion on them. To give them protection, time and space.

Sometimes though, it's not enough. I just need someone to see.......

So thanks for baring witness.

Your capacity to show love to me, a stranger, is the kind of miracle that helps me believe in spite of everything.

humbly

inside

2009-11-27T12:53:00.001+11:00

I feel so beaten

and alone

: (

2009-10-27T15:00:00.002+11:00

Beta 10 yesterday and going down.

Little embie didn't keep growing.

?

2009-10-23T11:21:00.002+11:00

Beta 45. (9 days post 6 day transfer)

Not looking good, have to have another test on Monday.

blah.

A visit with the Queen

2009-10-16T08:38:00.003+11:00

I had a dream last night.

I took the school kids to a function so I had 3 kids with autism in the back of the car. One of the mums needed a lift home so she jumped in the front. A person approached me to let me know The Queen needed to get home and could I drive her, which of course I could, so I abandoned my charges and somehow found myself driving a London taxi cab with The Queen in it.

Of course I don't know how to drive in London or how to drive a London taxi cab and within seconds I had turned the wrong way up an enormous Boulevard, realised my mistake, jerked the car onto the foot path where it hit a Narnia style lamp post and started hissing. The Queen and I got out, she was very polite and told me she knew a back way on foot.

It was dark by now, and the Queen was showing me the way through an unlit dingy park beside a river. She was striding on foot and I was, dear reader, keeping pace on a pogo stick.We had a lovely conversation it went something like this

Queen (thoughtful, satisfied): Appearing at public ceremonies or other occasions is where I really come into my own.

Me (very intelligently, pogo-ing beside): You're very good at it. Everyone in Australia knows who you are. Should I tell her I voted for Australia to become a Republic?

Me: Are you able to walk through places like this on your own?

Queen (politely ignoring the very stupidity of the question): No

Stupid stupid me. Do you think she would be walking beside my pogo-ing if she had a choice?

We arrived at the back door of Buckingham Palace. The Queen nodded to a footman and said a polite goodbye. I could see a long low table with a lot of kids having a rowdy dinner party all wearing home made costumes and masks.

The butler came to thank me for my troubles and presented me with four pewter dishes with the ER insignia. The back door of Buckingham Palace was closed on me. I realised the butler had forgotten to order me a cab back to my car. I had to pogo my way back with four pewter dishes in hand.

So. Tell me dear internettes, what does it mean? Am I pregnant?

Just to let you know

2009-10-15T10:17:00.004+11:00

We've been doing a cycle and we had a healthy embryo. Transfer was yesterday. I'm officially in the wait.

And the last post - it wasn't really to do with this cycle. It was to do with what I have been doing between the last cycle and this one. Making myself stand and face all possible outcomes without running or even turning away. Just looking straight at all the different paths that could lie ahead. Some of those options are unsettling.... to say the least.

It was something I think I had to do before this cycle. Self protection? Maybe?

Rage

2009-10-09T09:32:00.005+11:00

PJ gave an excellent interview and has linked the podcast from the interview to her blog. Go over and check it out here. Thanks Pamela Jeanne for your continued insight and thoughtfulness, and for leaving some lights on a dark road.

She mentioned the word rage. It hasn't left me since I heard it.

Rage.

The pit itself is bad. Dire.

It leads a woman or man to desperation. Clawing. Begging.

But there is no way out.

But what I really can't stand is seeing you all. You stand on the edge of that pit from time to time, jigging your baby on your hip, poke your head over and see me in it.

It ruins your day. It confuses you. She is not the type of woman to be in a pit. She used to be like me.

Yet there I am and that feeling of discomfort, dis-ease lingers in you. It's hard to know what to do with that feeling. So you pray for me, that I will be blessed in my pit. That I will feel the comfort of His hand while I claw the walls of my pit.

Prayer said, you walk away and get back to the business of your life. Glad once more that the pit is out of view. And I am glad that you're gone. I can't stand you looking at me. I despise your sweetly whispered blessings. They are redundant down here and their intent - to make you feel more at ease about me being in a pit - makes me boil.

I realise how rare empathy is. That almost all are incapable of it.

I am no better than others at giving it. My rage is selfish. I stand for no-one but myself when I demand an audience with God and scream "No. Not me" to his deaf ears.

I rage at you too, but in silence. I pretend I don't. I'm so ashamed. I try to take it elsewhere where I hope it can't be seen but it is crippling non-the-less. Who'd have thought that the werewolf was in me?

* * * * * *

...... Because, once alone, it is impossible to believe that one could ever have been otherwise. Loneliness is an absolute discovery. When one looks from inside at a lighted window, or looks from above at a lake, one sees the image of oneself in a lighted room, the image of oneself among trees and sky - the deception is obvious, but flattering all he same. When one looks from darkness into light, however, one sees all the difference between here and there, this and that. Perhaps all unsheltered people are angry in their hearts, and would like to break the roof, spine, and ribs, and smash the windows and flood the floor and spindle the curtains and bloat the couch.

Marilynne Robinson

Housekeeping

edited to add - When I say "you" I am not talking about you, dear readers, or any one person necessarily.

Dust settles

2009-09-24T17:48:00.003+10:00

My husband woke me up yesterday morning and told me to come outside. The sky was glowing the most eerie red colour I have ever seen. It wasn't light reflecting off a distant sky, the air in front of me was glowing red and I could not see the sun.

We came inside and as i put my head back on the pillow. Silence, then a lone siren heading up the street. You know we're in a zombie film i joked. I smell something. It smells like a swag. It's dust. It's tons and tons of dust.

And sure enough it was. Which was surprising because there had been a torrential downpour before I went to bed. When that happens you don't expect to wake up and find your world coated in thick red dust. The red earth from The Centre picked up and blown hundreds and hundreds of kms to your home.

Photos shamelessly pinched from the www.smh.com.au

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

I was quite happy doing the gardening. Poking my spinach to make it grow faster and munching on some sugar snaps. Quite satisfied, till I got a call from a close friend letting me know that she is pregnant - with twins - and all of a sudden my happy Pooh-ing about in the sun seems so empty and meaningless.

I'm OK. I'm just worn down with longing.

Hey there

2009-07-21T13:57:00.004+10:00

I'm here. Aint been round much........

I been tryin to stuff things into this great big hole.

A beautiful new garden (you should see the bromiliads at home in the big old olive), a holiday (I broke my wrist skiing and now have to do everything with my left hand), concerts, fine meals...... all the luxuries Double Income No Kids can offer.

It aint working. It doesn't make a dent in the emptiness.

And I think that I am sliding in. After all the grieving there is a terrifying emptiness that scares me so much.

Why do we have kids? Why do we long so deeply for it?

Is it because we fear death?

Thank you

2009-05-22T10:53:00.004+10:00

Thanks for your loving words of support.

Thanks for not walking away at my self pity and anger in the post before last.

Thanks for holding me through this time.

And also thanks to real life friends who sent cards, messages and left wine.

While you do this alone, it does not mean that there aren't people beside you, cheering you on.

Grateful to you.

Birthday

2009-05-17T08:04:00.002+10:00

Your birthday little girl.

I so wish you were here.

love your mum

A visit.

2009-05-15T13:55:00.004+10:00

I went to her grave this morning. I was looking for something and it wasn't there.

Instead, another act to add to the comedy of errors that is the grave side visits. Long thin candles bent banana shaped because they were sitting on the dash as I drove to the cemetery. Candles that won't light, forgotten matches, attempts to light candles with the cigarette lighter in the car... the list goes on. This morning it was the tap, which I was fetching water from to wash the headstone, it came on hard and at a weird angle, resulting in a shoe full of water. I also dropped a lit match on the tissue paper that the flowers were wrapped in. god.

God!

Yeah. The usual answer. A big fucking blue sky. So ironic. Still so comforting. So............. patient.

I was surprised by how much I fell apart today. I thought I was going OK. I thought I had found a little happiness, enough to keep the raft afloat. I think bodies sometimes remember things even when our heads pretend we've got the situation under control. There is something about this season. It is so distinct and truly so God damn glorious in Sydney. Cold nights, Warm clear days. Everyone comments on its beauty.

Beauty. It's reassuringly indifferent to my anger. Where the fuck did that wave of anger come from? I thought I'd done that. The day continues to bestow warmth on me while I rant, wage war, share death around with a few others inside my head. It isn't fair honey. But is that screaming about it gonna make it any better?

So I go searching, looking for something else to be in my head. I try to break in to a memory. And as always, when you try and force your way in, it disappears from you. Instead, I'm wiping a cold granite slab free of flung lawn clippings and bird shit. I hate it. It's a job usually done in tenderness, the only thing I can do as a mother, but today I hate it. I don't want to be here. I don't want it. I don't.

The sweet peas, so delicate and soft look stupid against the dark granite. The words on the stone, chosen with so much care, seem so hollow. Hollow. Look! It is hollow. The ground has resettled, collapsed under the concrete slab the headstone sits on making a cave with a small opening. I put my hand down there, up to the elbow. I'm reaching into her grave. Why the fuck did I just do that? And it leads to detached biological curiosity about the state of decomposition, 3 years on. Why did I agree to an autopsy? Why did they make me line your beautiful coffin with plastic before I covered it with that soft green embroidered fabric? We should have had her cremated. I would of if I could have made a big fucking fire and put the coffin on top. But the electric curtain with its conveyor belt spooks me. It had to be a burial. A hole is true. Dirt is real.

I look at the sky. The shimmer of gum leaves in bright light. If she is anywhere, it's here. The ground only has her body, but not her. That is why I can't find what I seek when I am there. I am looking in the wrong spot.

But the truth is, I never will find what I am looking for. It is gone. She is gone.

I make my way home in tears and frustration.

Maya

2009-05-08T12:11:00.004+10:00

The facts. A warning to pregnant ladies - detailed info of things not going right in a pg. If you are anxious (and aren't we all) you may not want to read it.

I had no trouble falling pregnant with Maya,way back in Sept 05. My body did what it was supposed to do. I stopped using contraceptives and a month later I saw two pink lines, cried, hugged and got terrified. Looking back, I realise I was terrified of all the wrong things.

At the 19 week scan, the Doctors detected a heart problem. They were unable to diagnose it, they had never seen it before, didn't know if it was a problem, or how much of a problem it would be, or if an operation would be needed at birth. I left the ultrasound feeling a little shaken and was booked in to see a pedriatic cardioligist the next week. I went armed. My friend came along with a notebook and pencil (which freaked the Dr a bit - he must have thought we were the suing type), I was going to get information and lots of it. That is, I was going to be in control of this. We had the same response from the Doctor who said he had never seen this before, and said he'd take a look in 6 weeks. In the meantime I continued my visits to the local Doctor for the other regular pregnancy checkups. About 4 weeks later she sent me back to the hospital. My fundal length was too small, I was bumped up and up until I was seen by the head of obs at one of the big three hospitals in Sydney. He looked at baby (as she was known then) for a long time. Flows looked good, placenta seemed to look good, but she was way too small, down in the bottom 2 % and I don't suppose they tell you if you are less than that.

I got booked in for 2 week appts. Each time the amniotic fluid heart rate and flows were checked. They all seemed to be working and the Dr said we would just keep monitoring. I asked if it was connected to the heart issue (as I was still seeing the cardioligist as well) and he didn't seem to think so. As my friend said, "It's like having a headache and then stubbing your toe".

I continued seeing both Doctors, Maya wasn't getting much bigger. The head of obs seemed to think it was probably a placental thing. The cardioligist continued to scratch his head and shrug his shoulders, maybe we'll know next time...... next time ....... when she's born. It seemed that all the lights would be turned on, all the answers given, when she was born. At the US I had when I was 34 weeks, even I could tell she wasn't OK. Where I was used to seeing dark pools, there were just thin lines. The amniotic fluid was real low. Everyone agreed. It was time for her to come out. I was given steroid shots on the spot (to boost her lung strength) and booked in for a c-section 2 days later as they did not think she would be well enough for a natural birth.

The surreal feeling of waiting to give birth. It's scary for any first time mum, and scarier when you know something is wrong. No - one though, had any idea, any idea at all, at just how wrong things were. I found the c-section really truamatic. I was not ready to have my baby taken out of me. I wept the whole way through, my husband holding my hand and the anesthesiologist giving me sympathetic smiles. When she was delivered, I heard a tiny cry. Is she alright? My voice cracked, too soft for the busy technicians to hear. The ob said over the sheet "Did you have an amnio?" No. No. I didn't want one. Maya was wrapped. I got to kiss her briefly. I don't know if my lips actually touched her little head. She was breathing, whisked off to high dependency with Jacob trailing and me off to recovery.

I was out of it, overjoyed, and hated it. It was surreal. Eventually Jacob returned and I made him get an orderly so they could push me to High Dependency Unit. I had absolutely no idea where I was in the hospital. I just watched the lights flah above me spinning and then righting as I turned corner after corner. When I got down there, the pediatrician told me to wait. They were trying to get a drip in and didn't want me to watch, I waited so long. I waited. She came back and told me they had had no luck . I would have to wait some more. I waited again. Waited. Finally, finally I was allowed through. I was wheeled through a room of screaming babies in cribs. Which one is mine? Which one is mine. They brought me to her side and finally, finally I got to say hello. I put my hand through the crib, I touched her beautiful head, It fit so snugly into the palm of my hand, just right in the centre. I saw her move her feet, and grasp her tiny fingers around me. She was having oxygen support. Bubbles were coming out of her mouth - a result of the fluid not being squeezed out through birth. She was tiny and so sweet, dark hair, a cute little nose, and honey coloured - our little mixed race baby. We had made so many jokes about how cool we would be. Her little hand went half way around my finger. She was small, and so thin. Her little limbs were so thin. I'm sorry baby. I'm so sorry. I have memories of my mother being there. Why was she there the first time I met my baby?

They gave me a room to myself, thank God, if I had to be put in a ward full of mothers with new babies they at least had the decency to give me a room to myself. In the middle of that night they woke us up to ask us to come down. Our little girl wasn't doing well. She'd been moved into the NICU and they were having trouble getting her to breath, they were pumping oxygen in. They asked if wanted to baptise her, we called my friend, myparents(who were near by) and Jakes mum (who wasn't), she arrived an hour later (4am) in a state of panic and complete disorientation. The image of her, 5 ft nothing, alone, charging through the NICU, forgetting to wash her hands, going to the wrong crib. It makes me cry. She was so ...... confused. Confused and alone. She needed her husband and he was dead.

We said a prayer, a blessing over Maya together. Trusting her to God. I still had no idea how serious this was, despite the drama. No mother believes their child will die. And they had managed to get a tube to her lungs to pump oxygen in. We went back upstairs to the maternity ward. To the crying babies and their mums and our strangely silent single room. A rough sleep, and I woke with that terrible heavy feeling from the operation lifted slightly. I was anxious to get back down. A nurse came an unhooked me from the drip with pain relief at the press of a button. She got me into the shower. It was so good to be in the warm shower. I wanted to stay in there forever. In my head I was saying "I'm sorry baby I'm coming" and then I would sit just a bit longer. Jake's friend arrived an wheeled me down. I bumped into the ob who'd been seeing me as I went in. He looked at Glenn pushing the chair and then at me, slightly confused (Glenn's white too). Glenn said "not the husband" and he smirked and rambled a bunch of shit at me, of which I head not a single word. Get out of my way. Get the fuck out of my way.

There she was. I leraned the routine of hand washing and sanitising rub. I can still smell it, it belongs with the eerie beeps of hospital machines. She was so sweet. She was moving her arms and legs a bit and looked - to me - a lot better. When I touched her head she responded and I was surprised. Surprised that she knew me. Of course she did. She'd listened to me talk jack and cry, sing, shout and laugh for 9 months. The doctors told me that she did a poo as she came out. Articulate! we agreed. Yeah there are some shit times baby. But there are some really really good ones and this one is the best of all.

The next five days are a time outside of time. A blur of breat pumps, midnight calls, friends and family looking at me with confusion and sadness, laughs. I have to give it to our friends. Between them, they made sure we never ate a hospital meal, not even breakfast. I know that I managed to walk down the stairs (from level 5 to level 3 - couldn't find the lift) less than 24 hours after my c-section. For those of you who've had one, you would know that only a mother seperated from her child would be able to do that. I also know that I took only 2 panadol from when they took the drip out, to the day after Maya's funeral, and I only took those cause the nurse made me. The pain, all of it - physical, emotional, spiritual - would come later. Those days are a blur, so distinct and yet somehow so unclear. Some piercing memories, especially the days - these clear blue autumn days. One of the best times in Sydney. I longed to take Maya out into the sun and on the grass. It got stormier during the week, in every way.

There was never any good news. Processions of confused specialists (now also looking at every organ in her body, not just the heart) x-rays, ultrasounds, drugs, oxygen. She was on a machine that made her breath 600 time a minute. Blood tests every 3 hours. Poor Maya, beautiful Maya. I wonder sometimes. If I knew she was going to die I would have held her the whole time and not let them touch her with all that. I would have just held her in my arms, and in Jacobs arms. In both our arms at the same time. And lived that precious precious time the best way. So close. No-one inteferring. But of course we didn't know. We were so sure she would live.

I guess we should of known - at least the day they told us her kidneys were no longer functioning. Those of our friends with any sort of medical knowledge knew the chances were pretty slim at that point. She was packing her bags for the next world.

Five beautiful precious days was the time she was given. And what a life. Another call to come down, this one for real. I raced down, my mother standing between me and the crib saying "I need to kiss you" (still so angry at that). They put up a screen, pulled out a couch for us to sit on together, switched off all the monitors. No beeps, no charts, no lines going up and down, She still had all the lines and tubes in of course. Quite a collection by that point and the machine beating her lungs 600 times a minute. I don't know how long it was, a few minutes at the most. We held her, kissed her, told her how deeply we loved her, we loved her so much. We loved her so so much. We love her so much.

I could tell the moment she died, despite 600 breaths going in, the breaths out were slow, I could tell from a small spit bubble coming out of her dry mouth. Poor girl. Poor tiny girl. What a hard life, but so much love in it. It hurts so much to remember. So loved. So hard. I wonder if she was aware of me, if she knew it was me at that time. We held her, we loved her. And she died right there. In our arms. In both our arms.

Can laugh in retrospect.

2009-05-01T12:42:00.003+10:00

There I was, naught but a surgery gown, feet in the stirrups.
The Doctor had just shown me a little bubble in my uterus on the ultrasound and told me it was my little embryo. He was removing his gloves and we were smiling anxious smiles and muttering "thank yous" "goodbyes" and comments about not wanting to see each other again. He flicked the switch to lower the lie-back chair, but the chair malunctioned and started tipping instead of lowering.

I was sliding spread eagled an uncovered into the lap of my (gay- for some reason it makes it funnier) Doc. He jumped up and back going "Whooooaa" (yeah - real chilvarous) and I desperatly tried to unhoik my legs from the holders so I could land on my feet (which I managed - yeah Barb). The Doctor/Patient relationship restored its balance and I said "See, even the chair doesn't want to see me anymore."

Tell me you funnies from the Stirrups.

Bloggy return

2009-04-23T16:36:00.014+10:00

Been away.

Me like holidays. Wanna share?

View from house we were staying in.

Web in rainforest with water drops

On board with dog.

(and overboard in the nikinoo)

Ahhh. Ocean pools. Places of magic and delight.

So the Universe doesn't hate me after all - see these critters waving at me!

If the camera was timely you would be looking at a seal above the water. Here's the splash.

Is that happiness I see on her face?

And. I saw dolphins twice in one day.

The Korean Bathhouse.

2009-04-05T07:58:00.003+10:00

Grief is like a virus. It controls you. You can't choose whether or not you catch a virus, how long it will knock you out, in what way it will knock you about, and whether or not there will be any long term damage.

The stress of this last failed cycle has been building. While I haven't been ignoring it entirely, I've been treating it with caldral - to continue the flu metaphor - patching up the symptoms and soldiering on. I talked with my psychologist last week about the number of things I've been forgetting, the things I've let slip, "Trauma. You've been through so much. So much death. So much trauma. It will do that to you." and it peaked Friday night when we got home at 1am to find that i had left the house 12 hours ago with the front door wide open.

Yesterday, yesterday it caught me. Catatonic is the only word I can find to describe that state of grief. Not awake, not asleep, but lying immobolised, staring, staring, staring. Any thoughts that were occuring were happening too deep for my conscious to catch on to. Submerged... buried.... unreachable.... unknowable ........ unbearable. Unbearable. Unbearable.

I had felt it coming but hadn't flagged it with my husband. I saw the panic in his eyes as he watched me disappear, again. Shouting and anger weren't enough to rouse me, to bring me back. Without a word I pulled the sheets over my head and stared at the underside of the sheet.

I have felt this before. The day after Maya's funeral. I lay like this in bed for 17 hours. Reliving. Inhabiting the memory, dreaming her life. The Dreaming. But real, but not at that moment. The past in the present.

I knew that this was something I had to get through on my own. I dragged myself out of bed and for some reason, I knew I had to go to the bathhouse. I don't know why I knew, I've never been before but I rang and booked myself a scrub and massage. Yes, hard please. My back, directly behind my heart.

The coldness has been spreading. Starting as a small, smooth, round, cold stone behind my heart. Over the weeks it has spread, petrifying my shoulder, my spine, across to the other side of my back.

Nakedness is compulsory in the bathhouse, but I was already stripped bare. I lay in the hot pool and let the water hold me, thank god for the water, for I was lost to myself. More staring. Hours of it. At some point I got into the ginseng pool and then the cold pool. The cold water bringing me back to myself. I held my breath underwater and put my face to the current. Like a cool stream, mountain water. I stayed there, surfacing sometimes for air, seeing how long I could hold my breath there. I felt the water move around my body, over my skin. Undisturbed by this large being in it's path, moving gently around me instead with a little song.

The therapist used her elbows in the middle of my back. Too hard, too hard? No. ....... No. I could barely feel it, I was so numb. Even after hours of soaking, I still felt numb to the core. But gradually, something started to shift. Break down. I washed the oil off my body, dressed and lay in the sleep room. I thought of Maya. I held my hand over my heart remembering how she felt when I lay her there. The size of her head, and length of her. I felt her. Eventually I got dressed and went onto the street to find a meal and a coffee.

When I got home, the tears were starting to come. I did not want my husband to see me. I know that he can find my grief too much to bare. But he sat with me, held my hand through the sobs, through the silent sobs, a pain so great, and from so deep within, that my wailing could not find a voice. Silent, wracking, sobs.

I think this might be the tipping point. The beginning of the end.

What's in a name

2009-04-03T12:26:00.003+11:00

For the purposes of this post, substitute * for a. I am trying to be smarter then google and make sure people thinking "Whatever happened to B*rb*r*" don't find me via here. I mean, it wouldn't be quite the way I'd choose to reconnect with say, that girl I used to scoop icecream with when I was at uni (not for fun - it was a job).

My name is B*rb*r* N*nce.

I didn't change it when I got married. We had great intentions of hyphening but never seemed to get around to it. Maya had both of our names though.

I've never really liked B*rb*r* as a name for me. I can't seem to work it right. I've tried exploiting the barbie doll aspect - having long blonde hair and all - but let's face it, I'm way too practical, don't look good in pink, and I'm A cup. I kind of tried to work with the retro aspect of the name, taking on some type of 50's rockerbilly feel, but that's not really me either. I thought Babs had a gangster moll feel until everyone started making Yentl jokes.

I much prefer my middle name. Ellen. Loyal, true, strong, a touch of sweet. It suits me to a T. Only no-one has ever called me that and the few lame attempts to get it going as a working name fell on their bottoms. So B*rb*r* it is. It's one of those things I've learnt to live with.

Both my name and personality lend themselves to nicknames and I've had many over the years. Here's a few of the ones that stuck (depending on who I'm hanging out with)

Barb, Barbs, Bubs, Barbie, Babs, Barbara Nellie, Barbara Cow (my parents had a pet cow called Barbara before I was born! Yes, she got et.)Bra 'n' pants, Bra, Pants, Barbalicious, Blah-Blah, Blah, and weirdly, Bubbling Parabola.

I have also spent my working career with people with disability. I can officially let you know that 98% of my friends with Down Syndrome (and I know 100's of people with DS) can't say my name. They either say Bahbah, or Brahbrah. So I'm pretty good at answering to that too.

And this is all a long and tiring introduction to a new song about me. Enjoy.

Leave a comment and tell me about your nicknames.

Show down

2009-03-24T18:48:00.004+11:00

A long time ago, a life time ago, I wrote a post on a forum about letting go. It was about 6 months after Maya died. I found it today

I am wondering if some of you would be happy to share how you came/are coming to a point of "letting go" of your precious son or daughter. Not of forgetting them or stopping loving them, but of saying goodbye in your heart, and of making a choice to live in the present. A choice to face the present and the future, which means, effectively, turning away from the past. A choice for life over death, a choice for what is, over what has been.I can feel this point approaching and it seems unbelievably unfair that this choice is before me. It is almost as hard as facing little Maya's death. I have been immobolised by rage at the thought of having to make this choice.... but I feel that it is something I have to do. Engage with now. Take stock of this painful, muddled exsistence, of my empty arms, of relationship complexities, of uncertainty about the future and (at the moment) my stupid job - and own it. Recognise that this is it. This is life, at least, this is my life (not what i imagined or planned I assure you!). It's the real thing, not something I have to sit through while I wait for the real thing to begin. These are the things that I need to begin to face, and I can't do it while all of my heart and mind and strength is with my precious girl. I have to gently say goodbye. And it splits me in two to do it.Where do you find the kind of courage that is needed for this? How have you "marked" this decision (ie, what did you do/say/write/draw/what ritual did you engage in/ was it witnessed by the people you love)?

The reason I have been thinking about this post is that I feel another such battle on its way. This time, it is about my future, not my past. It's a battle over hope, or at least a particular kind of hope, or hope in a particular kind of outcome.

I'm in the ring with God. I obviously won't win but I plan on giving it a red hot go. I demand to know why he is making me give over not only my past, but my future to Him. I want to know how He can be so cruel. Why He demands so much. And why He demands it from me. And why others don't have to give anything up, not even their illusions. Fundamentally, I do not want to give over, accept, let go, trust my future to Him because well fankly, He has proved himself to be untrustworthy. He does not hold my heart gently, but rather beats it again and again and again. He offers no protection, no sanctuary. He does not honour my love, for Maya and for all those little potential lives we have created together. He does not see it as worthy. He takes everything. He takes them all, those precious lives, big and tiny, and gives nothing in return. except inescapable beauty.

And like Jacob, I will not stop fighting until He blesses me. I will not hand over my tiny precious hope. I will not just give it up. Give me something God, something.

I did eventually give Maya into God's keeping. We had a little ceremony at her grave in which Jake and I said those words "We give her to Your keeping" . I did it, and wondered if possibly I was the worst parent in the world for doing so, but I knew that there was nothing else I could do for her while she was in the next world and I was in this one, so I gave her to God. I felt free after that. Strong and free, even though deciding to do it hurt so much. I still question that action sometimes, I wonder what it says about me as a parent. But I did it in love. I did it in love.

I wonder too, what sort of parent I am when I trust my daughter to Him and yet, do not, can not, will not trust Him with my own life.

My baby and embryos

2009-03-16T16:36:00.003+11:00

I only seem to make ones that die.

In my arms, in my womb, in the freeze, in the petri dish.

All of them die.

And I just don't know if I can keep on with this for much longer.

You know you're getting near the end when stop taking HPT because you know that knowing the worst will be much worse than not knowing. And I was right, knowing the worst is worse than not knowing.

Doc wants to do more test - this time on Jake. But I am really not sure if I have it in me.

Waiting

2009-03-09T17:24:00.002+11:00

I f#@kin don't like this.

My first embie didn't survive.

My second embie had 100% cell rehydration (for those in the know about frozen embryos). If you are not in the know, well, it's good.

They put it back.

I have chest pains from panic. But I am not too worried, I googled and after reassuring myself that I was not about to die of either a broken heart or heart attack, I resigned myself to the fact that anxiety is going to be a part of this ride.

The momentum for life, both scientifically and spiritually, has to come from this little embie. I can provide the best environment possible, but as with all things to do with your kids, they ultimately need to do it for themselves.

Go embie. Have a will for life.

Game on

2009-03-03T18:32:00.001+11:00

Yep. The next FET
Transfer Thursday.

Heartstrings.

2009-02-26T19:22:00.004+11:00

While at my friends wedding recently, I was sitting on our big tongan picnic mat -at least 5 metres of woven coconut palm -under the spreading Morton Bay fig, and a little girl around 2 years old wandered up to me and plonked herself in my cross legged lap. I had spied her earlier. How could I not? Her dad was Sri Lankan and her mother a whitey like me...... Dark curls and big dark eyes........ and I thought "Can I borrow you for a little while? I just need to know what it is like to hold someone like you."

In truth I am sure that neither she nor her parents would particurlarly appreciate a stranger holding and kissing and crying over her.

But for that little moment, it felt, so ........ right.

A question of etiquette.

2009-02-23T17:06:00.002+11:00

So. There I was. Coffee date with a friend. We were sitting at the bar at the window looking out onto the street in the last inner city suburb in Sydney that hasn't been completely overun by yuppies. The next place to be.

I'm staring out the window, tears dripping into my latte (decaf of course) as I tell my friend what's been going down. I spy my RE out the window, with his little posse of gay friends. I put my head down and tell my friend that that man out the window has spent many hours staring into my chimichanga*. I drop my head so my hair covers my face........ He walks past me in the window..... and then into the same cafe with his friends.

What does one do in such a circumstance?

Mrs. Spit. I needed you.

* I really have no idea why my friend and I now call it a chimichanga

Epilogue

2009-02-22T08:23:00.003+11:00

I ended up sending a copy of the post below to my family. They kind of have a vague idea that I connect with other loss mums over the internet but they don't ask that much about it.

I guess I sent it to them because, in a way, the last line - wishing they could see my invisible child - was directed towards them. Them, and my friends, and the people I interact with on a regular basis.

I got a very strong response from them. Mum and Dad rang the second they recieved it in tears. It was a little overwhelming as I was not trying to elecit that kind of response. They took my writing very literally, which my family is want to do, and focussed very much on the list of losses rather than the metaphor of carrying absence which was the most important part to me. I think they thought I was in a really bad space when I wrote it when in actual fact I was in quite a strong but reflective space, and was trying to express the feeling of the journey. I'm wondering if it was manipulative? It wasn't meant to be.

One good thing that came out of it is an email dialogue with my mother. Email you mother? you say. But yes, sadly we are not very good at face to face dialogue. I retreat and mum responds to my retreat by monologuing at me, and then I retreat some more. It is a pattern that has always hung around, but has spiralled way out of control during these last three years and try as I might, I've been unable to break it. Mum recognises it too and feels helpless in it. I guess were just not that great at discussing how we communicate - or not that willing - or something.

Thanks for the supportive comments. They mean a lot and are part of the strength I have been building and carrying this last week. That, and the lightness that comes from saying what you feel to the people around you.

I've also had the opportunity to connect and re-connect with some of my friends in real life (mums), and it has dissolved some of my anger. It has been humbling.

So. I'm back to knowing that "I'm going to be OK".

A bundle of Absence

2009-02-14T09:24:00.005+11:00

Sometimes, when on this horrid road, it is the loneliness that weighs on you. I am eternally grateful for the space created on the net to meet others and overcome this, but, at some point, each of us turns off our computer and takes our heavy heart out into the world.

I don't know anyone in real life, experiencing what I am experiencing. I know a few people who have had a stillborn child. I know a few people who have gone through IVF to build a family. I don't know anyone else (IRL) who has had a child live for a while and then die, or who subsequently has been unable to become pregnant. This is the world I take my battered heart in to day after day, in search of understanding, sympathy and healing.

The difficult thing is that I don't have anything to show for all my work, heartache, courage and pain. It is a burden that is carried silently. Unseen. The presence of a child (whilst not taking away from the individuality of the child and the importance of their experience) tells something, something of the experience of the parent. You know they have a birth story, wakeful nights, love, fear..... It offers an entry point for community. A point of connection, a place where experiences can be compared and contrasted, looked at from different points of view.

The experience of absence of children is as significant as the experience of parenting, particularly following the death of a child. It is the lack of a presence that is part of what makes this experience so isolating. There is nothing that signifies my loss - and ongoing losses. Nothing to tell the world something of our experience. Our love, courage and heart ache. Nothing that shows years of thought, longing, hope and disappointment. Nothing that offers that point of connection, an entry place, through which people around me can understand a little of our experience. And so, it is largely unseen. Carried quietly, and invisibly with me into the chaos of community life - as many wounds are. I recognise that there are plenty of people with other sorts of internal wounds that I cannot see as I travel in this world. I also recognise that physical representations of trauma (such as burns victims, quadraplegia etc) bring a different set of isolation as many turn away at the sight of you. The pain is too much for some to even look at, and your body betrays your story before you even have a chance to smile at someone.

I wonder though, what would it be like for a parent to have a child that was invisible to everyone else? To live in a world where no-one else had children, and the parents tried to tell the stories of their invisible child to the people in this world. You can see the disjunct. You can see how much people would not understand their experience. You can imagine an invisible child mum meeting someone else who had an invisible child and them huddling in the corner for hours, swapping stories of progress and pain. You can imagine an increasing frustration with a world that while somewhat sympathetic, did not really understand the cause of their extreme tiredness and occasional dysfunction. Frustration at people who could not celebrate their small victories of parenting.

That's how it is for me, carrying Absence, so heavy and obvious to me, but invisible to the world. I am grateful for the few that try to listen and understand, but, ultimately, only my husband and I can see our "invisible child". I am not talking about Maya, although the loss of her is part of it. It is also all the other losses, the times of opening myself to possibility and stinging from the smart of those possibilities crushed, the friendships that have dissolved, the loss of connection, loss of community, the losing and re-finding and re-losing of faith, the pressure on the relationships I hold most dear.... These are the things that make up my bundle of Absence, so burdensome and so precious, that goes with me into the world.

I wish you could see my invisible child.

For those that asked

2009-02-11T17:05:00.003+11:00

This is the cookbook that I got most of the recipes from for the fantastic FAG dinner. (see two posts below)

It is a restaurant I went to while on holiday a few years ago and we also went to the cooking school for a day. The restaurant is in a beautiful tropical garden. They grow a lot of their own produce. It's really a lovely experience if you are ever in the area.

Can you begin to imagine it?

2009-02-09T18:05:00.003+11:00

Have you seen the horrendous news about the bushfires?

And an interesting reflection on trauma survivors here - it may resonate with some loss mammas.

Please keep these people in your hearts and prayers (if so inclined). It seems hard to maintain faith in such bizarre and terrifying circumstances.

Blowing my trumpet.

2009-02-07T08:36:00.014+11:00

Well everybody. I say pat me on the back.

Thank you, yes thank you. I agree. I think I'm awesome too.

(afterall, it's my blog and I can brag if I want to)

Now let me tell you why.

Important things first. My sister's baby is OK but small. They had to help it along in a rather sudden way with the suction cap as it was getting distressed during the birth. My sister is OK now but had the thing where the placenta only half comes away and you loose blood at a very very rapid rate. I think she lost 3 lt which is rather alarming but thanks to some transfusions and emergency surgery to remove the placenta she was OK. Her poor husband sat there with a little baby in his hands watching her get whisked away. she was fine when I saw her.

Yesterday... I went to a counseling session which was good but tiring. Then I cam home and did stuff. And then I went to see my sister in hospital with her new baby girl. That in itself is quite an achievement but the things is, she was in THE SAME hospital that I gave birth to Maya in. So I just walked right on in (little panic attack) to the maternity ward (bigger panic attack) past the fancy double room they gave us to be with Maya in after she had died..... and stopped a few doors up. I could see my sisters shoes below the curtain, and her husbands, and someone elses. Bugger. What is it with visitors to maternity wards who think it is fine to just drop in unannounced? HELLO PEOPLE. THIS WOMAN GAVE BIRTH YESTERDAY. IT WAS VERY TRAUMATIC. SHE LOST ALOT OF BLOOD. You don't just wander in when you're not even in the top 20! So, I found a chair in the corridor to wait for her to leave. I waited 20 min. Apparantly unannounced visitors are also stayers and treat the place like a public lounge room. After 20 min I went in anyway and she made no sign of leaving. Eventually bro in law asked her to go so we could spend some time together. I held their little girl. I wept and wept. (She stopped crying when I started). I kept thinking about the story my brother in law's father told at the wedding. He spoke of the day they adopted Matt. A cold winter day, they'd flown into Sydney and had gotten a call to go and collect the child. They caught the train out to Penrith and just picked up this baby - no sling or pram - and carried this baby back. On the way home the trains had broken down so they had to walk for an hour in the cold with this baby in their arms, back to the hotel they were staying in. It was a beautiful image.

I couldn't let myself hold their girl close to me. I knew if I did, I would just want to walk out. Walk out of that hospital with a baby girl in my arms.... walk out and just keep on walking. The way it should have been. So instead, I just held her out in front of me, and cried and cried, and then gave her back. Next guest unannounced guest arrived and I took my leave. (So - that's the first pat on the back).

Being a clever girl, I knew I would probably be pretty wobbly at this point and had planned ahead. Yes, very unlike me, but I had. My reward/remedy to myself for such bravery was to go to the beach. The rest of Sydney, experiencing the same heat wave as me (meant to top 44 today which is 112) was also there. So, excellent waves again but I could feel a lot of arms/legs and heads as we got tossed in the same wash. Still it was very fun and very cooling and no wardrobe malfunction this time. (Pat on back 2 for being very strategic).

And now........ for the stuff I did in between the counseling session and the hospital visit and the beach. Some people sing, some play, some knit, me...... my true spiritual gift is cooking. There is nothing I enjoy more than spending hours and hours on a ridiculously fiddly little dish and then watching it get eaten in 2 min of enjoyment. I love that all that thinking and work just vanishes into a moment of pleasure. I guess it's like a recital, or a play. Vanished and nothing but a big pile of dishes to show for it.

Let me tell you about last nights dinner. This was my response to Mrs Spits Challenge to host a dinner party. The guests was a group of 6 friends collectively known as FAG (Food Appreciation Guild). Frankly, in search of "authentic" cuisine we have ended up at possibly some of the worst restaurants in sydney. Eat with courage and gusto - that's our motto.

Knowing I would need some cooking therapy to get me through this week I decided on a five course meal that was ridiculously fancy. I have to say, I'm really getting quite good. Take a look at this.

Course 1. Stuffed Lemongrass.

Course 2. Tom Yum Goong - Hot and Sour Prawn Soup

Course 3. Som Tam (green papaya) salad and sticky rice with sweet pork

Course 4. Red Curry of Duck and Lychees with Jasmin rice

Course 5. Cut dragon fruit - which I don't have a picture of because it was well past midnight and we were all quite merry. But here is one i stole from the net.

In between all this is lovely photos of the six FAGsters sipping wine bought on our cellar door weekend, laughing and making rude jokes a bit too loudly (we were sitting outside and the neighbours are quite close in this suburb). I was so unstressed it was ridiculous - it seemed magical, even to me, that these amazing dishes kept appearing without any fuss or bother, There they were out on the table being enjoyed. And i had done everything from scratch - the stock, the curry pastes - all of it with the assistance of a very good cook book and my local asian grocery stores.

The only down side of hosting a meal like this is that it pretty much garuntees that no-one will ever ask you to dinner again. Which means you have to become good at saying "You should ask me for dinner" in which case they have to. That is my third pat on the back for the day, and frankly, I think the day deserves a standing ovation for me being great. Thank you thank you. I'll go eat some humble pie now.

Torn. Sad. Happy.

2009-02-03T19:19:00.011+11:00

This baby arrived last week and this one is being born as we speak. Well, I assume so, my sister was being induced this morning. I hope it will be OK. I think it will be.

****

I'm fighting depression. I understand that I have to fight it so it doesn't push me down further. I hate that it is hard work and so very tiring. Being a fighter is not really my style. I'm better at mosey-ing and day dreaming. Unfortunately that can't work for me at the moment cause I only daydream about unhelpful and depressing things. So I'm on brain patrol again. And when I'm winning that, Depression - the bugger - justs by-passes my brain and goes for my body. Not great sleep, wierd tummy - you probably know the drill. It's managable, but tedious, BORING, and I don't want it.

****

But there are things that help. One of the things that helped this weekend was the wedding of my beautiful friend Ali. She's a phd student/disability activist/community building/rock chick friend who knows how to love. In fact, she's one of the few people in this world who seems to need to love more than she needs to be loved. She falls in love often and with a very wide range of people - which is not to say that she is not loyal, she recognises a crush for what it is and doesn't pay it too much attention - she is just really into people. The wedding was at a beach 5 hours drive from Sydney and was a mini music festival. There were at least 3 double bases and someone had dragged (how?) a piano into the middle of the paddock the wedding was on. She sang with her band, he played with his (YES they are both muso's). And there was a lot of love. A LOT OF LOVE. and it made me feel great.

So here are some photos from the wedding. Jumbled, sideways and completely out of order because me and html are not yet friends.

Girl with my lovely hula hoop.

bride, groom and minister

a lovely moment with a dad and his 4 yr old playing blues harmonica

more music

Nod in the direction of.........

2009-01-23T08:39:00.002+11:00

Australian Federal Government who extend Medicare benefits to IVF processes. I recieved my reimbursement cheque which means I am down a total of $500 at the end of a frozen cycle (Instead of $3000). I am very grateful that finances is not a barrier for treatments here.

My cousin.... who is a joy to hang out with. In many ways like a sister. We beached it together last night as the sun was going down. The wind hot, the water cool, the light soft and coloured, the waves breaking even and strong. We body surfed together and because our bodies are pretty much replicas of each other we would swim onto the wave and then surface at the same spot at the end of our ride - grinning, cahooting and pulling togs back over our bits. (I did a serious nipple flash while jumping around going "Yes" after catching a particularly good ride - no wonder the other swimmers were grinning. I thought they were sharing my joy!)

Yourself... why not. You 're great.

My sister

2009-01-22T11:58:00.002+11:00

Is having a baby in a few weeks.

She has had increased Ob appts due to the size if the baby being very small and continuing to drop in its percentile band. Last week (at 37 wks) she dropped to below 5%.

It is disturbingly similar to Maya. Although she was smaller than my sisters bub. It is wierd though. When Maya was diagnosed with the unbalanced translocation both Jacob and I were tested and it was determined that I carried the translocation. Then my other sister (who was pregnant at the time) and my parents were tested to see if they also carried the translocation and it came back clear. Which means that it was a problem that started in me - when I was one cell - even though I can pass it on to any kids I may have. Which means it would be very very unlikely to have a sister with the same problem. The odds would be similar to having two siblings (aside from identical twins) with Down Syndrome.

The thing that is worrying for me is that she is not small, neither is her partner. Also, all the flows look good in the placenta and chord etc. I know this should be a good thing but it tends to point to the problem being with the bubs rather than with her or with the chord/placenta. It all feels eerily familiar to me and I am quite concerned.

I guess this is where a "she'll be right" attitude works wonders. I am sitting nervously by trying not to assume the worst while she seems to be travelling pretty fine.

Please keep her and her baby in your thoughts/prayers.

Apparantly not

2009-01-19T16:03:00.003+11:00

The home pregnancy test only had one line. Blood test tomorrow.

Yes - I even hid the frozen cycle from you dear friends because...... well...... I don't know why.

But I was so very very happy for the first three days, before worry arrived. A quality of happy that I almost didn't recognise. So deeply peaceful and - happy!

Sigh.

Is it?

2008-12-30T09:31:00.001+11:00

Will it really be a New Year?

..... or just more of the same.....

I'm so tired.

Every day struggle

2008-12-14T18:29:00.003+11:00

7 months pregnant with her second, she leans over the pew, and retells a conversation with a mutual friend, equally pregnant. "It's not fair"the friend had commented to her "that some households have two great cooks in them and ours has none." The friend was refering to us, she said, laughing. "It's not fair" I said to my husband as she walked away "that some households have two kids, and ours has none". Bitterness and shame rise equally in the aftermath of that exchange.

And here I am, wondering again, how is friendship possible?

I have been engaged in a serious building project, the aim is to construct a significant internal fortress, that will provide the protection and support needed to be with these women - my sisters and my friends. Sometimes it works, sometimes we can all avoid the obvious. We can chat about movies and food, good wine and plans for the New Year.

But there are some things I cannot do. I don't tell these women how it is. I don't want to sit and cry in front of them. I certainly don't want to recieve a hug from them, feeling their swollen tummy press into me. They don't tell me certain things either - quite a few don't even tell me that they're pregnant. I figure it our when it is too obvious to avoid. They don't tell me anything about their pregnancy, or even their problems, because, on the whole, they don't really compare to what I am going through. In short, we have gone from being friends to being acquaintances.

I can see them hovering around sometimes, trying to find a way in, to offer support. But I don't really let them. I am closed. I change the topic. I don't want to receive. I don't believe that they have anything to offer, because they will never ever understand what I feel. Truthfully, I don't even want to see them. It gives me panic attacks thinking about it and trying to prepare myself for those occasions when I know it is unavoidable. Simultaneously, I am sure that I have nothing to offer them except my bitterness and jealousy, which makes at least one of them angry. Fair enough I guess. Afterall, why should they feel guilty just because they can have kids that live. All the same, i feel so incredibly distant. Alone.

Add to this my anger at not being understood, at people's clumsiness around me, my scorn for the inaneness of conversations I overhear or partake in. And yes, I am fully aware of the irony in this and my participation but am I interested in changing it?

What can I give? What can I receive?

I feel so broken that I cannot do either, at least not in the way I used to.

So, what is left?

What can I give and receive?

I gave and received a hug to a women - who after three years of trying has become pregnant.

I cried into the arms of an older woman simply because she was not afraid of my grief.

I put thought and care into the Christmas present I bought for one of my neices (yes, the one born before Maya died, I struggle being with the others).

That is all I can think of. Not much, in this season of giving and receiving. Drops of water in a desert.

But it is not nothing.

Thank you Lovely Ladies

2008-12-04T16:59:00.002+11:00

I always feel sheepish after I have put it all out there.

Undeserving of the support I recieve, knowing that there are others doing it tougher...... and that is before you reach war zones, which, in my head, are the pinnacle of suffering.

But your words lifted me up and here I am, on Thursday afternoon, and I am seem to be doing pretty well. If there's one thing I'm learning it's how to right myself when I have been totally tipped over.

Thanks for the boost up.

Barbs

In need of some care.

2008-11-30T16:21:00.003+11:00

Can I have a hug please?

My eyes sting from tears today and I am weary and tired and need to be carried.

If that is OK by you.

And also...

2008-11-26T18:22:00.002+11:00

Can you take care of beautiful Michelle who has been put through the wringer more than anyone deserves.

http://mylifeafterloss.blogspot.com/

The nine toes of Jill Dennis

2008-11-23T19:01:00.003+11:00

I didn’t tell many people (in real life) about this last cycle. A change that has occurred gradually in me since the death of my daughter. I used to be a confessor, and relied on the support and intimacy that confessions generate. I have found lately however, that, save for cyberspace and professionals, I prefer to go it alone. More accurately, for us to go it alone. The challenges remain pure in this way. They are not complicated by the needs and reactions of others. I can’t resent the hopeless responses of friends or family, or have my energy diverted by their need to help, their desire to “do something”. I know that others in my life will never understand my journey, and have stopped seeking that from them. It has been freeing to do this, and I feel strong, but there is a nagging tug. Dare I say it? At this moment, I feel like I don’t need friends anymore.

I got through the week, not much more than that. At least the waves of grief are familiar and I am not so overwhelmed that I cannot see, when I surface for air, the direction of the shore. I know I will be OK.

I returned to “my healer” (can’t say that without inverted comma, too much like my own personal Jesus). I told him i needed to re-inhabit my body, being a person that copes with the invasiveness of IVF by dissociating. He did footwork, to ground me. It wasn’t a vision exactly, but memory that has the quality of a dream, something comes back to you and you live that time again.

I used to do care work for people with disability. Jill had a spinal injury in a diving accident when she was a teenager. She was in her 60’s when I knew her. She had been sitting on her bum (literally) for decades, and her bum was rather over being sat upon. She had terrible trouble with complications -pressure wounds, skin break down, broken bones and poor circulation – which resulted in hospital stays for months at a time. To relieve some pressure and assist with circulation her feet were elevated so they stuck straight out in front of her when she got around in her chair. Due to the circulation problems, she had, at some point, had a toe amputation. It was a toe on her right foot although I can’t decipher if it is the second or third toe missing when I see it in my mind.

Jill was another woman ambitious for her own happiness, and knew how to find it in places most of us forget to look. She had a friend sew her up these way-out tops, floral print cotton, a tube shape with elastic and a frill around the top. A roomy boob tube. The particular joy of these tops was that you could sit outside and feel the sun on your shoulders. On blue clear days, like we had on Friday, I would shower her, wash her hair and dress her in one of these tops. We would go out in the back yard and I would brush her long silver hair, while she sat with her eyes closed and face to the sun, her wrinkled skin and head absorbing the warmth until they too began to radiate it. Sometimes I would pick a flower and put it in her hair.

Jill had a brother, Harold, who she was close too. I can’t remember if he was her big or little brother. We wouldn’t see him for months as he lived half the year in Bali doing god knows what. When he came back he had the skin of a white person too long in the tropics. Handbagged, as my friend Vicky would say. Brown and deeply wrinkled. Sandals on his feet, shirt buttoned low with a (greying) hairy chest and gold chain. He did look a bit like a dealer except for the kind smiley lines on his face.

Harold always came over with a big bag full of nail polish. He had every colour you could imagine and then some. Not only polish, but brushes, toothpicks, sticks. His wife would come out and chat to us carers or the others in the house, or help out with lunch while Harold and Jill hung out together. And their hanging out meant Harold setting out his toenail paints, and slowly and carefully, painting the nails of each one of Jill’s ten fingers and nine toes. It wasn’t just a matter of 2 coats of a chosen colour. He would paint tiny, finely detailed pictures on each nail - flowers with coloured petals and fine stalks, patterns of lines and colours, or little dot paintings. At Christmas he would paint holly or Christmas trees, bells and snowmen. It took him hours to complete and we would all rush to see when it was done.

The image of Harold and Jill in the sun, big sister little brother, painting and being painted is what came to me as my feet were being worked. It got me thinking about intimacy and friendship, giving and receiving. It provided a counterweight to my utilitarian dismissal of the gift of friends. And the image will go with me as I go back to the drawing board to figure out again, what friendship is about.

A new arrival

2008-11-19T19:57:00.002+11:00

Please go give some comfort to mlg - a new loss mamma

http://onemustcontinuetobelieve.blogspot.com/

Yesterday

2008-11-15T11:11:00.002+11:00

A bright red spot on the end of the progesterone applicator signals the end.

I go in for the blood test anyway. The nurse is still hoping for me. Sure. If it makes you feel good.

I pull over when driving home and say a prayer... of sorts....

FUCK YOU. mother fucker.

What is it in me that redirects my fist and foot? The tut tutting protestant whispering "waste" and "melodrama" and I hit the tiled wall and door frame instead of the intended mirror and shower screen. Fuck.

The familiar noise of my wailing - keeping up with the 6 month old next door. They leave the house, and I wonder if it is because of me.

The pee stick, thrown into the bin in disgust, is retrieved. Just. In. Case.

I turn up for my shiatsu appointment. Sunglasses cover my face. And when I remove them I cover my face with my hands and balls of tissue. He starts his thing about hope. Whatever. I need to be in this I say. Don't ask me about the future.

A humble practitioner. He accepts it and asks what he can do to support it. "I don't know" I whisper. And the sobbing begins. I lie there, a shuddering damp thing. The self conscious part of me wonders why on earth i came when I know I am in no place to receive whatever gift this kind man has to offer. But I continue to lie there anyway. My breath begins to slow, and catch less often. At some point I open my eyes and see that he is working, not only with his eyes closed but with his face turned away. To respect my need for privacy or to protect himself from the toxicity of my anger? Maybe both. Gradually, my hands are removed from my face, my shoulders gently moved from my ears. He stretches my arms up high and out wide, so that my poor broken heart remains open despite every instinct in me telling me to protect it. I see the wisdom in this and I'm grateful.

By the time he reaches my head my tears have almost subsided. My hair and face are damp from them. He massages my clenched jaw and smoothes my brow. Scrubs the top of my head and pulls something out, and I feel it leave. I don't know what it was that left me but I feel a little lighter. He places a wheat bag over my eyes and my hands over my heart saying this is where I need strength, and leaves me to be still for a while.

Jake comes home and we wait for the call together. It is late - which is a sure sign of an unsuccessful cycle. I ring the nurse and she confirms what I already know - it's the end. My hormones are not at zero - there has been some attempt to implant. Was it hours or even a day or two? Somehow this makes it all a little bit sadder. It is the closest we have ever come.

I don't know why I am not pregnant. When I fell pregnant with Maya I fell straight away - and yet we have had three healthy tested embryos put back (over the course of 4 fresh and a frozen cycle) and none have stuck. I don't get it.

Now the final wait. For my period - the post progesterone supplement tsunami - to come.

Some more good news.

2008-11-07T09:59:00.004+11:00

In the end they were able to test 15 embryos.

Out of those 15 tested there was the one they put back and a further three have tested as either balanced or normal.

So 4/15 - which is about average (usually 30% are OK).

So 3 embies on ice. One more piece of news to go. Let's hope it's positive too and makes this (my 4th cycle) a dream run.

One more week to wait.

Even I shed a tear....

2008-11-06T09:21:00.004+11:00

From one of "the forgotten corners of the world" .....

I was huddled by my radio listening to the world cheer.

What amazing speeches by both candidates..... but to see the dancing on the streets, not only in America, but in Kenya, Japan and many others nations..... To see the tears pouring down the faces of black people who have migrated because they have found in other countries a freedom that they were not able to find in their own........ to hear and see a belief in hope.......

It has moved me to tears.

(an irreverent aside - I can't get the theme tune of Bob the Builder out of my head. Bob the Builder, Can we fix it? Bob the builder, Yes! We! Can!)

Can I trouble you with details?

2008-11-05T08:54:00.007+11:00

Well!

This is the story of my ovaries, my heart and my brain over the last 5 days with a late but showstopping entrance by my uterus.

My Trojan ovaries really did a stellar job this cycle. Although my meds had only increased a bit, my egg numbers skyrocketed. In total 29 were collected. A gruelling procedure when you think about that meaning my ovaries were punctured 29 times - plus a few extra in and outs with that mofo needle in order to use a catheter to drain the bladder, etc. Even my Dr (who I am very fond of and trust immensely) was surprised. As I was looking at the screen, watching the needle travel further and further to reach the next egg (I swear it was up under my navel). My Dr's head surfaced above gown level and he said "of course they won't all be mature, otherwise your hormone levels would be through the roof". People. Let me fill you in for a moment on the most important lesson you can learn as a special ed teacher. You should always tell someone what to do, rather than what not to do. Because when you say "Don't climb out the window" what you are reinforcing for the person is the words "climb out the window". "Feet on floor" is a much better option. So, when I heard the Dr. say "otherwise your hormone levels would be through the roof" what I heard was "hormone levels through the roof" which was then reinforced when he poked his head round the curtain in recovery to let me know that actually 26 of the eggs were mature. Which then translated as "your hormone levels must surely be about to go through the roof, if they aren't already".

enter (or was it exit) heart and brain, stage left
Zen master Barbie (and I had been so Zen and chilled until this point) flipped. Although excited by the increased chances that 26 mature eggs might offer, I convinced myself that I was about to get OHSS. Which is weird cause although I have done 3 cycles previously this has never even crossed my mind. I've always thought my Dr was so conservative and safety conscious that none of his patients ever got OHSS.

If the static energy being radiated from my head was visible it would have looked like a giant plasma ball. I am sure if harnessed and used as an energy source I would have saved tons of emissions.

Let's just say I ended up on the doorstep of my shiatsu therapist two days later and burst into tears when he opened the door and went "Barbara?"

And I left school feeling rotten on Monday because I mistook a little panic attack as OHSS symptoms (well how would I know? I've never had either.)

Weirdly though, I was fine on Tuesday. I went back to school, having figured out the my body was doing just fine, and my head, considering the pressure it was under, wasn't really that crazy.
I got a call in the morning (in between chatting to parents at the gate) to say that 5 embryos were ready for biopsy. (For those techy people interested in why I'm doing PGD on day 5 instead of day 3 look here). I got a call to say what time I would get the results while trying to herd my little autie kids off the bus and towards the pool entrance. (I'm great at using all limbs to help shepherd kids in the right direction). And then..... the call with the results.

When they do day 5 tests they like to put the healthy embryos back ASAP. What normally happens is that they get you to loiter around town near the clinic at the time the results are expected back. The clinic loiter rates highly as a Bad Wait in a run of bad waits. You've come into the city (on Melbourne Cup day no less - it's all about office workers having boozy lunches, feathers in the hair, wearing pretty or laddish outfits, and betting too much on horses you know nothing about), found a park (and lady luck was on my side - not in the sweep I had entered, but as my personal parking assistant. I got one directly in front of the doors of the clinic), then you get out of your car and a) loiter, b)sit in a cafe drinking decaf c) sit all tight arsed on the edge of the very stylish lounges in the foyer of a ritzy city building. And WAIT. FOR. THE. PHONE. TO. RING. Then, as soon as the scientists have done their thing, and talked to the nurses, the nurse calls the doctor and the patient to let us know IF IT'S ON. Which it was yesterday. Apparently lady luck was in the petri dish as well.

We met the Doc in the lobby - he'd been running. He was sweat soaked with a singlet and running shorts and sneakers. Out of professional politeness we took a different lift to him although when we met again on level 4 he'd pretty much just washed his hands and chucked a surgery gown over his exercise gear, which I kind of liked.

And well - you know how the rest goes. A blood test. A wrist band. A talk from the scientist, the embryologist, the nurse and the doc (whose Scottish accent is rather like Shrek's) "Leit's doo it".
enter the diva lady uterus, shining in her sparkly progesterone supplements
And then it was done. Or in.

S/he was a good looking hatching blastocyst when shown to us on the screen.

And no doubt s/he'll be a good looking teenager one day too.

We hope.

My two week wait has been shortened from 11 to 10 days for the convenience of the clinic (which makes me why it isn't always 10 days). I'm sure there is reasons.

So, hopefully the last of the waits for a very very long time.

Oh - and for the rest of the techy details. 3 that were biopsied were "unbalanced" which means that if they continued to develop into babies they would die (like Maya), and 1 they were unable to get a result for so are testing the cells again today. They also tested more in the evening and more today so my nurse will ring me this afternoon with all the results and maybe we will even have one or two healthy embryos to freeze.

What's in the basket?

2008-10-31T12:22:00.003+11:00

A lot of eggs apparantly.

24 have fertilised!! Oh my.

Waiting for day 5 to do testing (PGD) to see if any can live.

Surely........... one.

It's all been a bit too easy this cycle. It makes me suspicious.
For goodness sake I only had 2 ultrasounds.

Mmmmm

wait and see. wait and see.

Shhhhhhhh

2008-10-28T19:45:00.001+11:00

Egg collection on Thursday

and then waiting, waiting, waiting

(and shiatsu, meditation, prayers, wishing, and crossings of fingers and toes)

join me in the last one?

What can I say?

2008-10-01T13:40:00.002+10:00

How is it that I have nothing to offer?

Are we built to forget the experiences of pain?

It was only two and a half years ago that I too, came home after holding my new daughter as she died. I know the horror of the nursery set up. The mockery of a mobile, swinging and playing tunes. The unbareable ache of empty arms, longing for a burden ever so light.

I know these things. I KNOW these things.

But when I look at someone else IN these things....... I have nothing.......

I want to warn them, to let them know that it will likely get much worse before it begins to get even a tiny bit better. But I know no-one wants to know this.

I want to let them know that they are not alone... while knowing, when it comes down to it.... we are all terribly alone in our greif.

I want to let them know that they will survive it, while knowing that their may well be a part of them that does not want to survive it. Because sometimes death has such beauty, and holds something so dear, it does not seem an enemy.

I am left a floundering fool - like the others whom I looked at with disdain - because I have nothing to say except those tired tired words that have well and truley crumpled under the weight we expect them to carry "I'm sorry". How can that give anything? Like this post, it is about me, not them.

But I am sorry.

Little Silas I am so very sad.

This medusa

2008-09-26T09:56:00.006+10:00

Intro to this post.

When holding your daughter as she is dying, and after she has died, you find out if you have faith.

I found out I do.

What exactly that faith is, or is in, is still quite unclear. But I believe.

------

Today. I am on my knees, weeping with gratitude.
Today. I know what makes the world.
Today. I know that LOVE is the only force powerful enough to create.
Today. I know that every single created thing is made in LOVE, and is LOVE.
Today. I know that my job in this world is to see this, and to carry on the job of creating with love.
Each blade of grass is profound.
The beauty of light hurts my heart.
I will plant a garden.
Today. I know that I know what love is.

-------

A mist has descended. It weighs on me. Heavy. Heavy.
I cry and it muffles the sound. My wailing sounds distant. A cry from ancient times, a legend I once read, about a woman whose only child died. She longs to be enveloped by the earth that holds the core of her. She goes down into it, away from light and voices.

-------

Can you see me? Can you give me a sign? Do you know how much I can love? Do you see my pain?

Please God. Please. Please. Please. Please. Please.

-------

Buried so deep, hiding so well, nothing can touch me. Not the coolness of the ocean, or the the way the new leaves shine like silver. A death of the heart, and of eyes that choose blindness, and ears that prefer silence. Giving birth to a rising panic. What is this place? Is there still further to fall? Will this be the death of me?

-------

But somehow I am found. A baptism, while swimming naked at the bottom of a waterfall. Thanksgiving rising with me and the bubbles. I shout "YES! YES!" and laugh, when snorkelling the next day, because I can hear the ridiculous noise of a parrot fish munching on coral.

And like in a good Irish hymn, I can sing from the middle of the shit, that I am OK. I haven't triumphed, turned the fates, won the victory, and yet, I know that it is well with my soul. Even in death.

This is my faith.

Thanks friends

2008-09-19T09:04:00.003+10:00

Thanks for checking in on me.

Yes my fragile little happiness is growing very slowly but surely. It has become a little sturdier, and while it gets knocked over relatively easily, it bounces back in a fairly short time.

When people ask me how I am I have stopped saying "OK I guess" or "not tooooooo bad" and have started to say "pretty good actually". Which is pretty good actually - don't you think.

I don't know what has happened. It's a miracle to say the least. And I put at least some of it down to the choir I have been singing in, and the circus classes. Did I mention how much I love circus?

My other sister (not the one who just had a child) but the one in the middle - she is also pregnant, and about to get married. Which is great for her cause she is 35. It was an Oooops thing. Although I'm yet to figure how two 35 yr olds ooopsed their way into that. I think it involved serious denial, Christians and all.

I won't go into all that commotion - the point is - this is something that could really tip me over. I'm organising her hens party today (a picnic tomorrow), and the wedding is next week. And, listen up peoples, I'M OK.

So there you have it.

Thanks again to those who have been checking in.

It means alot.

love B

In Silks

Do you think it is OK to do circus classes while doing a cycle? It's all about your core muscles getting serious workout. Feet tangled in the tissue - hanging upside down and attemping sit ups - that kind of stuff. Like uber pilates.

Could it be?

2008-08-09T15:22:00.003+10:00

I think it might be.....

I think I'm happy.

Look at that. I sincerely didn't think I would be writing that for a good few years. But there it is. That mundane, commonplace word. And what a delight to be reacquainting myself with it. I'm clapping my hands cause I'm happy and I know it.

I have been feeling like Charlie - pre chocolate factory visit. So deprived that when a bar of chocolate comes to me on my birthday, I treasure it as more precious then gold. Taking it out every now and then to look at it, eventually tearing off the tiniest bit of wrapper, nibbling a bit from the corner, tasting it's sweetness and then putting it away because I need to to last. *Happy* has been my precious chocolate bar.

For the last two and a half years, each time I have had a happy moment I have been conscious of savouring it - turning it over, trying to pull it out in the crap times to remind myself that it does exist. I would say I have become good at getting mileage out of even the smallest bit of Happy. I hang on to the memory of the feel of the sun of my shoulders, or the smell of the ocean, and try to make these little pieces of Happy carry the huge weight of my sorrow. Unsurprisinngly, they often sink under its weight. (OK so now I'm really mixing metaphors -chocolate bars/life bouys-but are you with me?) I make each piece of Happy go a very long way.

But look at this week's list of Happy:
Tuesdays circus class - Check
Taking my 3 yr old niece out for the day on her birthday and decorating her cake with paper shapes and icing sugar - Check
A boozey dinner followed by whiskey and watching The Opening Ceremony - Check
Watching Tima (my furry friend) retrieve his stick from the ocean and accidentally body surf back to shore - Check
Sydney sun (even in winter). It's all gold and blue today. - Check
Lyrics Born gig - Check (well that is tonight but I already know it will make me happy)

Not quite a chocolate factory but definately enough to gorge on in a week. Fortunately, unlike chocolate, too much Happy does not make you feel crook.

There is no reason to explain this showbag of Happy - there are many things going on that could have tipped me into more months of heartbreaking sadness - but I just don't want to let these things do that to me anymore. I have developed an almost ferocious ambition for my own happiness. I WILL BE HAPPY. Damn it. I f*** in will. I am.

You watch me be it.

Family circus

2008-08-01T11:43:00.003+10:00

There is what is "right" and what is true. Be brave my family. Give up "right" and embrace what is true. I promise it is not as terrifying as you think.

*****

But I felt at home at the circus class. Here are my people, even though I don't know them. We laughed and cheered as we watched each other swing on a trapeze for the first time ever. Issi climbed like a monkey up the fabric. I only made a few metres, but managed a pike upside down.

*****

And I am learning to bounce in other ways. The more times you get knocked over, the better you become at righting yourself. Some days I can do it in 1/2 an hour. Which is pretty good going don't you think.

Faith, Hope and Longing

2008-07-07T10:28:00.005+10:00

I am trying to untangle what hope is.

Hope is something that we all think we know what it is. Most people think that hope is a good thing, that we can't live without it. But us baby-less people know it as something else.

Hope is a monster.

Nothing makes this clearer then doing an IVF cycle. The very fact that you are doing an IVF cycle is a statement of hope. You are doing all you can to make real the hope of bringing a little person into this world and your arms. But for those of us who have been burnt a few times by this, that hope comes with a great amount of fear. We want to be hopeful, be positive, and at the same time protect ourselves in the event of failure. Managing hope is an exhausting process of hedging bets both ways. Of opening yourself up to possibility and shutting yourself down to disappointment. The process of wrestling hope also includes a strange entanglement with superstition.

It goes a little something like this.......

I need to be hopeful. It is important that I be hopeful. How can this possibly work if I don't think positively about it. I have to be positive for this to work. But what if it doesn't work. What if I have bought the lie and then have to pay the price. Maybe I will just pretend this isn't happening. I will go to the clinic and pretend the blood tests are for something else - to donate blood. I'll ignore that bit of the day where I have to give myself injections and just pretend, pretend, pretend..... and then maybe it will sneak up on me. Catch me by surprise. Yes, pregnant, Yes, delighted. Surprised! / No, no, I'm doing just fine. I never expected it to work anyway.

It is true, the amount of hope you have for a cycle does effect the crushing disappointment of a failed cycle. The higher you climb, the harder the fall. Last cycle I believed I was pregnant. For gods sakes I started lactating! The changes I felt in my body were real, so I believed them. Sadly, they were real changes that came as a result of injecting hormones into me, not as a result of being pregnant. The despair of the last failure was extremely bitter, and I am still coming to terms with it.

So I have this little flame of hope. The wind blows and it becomes a raging fire during an IVF cycle, and then my period comes and a fireman with a wet blanket starts beating at the raging hope. Smacking it into place. Suffocating it. Until, once again it is a tiny ember. Precious, suffocating, almost spent. I look at my little ember of hope and wonder if I have the courage to nurture it back to a fire, and face the chance of it being beaten again. Maybe this time it will finally be put out. Is that what the end of the road looks like?

People who want to "give you hope" have no idea what the hell they are talking about. That kind of hope is high risk, terrifying to the extreme, and could possibly kill you.

But I have had a different sense of hope that is growing alongside this. This hope is not like the fire that gets whipped into a fire storm and then beaten back down to a tiny ember. No, this is a very different kind of hope. And I think it is secure enough for me to build something on. Let me tell you the hope.... I have to whisper it because it's still tiny........ but it is this:

I'm going to be OK. No matter what.

See. Nothing like that out of control fire. Just a tiny little seed of something that might grow and grow and grow and become big and strong. It will stay with me through all of life. It won't be able to be suffocated. Sometimes I won't be able to see it but I will know that it is still there. It grows with strength and a sadness too. Because to live without a living child would be a very very sad thing indeed. But I would still live.

What is this kind of hope called? Is it faith? Or is this true hope and the other sort just desire or longing. What does it mean for my longing for a child? that other sort of hope? do I have to let go of that?

A day in the life of.......

2008-06-06T08:13:00.004+10:00

These relentless rainy days are the worst. The nightmare of every parent of young children, childcare workers and school teachers. ( For those of you that don't know, I teach kids with autism and have the "high support" class)

I guess we get a bit complacent in Sydney and view outside play not only as a right but a daily need for children (and for those of us that care for them). So we pay no attention to the miracle of long sunny day after long sunny day... and when the rain finally comes..... as it did this week, we find it can be a rude visitor that overstays it's welcome. Sydney likes to get all it's raining done in large chunks so we can get back to those clear blue skies, so we love the first day or two, the idea of rain, the feeling of relief that it inevitably brings, and then get much less tolerant by day 3 and then when we are on our 4th or 5th day of constant rain, the world begins to turn upside down.

A damp start to the day then. But a sweet tableau on arrival, a mum sitting on the floor trying to engage one of the other kids (let's call him rock star - he's very good looking) in play. Rock Star was busy trying to stack the toys in two tall piles and experimenting with height vs base area ratios. For him, the ideal achievement was to get as much height with as little touching the ground as possible, resulting in inevitable crashes of large piles of toys. A large, clunky sound from Elmo and a rather deformed looking B1 who popped back to his bannana-ry shape after a ship was taken out of his head.

Enter (let's call her) Floss. Filipino. Two very messy pig tails (she can't tolerate the hair brush) sticking out perpendicular to her head. She sees me and does a little jump and flap of excitement - her way of saying "Good morning Barbara. I like you" and then starts whinging at me to find her favourite Dorothy the Dinosaur song book. Said book found, she finds a spot to look and point at the pictures singing "Ya, ya, YA" which is the only sound she ever makes. Apart from lengthy wailing.

Not-at-ease comes in with his mum. He is a difficult kid. One of those tragic cases of autism where the kid develops normally through the first few years of life and then all of a sudden starts losing skills. The parents watch in horror as the child they know disappears in front of their eyes and a complicated and very unsettled little person takes their place. Not-at-ease does not feel right in his own body. The proportions somehow aren't right. His joints think they need to be carrying someone much heavier, so they feel restless and constantly want extra weight. Not-at-ease searches the room for things to push against, to make his bones feel right. He touches things with his fingertips and leans into it to feel pressure through his fingers and wrists, he taps things to his mouth, he puts his head into my knee cap and leans in to get a strong pressure through the top of his head, he puts his head between the legs of anyone standing near and pushes against them with his shoulders. He will grab the front of your shirt and pull very hard to try to let you know something (but what????? I can never seem to give him what he seeks.) A day trying to help not-at-ease feel a little easier in him self sends your blood pressure sky high and is physically exhausting.

The day starts with our usual song and dance routine. That is, I sing and dance and the kids look at me and judge my performance by either staying in their seats (yes, an excellent performance today Barbara) or by popping up out of their seats and wandering round the room (not-so-good today-Barb. Could tell your heart was not in it). The teachers assistant sits behind them and plays "whac-a-mole" - only with kids - and hopefully we more or less muddle through and the kids more or less sit, and something more or less is learned.

We, all of us, are ready to get outside when morning tea time comes. Only no outside play!! AGHHHH!

Normally on Thursdays we spend some time at a soft play centre but due to this miserable weather, it was very crowded yesterday. Rockstar has got a habit of tipping anything with wheels upside down to spin the wheels, including prams. Not-at-ease is a constant forager and will eat food off any table or the floor. Mr Wiggle constantly tries to climb in the ball pit which is only for toddlers, and the little fella climbs the walls of the jumping castle and then sits on top and bounces up there. He likes to watch everyone shouting at him to get down. We usually try to go at least busy times so there are not many other kids around as we expect all of the these things to happen. When we arrived, the teacher assistant and I looked at the room full of prams and kids parties and decided that it would be fool-hardy mission even for brave people such as us. Poor little Mr Wiggle wept and wailed the whole way home. He was the only one cluey enough to realise that we had dangled the promise of an hour in the ball pit in front of his face and then taken it away again. He thought it was very unfair. Fair enough.

So, here's a priceless moment from the day (I have great stories after each day of work and if I ever stop finding them funny you may have to kill me). Rock Star has a big bucket of beautiful glass beads that someone gave to us. He is busy making a cartoon graphic out of the black and yellow beads (like the Walt Disney castle or the Pixar logo - only this one says Ragdoll). At one point he had either messed the whole thing up or had run out of the right beads to continue. Frustrated, he messes up the whole logo , lucky I had already taken a photo - and then picks up the bucket of beads and tips them over his head. Very Rock Star. Just like in Down With Love where Catcher Block tips the champagne bucket of ice over himself. Apparantly Rock Star thought it was a pretty neat move because as soon as I had cleaned the mess he did it again. And he also did it with a jigsaw puzzle, and then with a box of plastic shapes.

So, that's my day. Each day.

That's why I took a mental health day on Wednesday. When things are fine I am usually OK, but when I'm tipped over already, it's a hard place to be.

A list of choices

2008-05-31T16:38:00.002+10:00

I'm angry.

Just the usual cause - a friend, referred to often in this blog just told me she was pregnant.

Well, it was a pretty clumsy affair in all and I am simultaneously managing to cast judgement on her lack of strength while understanding that there is no OK way for a person close to me, to come and tell me they are pregnant. But a tip for young players, don't do it at the beginning of a long interaction if you can't manage to then look at the other person.

I had a moment when I looked at her and thought "I am so much stronger than you". But so what. What if I am stronger. What difference does that make? I guess I can give the old pregnancy hormone excuse to account for some of her weirdness....

So we aborted the planned bike ride, and she went home and I was left with a lot of energy with no place to go. Hubby stepped in and we took the dog for a walk together. I struggled to escape my own head and the angry thoughts which are as inappropriate as always. Because who exactly am I allowed to get angry at. It's no ones fault that my baby died and two years later after extensive procedures I am not pregnant. But the fact that it is no-ones fault does not make these moments less. Less painful. Less tragic. Less consuming. Whatever. It would be nice if someone was to blame cause then at least I could fuckin let them know how I feel about it. And the fact that it is not my friends fault doesn't stop me feeling angry at her. Because she/they made a choice that she knows hurts me. I don't judge it. I would make the same choice myself. But she made it and it hurts me. And now I hurt again.

I typed "hurting angry how would they know" into Google and someone somewhere had a neat article on anger and all the right things to do with it. Which is almost enough to make you blow if you already have a bit of steam lifting your lid. Still, it did suggest I write down the options available and take a look at them and see where they lead me.

OPTIONS FOR AN ANGRY PANTS IN RELATING TO PREGNANT FRIEND.

No 1. IGNORE IGNORE IGNORE IGNORE. Ignore her, ignore the fact that she is pregnant (at least for a bit) Ignore the weirdness with which she told me. leading to ever increasing amounts of weirdness and ignoring in the friendship until it is but a shadow of what it was, a memory of something good.

N0 2. Is very difficult to think of because all of me seems inclined towards number 1.

Would appreciate your feedback.

I'm needing the wisdom of some IF old-timers .

What are my options? Don't be wussy and tell me do whatever feels right. Just think of as many different ways I could approach this and let 'em fly.

Please

Thank you.

Rest well

2008-05-21T17:12:00.009+10:00

My sweet girl.

Rest well, rest well.

Beloved, sweetly sleeping

that I may cease from further weeping.

Sleep well, sleep well. *

* Translation of St Johns Passion by J S Bach - Mary weeping at the death of Jesus.

I am scared. I do not know what this means only it haunts me.

Your birthday

2008-05-15T16:45:00.010+10:00

There is a crispness in the air.

How else would we know

that these warm, clear days are bringing winter?

Mellow and sweet,

liquid amber and bleeding heart begin to fall.

The weight of it all

pulls shut my eyes

and takes me to a time when I breathed you.

The stories they tell.

2008-05-12T16:51:00.004+10:00

When I was pregnant with Maya, I was very small. Because she was very small. I was so small that I had to go to the hospital every two weeks to have full ultrasounds to measure every bit of her body. I also had to see the baby cardiologist cause her heart didn't look right. They couldn't say what was wrong, only that it didn't look right. I got so good at reading the ultrasounds that I knew that her amnio fluid was low and that they would make the decision to deliver about 3 seconds after the sonographer put the US to my tummy that final time. (I was almost 35 weeks)

I got a lot of calls from people. They went like this.

"The Drs all thought my kids were small and they were at least a pound heavier when they were born." (Yeah but you didn't have to go in to the head of Obs at a major hospital every 2 weeks)

"Have you eaten enough?" (I thought I'd rather keep my figure and starve my baby)

"I was so small my mum had to use a face washer as a nappie"

"She was only 500gm when she was born and now she is doing OK"

When Maya was delivered - an uneventful c-section which I found unbearable, she was moved into high dependency and then into the NICU within 12 hours. These were the stories I was told

"You'll be laughing about this when she is 13"

"It's in the range of normal"

When Maya died, these were the stories I were told.

"I know a woman whose sister's first born died and now they have 7 kids"
"I know someone who had a child die and now they have three beautiful healthy children"

When the IVF started it was

"So and so is an IVF baby. She got pregnant first go." (Yeah but did she have a balanced translocation?)

"It's only a matter of time" (as if there was no cost to a failed IVF cycle - only time)

You can imagine how many IVF stories I have been told.

These days, the ones people tell me are like this

"... and then on their last possible attempt they concieved, and now they have a beautiful child."

I'm also starting to get adoption stories.

These stories have always given me the shits. It is the unwillingness of the listener to actually listen. They already know the outcome. It happened to a friend of a friend. They have raced ahead to the end of the story, which, they are sure, is a good ending. A few months after Maya died I started telling people how unhelpful their stories were. Which kind of throws people. They think they are giving hope, when in reality they are trying to make the moment more comfortable for themselves. Or else I say "that's nice for them".

How I have longed for someone to stand with me and look realistically at the present and the future and say "Fuck. That really sucks". I have wept when people have done that. It is a great gift to allow yourself to feel the horror and fear of your friends uncertain future. To stand with that person in the pain of the past and present, and confusion of the future, and resist the temptation to try to make it better. How come so few people know this?

Thank you to my friends who have the wisdom to do this with me.

Of course the irony is that while I hated my friends telling me these stories, I would go home and spend hours on the internet looking for a person with the same balanced translocation as me, and trying to find out how many children they had out of how many pregnancies. Which is a little different I know, but still, I too am guilty of trying to write the end before it is time. Of not having the courage to stand and look at the hideous uncertainty of a pretty equal chance of things going right and things going hideously wrong, again. Well in truth, the research tells me the odds are tipped in favour of hideously wrong, but there is still a good chance for things going right.

I wonder what stories I will be told in the future?

I wonder what stories I will dole out to others in the name of "giving hope".

All anyone wants to know is that they are not alone. That someone else knows.

And just last weekend....

2008-05-07T20:28:00.002+10:00

Ali tries to be a saggy bottom boy.

Chasing an ominous black shadow in the water. Turns out it was a seal swimming in the waves.

outing the fire.

mmm. fire pancakes.

So. It seems the east coast has a lot to offer in terms of healing. Far Nth Queensland to the South of NSW.

I'm glad I get to live here.

And then this (and this is a city beach!)

2008-05-07T20:26:00.002+10:00

A friendly dog begs Jake to throw his stick in the sea.

4 days. A journey and a moment of joy.

2008-05-07T19:50:00.007+10:00

The breakthrough. Thankfulness bubbles with the water.

Peace.

Insult to Injury

2008-03-28T09:14:00.004+11:00

So.

A week or so after the shower incident letting me know that I most certainly WAS NOT PREGNANT, I started lactating. And I have to say it was/is pretty confronting. Not horrible leaky kind (like after your baby has died and you stop expressing) just a very distinct feeling in my breasts and an urge to check if I was lactating. Which I was. You can understand that it kind of threw me.

I visited Dr Google and typed in lactating while not pregnant and got pituatary cancer, benign cancer of the brain, menopause.

Which is a good reason why you should never visit Dr Google.

I rang the clinic and the nurse said "that can happen sometimes". CAN IT???? I don't get why injecting estrogen would make my prolactin go crazy.

And I get starving hungry (which I am sure is hormonal) so when i was racing past a teacher (who is pregnant) at 8.30 am with a packet of chips in my hand and some salty crumbs around my mouth, she asked me if I was pregnant.

DO YOU THINK I WOULD NOT KNOW IF I WAS PREGNANT AFTER HAVING A BABY DIE AND 4 ROUNDS OF IVF?????

I simply said "No I am not" and went home and took another pee test to confirm it. Definately not. I even dug it out of the bin half an hour later even though technically I would be 7 or 8 weeks and an early reading pg test should show positive in about 0 seconds if I was pg. I still wasn't.

I have become very effecient in my grief. I can now fit a good half hour wail (literally) in between the coming and going of two sets of guests, or between arriving home from work and leaving for a social engagement. I've given up trying to look after myself at those points. I mean, I could send the guests away but I would stay miserable and if they arrive I have a better chance of not being as miserable for as long. So I sit and stare for the first 40 min and after a while I just join in. There is only so long you can maintain the intensity of feeling absolutely miserable.

Which is not to say I feel happy. Or I do in some moments. Minutes, hours even, but never for a whole day. Never for days at a time. The heaviness always comes home to roost - settles itself in my chest again, clucks about creating noise and discomfort.

I still wish I hadn't experienced any of this.

I just wish it was someone else and not me.

Yesterday I thought that nothing seemed important to me anymore. I don't have anything to say about anything (except my pain). It does not seem important. I don't get uplifted by seeing something beautiful. What meaning does it have. My husband and I are going parrallel but both seem stuck in our own depression and grief this weekand don't often connect in that. Which is a pretty bleak place to be, and I get scared because after years of grief these feelings seem to be stiffening into a more permanent part of my character rather than a transient feeling that I know is just something I am passing through. That scares me.

Perhaps the fact that I ran inside to grab the camera and take this photo this morning means that is not the case. It was enough to excite me and make me feel like the day had something in store.

It's a rosella in the gum tree I planted which is now in flower. There were a pair of them, sipping nectar out of the blossom. I only managed one picture before they flew off but I hope they come back.

Some things

2008-03-13T19:01:00.003+11:00

You should check out my husband's blog (link to your right - my dearest). He doesn't blog about the IF thing.

But you will see a lot photos of him eating, me eating, our friends eating, the food we make, and the scraps after people have eaten the food we make.

Can you tell that food is a hot topic in our house?

I was very impatient with one of the kids at school today. He keeps sticking his hand down my top and tugging at my bra.
So the internal dialogue goes like this

Good Barbie " It's a way of trying to communicate, what is he trying to tell me?"
Bitch Barbie "back off and STOP TOUCHING ME"
Good Barbie "Maybe he's not coping, maybe the work is too hard, maybe it's too boring"
Bitch Barbie "Why don't you just SPEAK to me. There are these things called words and they work for the rest of us. We don't have to pull clothes off each other"
Good Barbie "Hey little Mister. Why don't you grab this elmo doll instead"
Bitch Barbie (and todays winner) physical wrestle to untangle kid from my clothes and get him to sit down. Shouting "NO" in a startling manner.

(times that scenario by about 10 and you have a little piece of my day).

Yeah - there are days when I feel like I really could improve quite a bit at my job.

The weird thing is, I forgave myself for being like this when I was in the middle of the IVF cycle and had that mountain of stress. But it does not seem OK to be like this now. And today is not even a cry day. No tears today, just a run of the mill, life-after-your-baby-has-died-and- a-string-of-failed-IVF-attempts kind of a day.

I had a great massage last week. It released so much sadness and I had to do a lot of weeping for the next few days.
But it grounded me somehow. It was one of those great moments when you are so vulnerable that you will trust anyone - and somehow - this person was just the person to trust. Not that I spoke with her beyond "I'm really sad" but I completely gave myself up to her care. Her hands and my body had a heartfelt conversation. And she undid something, and put something else back together. And then she pulled something out and shook it from her hands and it left me. It wasn't the end of sadness, but it was a beginning. I had strength to enter my grief. To let myself live the aching pain of hope gone dry, again, and know that I will live beyond this too.

red, white (but no pink)

2008-03-02T10:19:00.003+11:00

Standing in the shower with my hand between my legs.
Trying to stop the blood.
Trying to make it stay inside.

Please don't go

Please

don't go

little Bo

I

love you

so

much.

Saturday

2008-02-23T11:34:00.003+11:00

WE PUT ONE BACK!

Yep. You betcha. Got the call at 4 in the arvo to say they did the testing on the 3 little embies (it's starting to sound like a nursery tale) and one was NAD. That means no abnormalities detected. Which means it can live! It has the same chance as any little embie going into a body of growing big. So by 4.3o and after a mad drive into the city it was done, or, I should say, in.

We waved at it on the screen and welcomed it to my uterus.

Now the 10 day wait (it was a day 6 transfer). But I can't believe we made it this far.

We may even have a 2nd emby in the freeze - well it has been frozen but when they did the testing, 2 of the cells showed that it was normal and one of the cells did not take the dye which shows up the particular chromosomes we are looking at. So they are trying to look at it again on monday. They have frozen it because there is a good chance it is normal.

The 3rd one sadly, we say goodbye to. If it grew inside me it would be like Maya, beautiful, but not bound for this earth,

I can't believe how good it feels to have good news instead of crap.

HOORAY! HOORAH!

Click heels together.

I know you are thinking that I shouldn't be celebrating yet........ after all, I have only just started the wait, but join with me. It is a miracle to get this far. I will deal with the future when it arrives.

May it also be good.

Friday

2008-02-19T17:11:00.002+11:00

On friday I am not going to work.

On friday I find out if there are any healthy embies to put back inside me.

On friday my neighbour is booked in for a c-section.

There are only 3 embies still going strong..... do you think one of them might be able to grow into a little baby in me arms?

Sorry

2008-02-13T19:06:00.001+11:00

now this makes me happy.

Update (or is it down)

2008-02-11T12:36:00.000+11:00

So first with the good news.

My dog's paw is better. He's not quite his handsome self due to a rather large and pinkish scar on his leg - not to mention the shaved bits that haven't grown back, but all in all he seems to be returning to his doggy self. And our walks have become the usual mixture of delight and apolgetic shuffling on (he tends to get a bit snappy at certain dogs despite my best behaviour management strategies).

So dog is on the mend. First box ticked.

My dear hubby who was so unjustly fired will finish work this week. I am very proud of him as he has made the transition from righteous outrage (justified I might add) to forward looking job seeker without sinking into a trough of negativity and depression which would probably have been my option if I had gone through that. I forget that he is stronger then I think he is. I just hope that the union lawyers kick ass. I would like to see the evil people who made this decision SQUIRM. In an act of self preservation and solidarity another member of staff is leaving on the same day. For a team of 5 it now looks a bit on the nose to have 3 positions unfilled.

I'm on Day 11 of FSH and looking to be going for a few more days. Did i mention how shit my body is at responding to hormones? I am questioning why my doc did not put me on a big mamma dose of hormones. I think he is kinda conservative. I bet none of his patients ever get whatever it is you get when you're overstimulated. Anyway, not only am i responding slowly i seem to be responding poorly (for me). I've seen enough ultrasounds to know something and despite the cheesy smiles of the sonographer I know that there are a lot less eggs then last time. It feels like my body is rather unimpressed with this whole business and has decided not to cooperate any longer. I used to be the best at giving blood - but now, my little old veins give a polite "no thanks" before being held at needle point and forced into giving up their luscious flow. They bruise in protest. And my ovaries, no matter how much singing and patting, kissing (my hubby does that one - too hard for me) and coaxing, just don't seem to want to give up too many precious little eggs. I confess I have unjustly thought violent thoughts towards my ovaries after former failed cycles but I was hoping that they would be a little more forgiving.

I've noticed that it only takes me hours to detach myself from myself and speak in the third person about the me that was on the bed weeping and begging heaven to have mercy just a few hours ago. As if it was a long time ago. The old me in a different time and place. Who am I kidding?

I'm kind of sick of feeling like a dead weight around people. My friend returned from a conference in NZ yesterday and I have, in truth, not been doing all that well. I rang her up to see if she wanted to go for a walk.. and she said yes because she knows that I have not been doing all that well and then rang back and asked to postpone it as really what she needs is to sleep after being away for a long time. The only thing that bothers me in this interaction is the thought that people might feel like they need to give to me all the time..... even though I feel so desperately needy all the time...... I don't want to be a person that requires "energy" to be around. So I try and section off not-coping me and do this weird thing of talking about those times or moments as if it is another person. As if I had a really close front row seat of watching someone else go through excruciating pain and confusion. Which in a weird way is what I want. I WANT SOMEONE TO KNOW. Not just that I am having a bad Sunday but that Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday weren't very different. That even in my sleep I can't escape this because it occupies my dreams.

I dreamt I was holding a dead baby and then the babies face turned into Maya's face and I gave her mouth to mouth and she came back to life.

That one was a nice one.

I have started going to a church. I like this church. It has a lot of tradition and does a sung communion each week. I like this because there is a lot of beauty in it and I like the physicality of participating in communion. Of being on your knees, holding out your hand. Of receiving the gift of the sacraments. Of singing a response which is both haunting and uplifting.

But I loose it most weeks. It is a space where it is OK to loose it. I am sure I have cried my tears into the communal cup which is a nice metaphor in a way...... last week I lost it quite badly as my friend arrived with her new little baby girl. The one I have talked about previously. It really really does hurt to be around and no matter what self talk I use it remains a heartbreaking experience to watch someone else be a proud mum for the first time and think that the time I held my little girl in front of others was after her death. In fact, I don't even think. I. Just. Cry. and feel that deep ache inside my chest which has not really changed with time....

I am loosing hope for this cycle. It seems easier to give up hope now then to try and fan it back to life and then have a bucket of water thrown over it when I get my BFN.

Ain't that a sad thing.

post script

I just spoke to the friend who was in New Zealand and did not speak about myself in the third person rather just broke down and unapologetically hogged the space until I was in a place to stop and listen to her and how her trip was. Later I said I was looking forward to being in a place where I wasn't so needy all the time. She assured me that that was not how she saw our friendship at all.... which was nice to hear. I think I believe her.

Simply smashing

2008-02-01T20:14:00.000+11:00

Sometimes I wish I was Greek. Then maybe I wouldn't feel so goofy about smashing crockery. I was angry today, and thought "I'll smash some plates" which seemed a very satisfying thought and much more productive then anger turned in on myself (you know the thoughts "i think I'll smash me"). So. Smashing plates....... but sadly I've missed the boat. The impulse has left and all my crockery is still in tact. I was lying on the couch you see, but my husband was home and I was too embarassed to do it in front of him. Then I started planning.... we live kinda close to our neighbours so I'd have to shut the doors and windows. Then I would need to shut the dog away so he didn't hurt his injured paw further, wear some flip flops, find the crappy crockery (I mean I'd regret it if I smashed Nanna's plates), and find a corner that was easy to clean up. It all seemed too much for someone who couldn't manage to peel herself off the couch. So I just stayed there and cried instead.

But in a similar (less violent) messiness. I did sensory play at school with my little autistic friends. "Sensory Play" is the name we give it to make it sound legit. It involved covering one desk in shaving cream and putting marbles in it, putting out a big bucket of rice with toys in it, putting out a big bucket of soapy water with toys in it, covering the floor of a corner of the room in packing filler (you know those little styrophoam bits), putting out a foot spa, and putting out a tray of tiny shells to run their hands through. It was great. This kid just went up to the massive pile of shaving cream and scooped up a handful and rubbed it all over his uniform and then all through his hair and over his face. He he heeeee. I know how to give kids a fun time. Another one just stuck his hands in the rice and started chucking it about. He liked it falling on his head and watching it bounce on the floor.

As you can imagine the room was a little messy when we were finished. But that is why we pay for cleaners. The kids were very happy, and once the froth had settled, they were quite calm too.

I am angry because my friend (the one who had preeclampsia in the last post - delay in the induction) just had a baby girl in the hospital I had my baby girl in. How can it not hurt?

Tomorrow I am doing this - without the extras of a clairvoyant and Rob Dekota. It looks a bit tacky but truly, you haven't seen Pittwater. It's amazing, and sitting on the deck of a boat looking at that scenery can only ever be uplifting. And I think swimming in the boom net could be fun. (yes. I have just learned how to link other sites)

Tomorrow is Day 2 of FSH.

mmmm......... I wonder.

Today

2008-01-23T18:43:00.000+11:00

I bought more fruit then we can possibly eat. Hoorah for summer.

I took Tima to the vet (as I have been doing everyday) and his wound is looking pretty awful. It aint doing what it should be doing.

I cried.

I had my first Lucrin injection. (I think that it is like your Lupron)

My husband got fired - completely unfairly (he asked to continue part time while we are doing IVF and they fired him).

I am making dinner and will take it over to our good friends so we can talk.

Our friend told me she has preeclampsia and has to be induced tomorrow. I hope she is OK.

As little Annie says......

Tomorrow is another day. (Is it Annie?)

I'm just not up for too many of these days.

3 referrals

2008-01-21T11:47:00.000+11:00

I was going to take a picture of three referrals my GP wrote for me. But I've posted them off so I will have to describe them instead.

A note for those in other countries. We have a lovely public health program called medicare here in Oz. The latest is that medicare (ie the federal gov) will pay for 80% of all medical treatments once you have spent over $1000 in one calendar year. This does make IVF much more affordable as most of it paid for by the gov. It also covers specialist treatment as long as you have a referral from your GP. Hence my need for these referrals.

So, back to the three referrals.

No 1. A referral to my IVF doc.

No 2. A referral to my psychologist

No 3. A referral to a psychiatrist.

Is there a connection you ask? .... You Bet.

But I am trying to understand it. I really like the psychologist I have been seeing but I went through a stressing stage and was thinking "there has to be a better way of living through this". So my GP suggested a shrink.

So we all know what the referral to the IVF doc is for but what is the difference between the other two?

My psychologist treats me as a well person going through a really shitty and stressful time. Last time I was there I looked her straight in the eye and said "Am I doing OK?" and she looked me straight back and said "Yes". I know that she is a believer in self talk and the importance of these types of thoughts: "I will get through this", " I can survive this". "There will be a time when I am happy again". So part of me knows that she believes that it important for me to believe that I am doing OK. That I am traveling well with this.

This week I went along to the psychiatrist I was referred to and he has basically said that I have anxiety, depression and PTSD. Quite a cohort of unwellness. He thinks I'm stuck somewhere in my grieving process about Maya which triggers the unbearable pain I feel when someone tells me they are pg. I see a new-born. I go to the birthday parties etc...... You know, the equivalent of a Nam vet. diving for cover when a car backfires because it takes them back to the jungle.

So my question to myself is....... Am i well or unwell? Have stressful events triggered anxiety and depression or am I just stressed and sad? Are my response to my circumstances inside the range of "normal" or am I really really not coping?

I'm not sure that I have anxiety. But I am anxious and I feel it physically. When I have spoken to my friends about anxiety it seems that it centres around going to extremes in your mind. Letting remotest possibilities have more weight then likely outcomes. But it is not the worst case scenarios that are pursuing my thoughts....... or should I say it's not the remotest possibilities that my pessimistic mind can think up. It is the most likely thing that terrifies me. We will do IVF and it will fail again. I mean I have a 1 in 4 chance of it succeeding so most likely it will fail. It is not my mind taking me off on wild journeys of extreme pessimism that is causing the anxiety, it is plain old looking at what is realistically in store. Besides, when you've lived through possibilities worse than an anxious mind could have conjured..... well...... statistics aren't much of a comfort anymore. The worst did happen.

So I tend to think that I am coping. My evidence is that I manage to work (and do it well), and I participate generally in life. I don't usually stop doing things because I am feeling really bad - just occasionally.

The evidence in favour of the anxiety and depression is that I don't often feel happy - more just a lessening of "the weight" - but it never goes away completely. And I usually feel at least a bit nervous and often quite nervous. And occasionally I wake up with my chest so tight it hurts. But I have also talked to friends about this and it does not seem that uncommon. The other things about the PTSD is that I know that my grieving process took a serious left hand turn when I found out the death of my daughter was caused by a chromosomal problem inherited from moi. That changed the shape of my grief a lot. Perhaps there is still unresolved things there....

I find it hard to get perspective......... but I know that others find it as hard as me.

And this is my main reason for thinking that I'm not doing too bad. It's just a really shitty road.

I'd be interested in your experiences with different sorts of therapists and what you found helpful.

(But don't feel the need to comment on my wellnes or unwellness - I think I'll have to figure that one out on my own.)

Poor Tima

2008-01-17T14:31:00.000+11:00

Look at this pathetic little creature.

Now if that doesn't make you go Ohhhhhhh! You officially don't have a heart. You are clinically dead.

He has a lot of staples in his leg where a lump got cut out.

He has stopped wagging his tail and gets around with it in between his legs and his ears back.

I hope he gets better soon.

The Real Christmas letter.

2008-01-03T11:19:00.000+11:00

A counterweight to the circulars stuffed into Christmas cards telling you all the things you did not want to know.

If I were to send one of those...... a truly honest one....... it might look like this.

Greetings friends.

We hope this letter finds you well (although being too happy is a bit gratuitous and I don't want to know if you are pregnant).

2007 has been a year of joy and crap. Mostly crap but there are a few miracles to celebrate within. Most importantly the fact that I have not descended into madness and that we continue strong as husband and wife despite the pressures of our circumstances on our relationship.

The year started with a new job for me (Barbara) at the same time as undergoing our first ever IVF cycle. Being only 7 months after the death of our daughter Maya it was a very loaded experience and induced trauma. I had frequent flashbacks, intense anxiety, and lost a lot of weight. My new job teaching kids with autism was very intense as I suddenly was landed with the high support class when another teacher quit. Whilst extremely challenging, it was the only experience that was demanding enough to make me stop thinking about myself and focus on something else for a moment. So each day I cried my way to school and then support some extremely distressed children who were regularly self harming or having intense and frequent "melt downs" and then return home and start my own grief and trauma again. I am grateful for a few friends who listened to me during this time and offered sympathetic murmurs.

The IVF cycle had the result of having three healthy embryos. One was transferred and two were frozen. The transfer did not take and I did not fall pregnant. I found out and managed to get a urinary tract infection and nits from the kids at school on the same day. Funny now (well the nits are) but not at the time.

Luckily it was school holidays after that and I spent time with my husband resting and grieving. We found the process of our first IVF cycle quit damaging to our relationship due to the high levels of stress we experienced so we spent the next few months talking and being gentle and trying to understand if there was a way forward - a way to do it again without hurting each other (unintentionally of course).

After a month or so it was the first anniversary of the death of our daughter Maya. We got together with a few friends and had a picnic. Her absence was felt keenly. My two closest friends and sister had had children in the meantime and seeing these three children together while Maya was gone was very difficult. Visiting the grave of your only child hurts.

I also caused a lot of pain to a friend who I had not acted well towards (not intentionally) but due to being so absorbed in my own grief. It was a friend who had been very supportive and also had an intense time (but very different in that she chose it). Still. I overlooked something and it made her angry. We recovered, but it shook me as I wondered how many other people felt this.

June brought on our second IVF attempt with the two frozen embryos. On the day of transplantation I drove to the clinic with my husband only to be called on the way to the clinic to be told that neither of the healthy embryos had survived the thaw. It was extremely uncommon as they have a survival rate of 9/10 at this clinic so to have 2 not survive was very bad luck.

Tell me something new.

We grieved again.

I experienced intense anger a the unfairness of our experience and took it out on life and myself.

My friend told me she was pregnant that week.

The next few months were spent regrouping, and strategising about how we would cope physically and emotionally with the next round of IVF which of course would be a fresh cycle. Which we did well. And found the next cycle to be quite bareable and maintained a strong hope throughout which helped us to be kind to each other as well as manage the stress of work and cycling. Well done us and though none of you saw this or knew it, we were a walking miracle for a while there.

My next door neighbour told me she was pregnant.

Once again on the day of transfer whilst driving to the clinic we got a phone call to say it had been cancelled. This time none of the embryos tested were healthy. They would die if they were transplanted.

This time I tried a few weeks of denial before going into grief and experienced a blessed and delicious numbness.

I spent may hours stressing about seeing my friend who was pregnant. The thought was unbareable and the actual experience not much better although survivable.

I was bridesmaid for a friends wedding. I could see she was really happy on the day which made me happy but I felt very removed from the experience and spent most of the day strategising about how I could get through without a melt down.

More people became pregnant.

I went to a first birthday of the aforementioned babies born after Maya. Bad idea. Did not cope at all and had to leave.

I didn't go to the next first birthday.

Thought for a few exciting days that I was pregnant but i wasn't.

Looked after by friends.

Jake and I are still working hard to find the way forward for us. But we are still doing it together. And that is a big blessing.

I am hoping that 2008 looks very different.

PLease forgive the general lack of me initiating contact over the last few years. I try to do it when I can.
I am sorry that I have totally dropped out of those organisations and commitees I used to participate in and contribute to. I am not up for it at this time. Sorry to my dear friend and sister who are pregnant. I won't be visiting you in hospital. I don't want to hold your beautiful babies cause I might not want to let go. Sorry I can't spend time with you. I still love you and miss you. Sorry to my husband for the many and lengthy times that I am emotionally inaccessable. I will try to be more available this year. Please be gentle and patient with me. Please believe in my love, and my intentions.

Ant to those who sent me a Christmas letter giving me details of your children's progress and favourite toys. I recycled it without reading it. Think of something else to say to me cause I can't make chatter about kids.

And to people who still have the illusion that you are in control of life. You drive me F**Kn crazy.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Yours

And it felt so different.....

2007-12-18T17:12:00.000+11:00

My period was due two weeks ago.

Pre IVF I was more or less a clockwork girl. 28-29 days. I never used to keep track (I'm not the most organised person) so would still manage to get surprised each time they showed and then think "Ohhh so that's why I have been thinking my husband is the worst person in the world.....". But as you would know, when you discover all is not hunky dory you start paying alot of attention to these things.

Just to refresh your memory - I am actively NOT trying to fall pg naturally because of the high risk of having another child that will die. So i do IVF and test the embryos before they go back in.

But when my period was a week late, I started thinking...... well you know what I would have been thinking. It's ridiculous really. We don't have very much sex and we when we do we use condoms, but truley I got thinking. Not just thinking but believing. I looked up early pregnancy symptoms.... yep, I've got LOADS more zits then normal. Yep, my mood is waaay off. I did frequent bathroom runs to check my knickers and it was plain old CM...... I looked up statistics on the net of how often condoms don't work (surprisingly often I'll have you know)...... the evidence was clear. I was pregnant.

IT FELT SO GOOD.

I bought it hook line and sinker. But I didn't want to go and pee on a stick in case I really was pregnant and then I would really have to think about if it was another baby that would die .......

But the thing was, it was my ticket out of hell. I would be OK. I would fall pregnant just like everyone else. It would be different this time. It would be a miracle baby and because of that it would be OK. It wouldn't die like my last baby. It would balance all the wrongs in my life, I could cope with my sisters pregnancy, with anyones. I could enter the New Year with it being truly a New Year and not just another lap of the IVF tread mill. NO MORE IVF. Yippeeee. No more...... and a baby. I would have a baby. I would hold a little bubba that would one day look at me and say the magic word "mum".

So when my period did actually come (10 days late) i was kind of shocked. And devestated. I cried. I cried alot.

And it came on my birthday. And me and my husband fought cause J thought it was unhealthy that I had let myself believe that I was actually pregnant against all reason. He tried to bring up the time when I swore I saw a platypus in this little creek but in the end it was just a stick. It was the movement of the water that made it look like it was moving.

I was really really sad.

But because it was my birthday I had organised lunch at a beautiful pub in the country and hour or so out of Sydney. And my friends came and brought me organic offerings from their gardens, and home made truffles, and hand printed t-shirts, and a cake. They gave me kisses and laughed at my jokes.

I realised that my friends still love me. Despite the serious drops in communication that happen from time to time. They forgive me for that. They know I am still doing it tough.

So somehow I became happy again, even though I was so darn sad.

It's weird isn't it. That despite everything, their is still to much beauty, too much love to let you sink into overwhelming despair. I feel like everything in my life turns to shit, that 2007 has not a redeeming moment in it..... but it isn't the whole truth. I've just had some really tough parts to it.

So that was what my birthday showed me.

That and one more thing. How much hope I have. I knew how much pain I had - it pops it head up often enough to assert it's presence. But I never give myself space to hope (for the reason that I might be let down). So I didn't know how much I carried until I gave it a moment.

Maybe one day my hope will be in something real.

I will see the platypus, and not just the stick.

In full flight?

2007-12-06T19:26:00.000+11:00

I got an email from a friend today...... asking me if my spirits had returned to full flight.

I love this friend. He's really more like an adopted uncle. He's been a bit of a mentor to me as someone that has worked in the community / Not for Profit sector for years. He's insanely idealistic and won't let cynicism and poor government policy or bad practice drag him down. Anyway, he took a holiday earlier this year to Alice Springs which is the town near (well nearest - it's still a couple of hundred kms away) Uluru (Ayers Rock).
Uluru.
The big red heart of this wide land.
When you are there you can understand why land is everything to our Indigenous peoples. It is their history, their law, their "dreaming". It carries their stories. It is their text - their bible.

You've never seen a sky as big as the one in the centre of Australia. If you tipped your head back as far as you could you wouldn't see the end of it. You have to turn in a circle to trace the unbroken horizon all the way round. The earth is red - not a clay red - it is almost like a blush - rust and ochre. It makes an insane contrast to the blue sky.
When you first catch sight of Uluru it almost looks fake. Like someone has stuck a fuzzy felt against the vast blue sky. But as you get closer you get more and more excited. And despite the bus loads of tourists buzzing around, you will still be taken in. In that moment it will own you.

I went to The Centre with my husband after our daughter died. A bunch of people chipped in to buy us a holiday and we flew to Alice. A friend there lent us her 4WD and a swag (it's like a made bed in a canvas casing that you roll out - no tent as it's so dry, so you fall asleep watching the desert sky). Two weeks after a c-section is probably not an ideal time to drive 700km from the nearest hospital on bumpy dirt roads and sleep out bush with not a soul around. But for me, and us, it was the best thing on earth. I could think of no better place to begin a journey of healing then in that heartland. The land was patient with me. I would cry and wail and work myself into knots..... and when I finally looked up, it would be there waiting.... offering it's stark and rather painful beauty as an answer to my many questions.

I've lost my way - I started with a friend who had visited Alice. My beautiful friend - well he got stuck there. He's just left everything ad made it his home. I knew he would. He loves being with Aboriginal people and there is plenty of work to anyone in the community sector. So he wrote me a little email just to let me know he was there and to ask after me. Asking if I had returned to "full flight". I was going to write about how far I was from full flight..... (I'm still free falling...) but my emotions carry no weight now that I have written about Uluru.

I have the feeling you get when you stare a huge starry sky. You feel small and yet not insignificant. Somehow the proportions work out and you see your place in the world.

Instead I'll leave you with some photos from our trip there.

I'll write about me another time.

Enjoy.

Another one

2007-11-27T16:50:00.000+11:00

My sister is pregnant.

She has already had one little one since my girl Maya died. And now she is having another (her third in all).

And I have been doing everything under the sun ever since to try and have a baby.

I have nothing new to say on this...... I've said it all when others got pregnant........ but darn it. It's killing me.

Full and empty

2007-11-17T09:46:00.000+11:00

I haven't blogged in a while.

Sometimes it is too hard. My head is so full but I feel empty.

It's been a hard couple of weeks which I won't go into.... but the long and the short - my Nana died, and in the same week I was a bridesmaid and my best friends kid had his first birthday.

My Nan was cool. She wasn't the type of Nan to bundle you up in her ample body and stuff you with biscuits and cake. She was a skinny Nanna. My husband rekons no one actually told her that the depression had ended, she still cooked, ate and spent money like it was still here. It was a question of virtue for her. So biscuits at Nans place always had a musty flavour - and it wasn't until years later when my uncle explained that she used the leftover lard (from the bottom of the grill) instead of butter, that I realised that the musty flavour did taste a bit like a chop. Which is of course confusing in a biscuit. She grew her own lettuce and it was always leathery and purple and regularly contained a slug or snail. In the recent period of drought she confessed to me in an intimate moment that she only used cold water in the shower (she was 92) and she turned it off when lathering the soap on her body as a way to save water (the cold water was to avoid the temptation of standing under long hot showers)..... she remembers visiting farms in drought and this is what you had to do.

No... she wasn't extravagant, and spoiling kids was not part of her repertoire. Where my Nanna came into her own was in doing things. She lived down at Chinamens beach. There was a little bush track heading down from the bottom of the great sandstone rock the house was built on down to "the green" the hectare or so of grass and trees before you rose over the dune and onto the beach. Nannas beach - as we called it - was a inner harbour beach .... so no crashing surf except in the wildest of weather. It was perfect swimming for us kids and we spent a lot of time there. We walked up and down the beach studying the flotsam and jetsam. Nan would show me what a shark egg looked like. We'd collect witches fingernails - a long thin shell that we held over our own fingernails for as long as we remembered or until they got a bit cumbersome and in the way of our climbing. There was a rocky headland at either end of the beach. The southend is where we hung out. There was a bamboo patch behind the rocks and my cousin showed me how you could lift the bamboo edges and crawl into a big hollowed out section. This was cubbyhouses on a grand scale - 12 ft ceilings and soft leafy carpet. It was a place to conduct important kids business although I believe the passage to and from was the most exciting part of this cubby. Once there.... well we were ready to move on pretty soon.

You could make your way round the rocks at sea level to the next beach - but you had to time it to miss the tide. Going around the rocks was one of my favourite things. I remember the feeling of power in my body and trust in my agility as I ran over the rocks, always sure footed and doing what seemed like flying leaps over gaping chasms in the rock. The barnacles hurt but if you learnt to relax your feet over them rather then tensing up it wasn't so bad. When walking on the green weedy parts you had to grip with your toes in order not to slip. We were forever stopping to wait for the adults to catch up. So we'd holt our nimble progress where the waves were lapping the rocks and tread on the cunjevoies(sp?) to try and squirt water at each other.... or just into the air. A little geyser controlled by yours truly. Next you had to find the best rock pool which meant finding one with something you hadn't seen before, or, finding one with heaps of anenemies. You could stick your finger in the middle and feel the gentle suction of the fronds closing around your finger. It required a small tug to release.

I remember waiting for Nan to catch up one day. The spot I was waiting at required a decision to be made. The tide was coming in and we had three options... 1 to turn around and go home (not really and option) 2. to lift skirts and wade in the water to our waste, 3. to crawl on a rock ledge on our bellies to get to the next platform. My preference of course was to crawl on my tummy. I remember being surprised that Nan agreed to that one. I felt very proud looking behind me to see my (seemingly ancient) Nanna on her scrawny tummy crawling after me. I felt very very proud. This is MY Nanna. The one doing what kids do.

This was the best of Nan. And I believe that she did not need her grand kids to be with her as an excuse for these things. In later years we'd swap travelling stories and where I would be struggling to remember the name of the port in Athens or which state of India Bahratpur was in, she would be able to remember the name of the plaka where she sat to drink coffee. She travelled more or less overland with Pop from Australia to England. Up through Australia, across to singapore, west through asia, the top of india, afghanistan, then i think a flight to turkey and overland from there.... This was well and truly before the invention of the Lonely Planet.

I visited her for 3 hours before she got suddenly sick. I think she knew. She was in a lot of pain and could barely stand up. She wasn't able to walk me to the door when I left, so she stood in the hallway of her home and waved and said "Goodbye" "Goodbye".

Goodbye Nan.

An apology....... of sorts.

2007-10-17T17:01:00.000+10:00

I am feeling kinda sheepish about the melodrama of my last post.

I don't really think I am cursed, or that God hates me. It was obviously a crap week. I would delete the whole thing except that would make something a lie.... this blog I guess.... so for the sake of truth in the personal annals of B I will keep it up there.

I just read a beautiful entry from msfitzia at http://peanutsmom.blogspot.com/ describing her experience on the night of October 15th. A visit, if you will, from her son. A message of love and of peace. A moment of stillness in the darkness and turbulence of greif.

i know those moments. You can't break your way into them. But they are all the more precious for the fact that they cannot be conjured. I know it has made me fall on me knees and weep tears of gratitude.... for the chance to have experienced love. To love the little person that was made in love by me and jake and the grace of God. To know that even in death, there is still love.

I went to church last week which I hardly ever do because sermons really give me the shits. I just can't think of any other time in life where I would subject myself to listening to someone telling me how to live in three alliterating points with a tacky metaphor thrown in for good measure - so why do it at church? But I went last week cause my friend Jo was preaching. As it turned out the passage she was preaching on was from Jeremiah where the Israelites had been taken captive and were living in exile in Babylon. It has the oft quoted passage of "I have plans to make you prosper" but starts with Jeremiah telling the Israelites to make there home in Babylon, to take wives and have children, to plant gardens and eat the crops..... It meant a lot to me that she spoke on this because she too is experiencing infertility (which is a kind of exile) and her husband has been living with depression and had been home from work for a couple of weeks because of this.

The bit about making your home in Babylon..... that is the thing that has been ticking around my head. The Isrealites didn't want to hear this, they wanted to be delivered from their conquerors and returned to Jerusalem. They did not want the permanence of planting crops, building houses, taking wives, having children.... and the command to seek the welfare of Babylon. I have been thinking about the wisdom of making this, where-we-are-now, our home. Of building a home in exile, rather then waiting for deliverance.

I have been reluctant to accept this. For one it is just too sad. To accept my present life. And there also seems a kind of resignation to "building homes" and "planting crops". It is what I think other people mean when they say things like "getting on with life". There seems a lack of hope. Or a feebleness, a refusal to fight for what is right.

And yet, this week I have been reviewing this. I don't know how long our "exile" will be. If I will ever be able to have living children. Maybe it is time to begin to look at this as my new life, rather than a lapse or a pause from the real business. Looking at this passage also made me realise that embracing the present and finding a way to plant and build and harvest in this painful, confusing time is not giving up on hope. Rather, there is a deep level of trust.... of trusting the future to itself, or to God (if you are so inclined), which lends true freedom to the present. I cannot be held ransom by my imagined future...... I must plan to live wholly, fully, now.

****

Am back teaching at school. That is a good thing. I held a little kid tight today as he was loosing it. The body wracking sobs and self harming gradually subsided to indignant outbursts (in Shem-speak) and then sorrowful mumurs. He looked me in the eyes and touched the tip of my nose with his pointing finger. He took a shuddering in-breath and crawled out of my lap and onto a bike.

tis the season to be knocked up

2007-10-11T13:38:00.000+10:00

I lied. God doesn't love me at all. He may even hate me, or curse me.

I am being a bridesmaid in three weeks. The bride just told me that my fellow bridesmaid is officially announcing her pregnancy..... and my response "wow. That's really great." and then get off the phone and bawl. I was already afraid because I know that my other pregnant friend will be there (you know... the one who ended up staying over at our house....) and I know that the day after the wedding I am going to a one year birthday/thanksgiving for my friends little bubba and there are going to be all these babies there born after my little girl. So its already an emotionally loaded weekend.....

No-ones knows how much it costs me to participate in their lives. I wouldn't make any other choice.... I just need a witness to my courage in continuing to participate. I need someone to see how hard it is, and how much courage it takes to be involved. Call me dependent. But I need a big fuckin "congratulations - on being a friend to your friends when the price is so high. you deserve an honorary degree in something"

Did I mention my next door neighbour who is pregnant? I stupidly spilled the beans about our last failed IVF cycle (the one before this) only to find out a month later that she was pregnant. We have been studiously avoiding each other which is hard given that there is only a few metres between her front door and mine. And it's (almost)summer so we all spend our time outside anyway. It's like when Maya died - 5 other cousins were pg, 2 workmates, 2 bestfriends and my sister.

Man it hurts. And i hate to say it but it is getting worse. I have been desperate to have a child since Maya died. Each new pregnancy feels like a nose rub in the shit.

And I voice my protest to whoever cares to listen.... actually... just to God and you and my husband.

But God doesn't hear and you guys and husband can't change it (I know you would).

Excuse the lack of imagination in this post..... somedays there is just no love.

Confused

2007-10-08T08:25:00.000+10:00

I never did get my vision.... my midnight encounter with God.

But the week went on moving and once again I am caught in it's flow. And I persist in believing that LOVE is the force that creates and sustains each molecule and moment of this crazy world. And I believe that God and LOVE are one and the same. And therfore I persist in believing that God loves me.

Here's this weeks proof.

My friend Ruby dancing.

Love in beauty.

Fellowship.

And I love my husband and he loves me. Which means...... everything.

I spent the week wondering why I did not feel worse, thinking that maybe all the greif and anger would hit me when I got my period. But the anger never came, or is still yet to come. I don't get it. I think I'll give up trying to get it. Maybe understanding yourself is not as important as I think it is.

What is this thing?

2007-10-01T03:57:00.000+10:00

I don't normally go in for denial. It's a stage of grief I've never really bothered with. Let me tell you, I know grief..... I know how I grieve... well I think I do.

I'm having this new things happen. And it's scaring me shitless.

I found out on Saturday that there were no helathy little embryos to transfer. The fact that I had remained so positive through the cycle (except for the tiny wee hour on Friday which is when you happened to catch me last), the fact that the daisy whose petals I pulled told me I would have a healthy one, the fact that I was on my knees before God asking Him to see me, just see me this once....... these things didn't count for anything. As if i needed my lack of control reinforced.

I didn't even make it to transfer this time. Shit.

But this new thing.... I seem to have shut down completely emotionally. Yesterday I had a tiny cry, went to the pub for a beer and yes a cigarette, and came home and played jenga (can you pick a more nerve wracking game than waiting for a tower of blocks to fall?) then went to bed and more or less slept. Did I mention that we made love? for the first in unaccountable days/months. Who knows? It's hard to reenter your body when you have spent the last month and a half trying to remove yourself from it while needles, ultrasounds, hormones, pessaries, tablets get put in you. It was hard. It was clumsy. I didn't know what to do. The thing is.... we didn't use contraception (which we never do- it is playing with death). I woke up this morning with this strong feeling that I would become pregnant and it would be a miracle baby (you can't get pregnant 6 days after an egg retreival can you? you know.... if they missed and egg) and because it would be a miracle baby it would be healthy and I would have a child in my arms at last and we could be parents at last. And then I thought about donor embryos and maybe someone would want to donate their embryos to ME. You can't use money in that kind of exchange in OZ (I guess its not an exchange, that is why they call it a donation) so I don't know how you go about finding a donor. But I felt sure that anyone who met us would realise exactly how much love we were able to give and would be happy for their little embies to go to sorrowing couple. We would send them photos and updates. School reports and paintings. They could have as much or little contact as worked. I thought it all through...... "Yes" I thought "we will have kids". So simple.

I went for a two hour walk. We went to Oktoberfest at the daggy German club across the park. I laughed, danced and ate strudel and drank too much beer (obviously didn't have that much faith in being pregnant..... but it is a miracle baby, it can survive anything). I came home and read. The only thing to tell me I am actually "grieving" right now is this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and the clenching of my jaws.

So can your body take over your mind? Can it make the decision that enough pain is enough and just take over and let you not feel things anymore? That is what makes me scared.... It's never happened before and so I am worried that when it comes it will be unbearable. I am more worried about my anger.... I swear I find that more unbearable than sorrow and pain. I am scared I will be unsafe. The thoughts I have terrify me so much I wil not even tell you. I mentionted them to Jake and he said "That is not OK".

I lay in bed and prayed and prayed for a sign that God loves me (I'm not normally into "signs and wonders"). I asked him to give me a vision. To come to me. To let me know that he can see this terrifying mess that I am in.

And it is four in the morning and I am not even asleep. Can God come to you when you are awake?

Will I (and we) withstand the storm when it comes?

How can I shelter myself?

The love affair

2007-09-28T18:30:00.000+10:00

......... and while I am flipping the bird to The Universe.......... there is a famous love affair between it and my garden.

Spring will have its way.

(actually this one was taken when we planted the garden in winter but it has my doggilypog)

Merciless tease

2007-09-28T17:25:00.000+10:00

Have you ever seen a bully hold a thing of value above a small kids head. You know, just wave it there, lift it a little higher as the kid tries to jump for it, watch the kid go red, scream, swear, beg, plead, cry ........ and maybe, eventually, loose hope. At which point the bully walks away and either tosses the kid the thing they want or throws it away.

I feel like that kid.

Today is day five post transfer....... and non of my embies have turned into blasts. That means no pgd testing today. Those sweet little things seem to be dying by the hour.....

I wonder if any will make it through the testing tomorrow.

I am in the rage part of being a victim of universal bullying. Of having the universe tease me.

It is hard to be angry at the universe, its too sloppy a thing to punch. So I am angry at my ovaries. I am angry at my friends who have kids. I am kinda angry at my husband although my heart is not really in that one. And I assure you if you were brave enough to stand in front of me..... I would probably want to blast you too.

I could reduce a happy family to a pile of cinders with the force of my gaze.

That kind of anger scares me. It still feels new. And boundless. I am scared because I don't know where it will end.

More waiting.

2007-09-24T10:40:00.000+10:00

Do you think it could work?

Today I think... well.... maybe it might just.

I'm waiting. Again. Different kind of waiting today. A waiting that will make any PGD (preimplantaion genetic diagnosis) veteran tremble in their boots and feel sick to the stomach. I'm in the 5 day wait. Which is even worse then the famous two week wait. The five day wait is the time between egg retrieval and fertilisation, and the testing of 5 day old embies to see if they carry the inherited genetic disorder that my stupid chromosomes carry. Literally, we are waiting to see if there are any good eggs.

Can't write anymore now. It makes me feel sick.

The chicken

2007-09-09T11:39:00.000+10:00

Well I did it as I promised myself.

I cooked. I woke up the other thursday (day off for me) and thought.... well..... I can cook or I can mope.

So i cooked. And it was jerk chicken. Couldn't find scotch bonnet peppers in sydney so I had to go with regular chillies. It still tasted darn good to me.

The bbq

The diners

The remains.

And this week I made a strawberry tart (although no photos of these sweet things).

Which might lead you to believe that I am OK. But actually, today, I feel like (to borrow a hyperbole from my friend Vic) "pooh-on-wheels". It must be the hormones. They make me cry - the only benefit of that is that I have a sinus infection and it helps move the goop out.

I think I will go back to bed now. It's midday.

A little ironic

2007-08-23T11:47:00.000+10:00

I guess this post is really a post-script to the earlier post about fertile friends.

There has been one friend in particular that I have been dreading interacting with. She is a beautiful and supportive friend and has been a fallback "safe place" for me while other close friends have been pregnant and then mothers. Which was partly why it tipped me so much when she told me she was pg. My safe place wasn't safe anymore.

She told me she was pg a few days before I was due for a frozen embryo transfer. As it happened, I had the "tottaly unexpected" horror of having neither of my two embryos survive the thaw and thus the transfer never went ahead and I was back at square one and further away then ever from having a living child. So, I guess the timing wasn't that great either. Along with her "it's only a matter of time" comment. Which we all know is a lie. But it was very uncharacteristic of her to say something to make the situation emotionally comfortable for herself.

Well I was getting more and more worked up about having to see her. I was trying to think of the things I can do (as per suggestioni from my counselor) and I had sent her a card to say I was thinking of her. In particularly, I was dreading the engagement party of a mutual good friend. A "happy" occasion. And one that is definately not about me. But an occasion when I knew I would see my pg friend.

Tuesday night my husband and I were driving to a friends place for dinner and I was discussing/ crying/ wondering how to cope. Should I call her and arrange to hang out before hand? Should I tell her how hard it is for me to be around her? But it's not really anything to do with her, the problem is pretty much on my side etc etc blah blah blah ( I am sure you all know the drill). In the middle of dinner that evening I got a message from her hubbie asking if they could come and stay the night as they had had builders in and the long and short of the story was that they were unexpectedly unable to sleep at home.

So they came over. And funnily enough my friend hadn't turned into a scary monster - she was still the same person. And I avoided all conversation about pregnancy until late in the evening when I asked a very general question about how it was going then retired to bed about a minute later.

I still had bad sleep and wierd dreams after this interaction (why is it so God damn hard?) and I don't know how I'll be in future interactions. But I feel kinda glad my hand was forced in this situation.

It's official

2007-08-14T16:26:00.000+10:00

Starting IVF on Aug 29th.

Which calls for a plan of attack. I am not known for being a strategic person. I rely on my intuitive reactions which can serve me well in an event where everyone else is unravelling (eg. lose someone on an excursion) but is not great when you know there is something momentous ahead.

So - against the grain, I am trying to PLAN for my and my husbands emotional stability over coming weeks and months.

Strategy 1. To remember "this is a new event. I have not done IVF in Aug 07 before. I do not know the outcome. I do not even know how good/bad I will find it. I will take each day as it comes". Gotta get a good start with that self talk huh.

Strategy 2. And here I am drawing a short straw. I can't think of a strategy number 2. How the hell do we do it?

Well...... that post was short lived.

Mmmmmm maybe I could at least think of a few "thou shalt nots". 10 commandment style.

Thou shalt not try and predict outcome but will take each day as it comes (yeah right).

Thou shalt not fight with husband (yeah right)

Thou shalt not withdraw and isolate self

Thou shalt not go loopy

Thou shalt not stay in bed every thursday - but every second thursday is oK

Thou shalt do reading on anxiety and panic disorders and how to manage it

Thou shalt buy series 6 of Northern Exposure and hang out with thine Alaskan friends.

Thou shalt cook something excellent at least once a week. (starting with jerk chicken)

Thou shalt sit in the garden with the dog.

Thou shalt have a wee sip of wine from time to time

Thou shalt tell thine husband when thouest is blue or down

IS that 12 yet? Or is it only meant to be 10? And I call myself a preacher's kid.

Anyone want to add something to my list of commandments?

What a little sweetheart.

2007-08-07T20:01:00.000+10:00

Cute moment alert.

At school today a little autie kid was getting excited and flapping and buzzing in front of me. He's a good looking kid with these beautiful big floppy curls that looked so darned sweet when backlit by the sun. This kid has a big vocabularly but almost never uses words functionally - just to provide momentum to his incredibly complex inner world. I did the super-nanny thing and got down to his level and said "hey sweetheart. What do you want? What do you want?" and he goes "love" and offers me his head to hug.

Ohh bless

Infertility and fertile friends

2007-08-05T17:09:00.000+10:00

I guess you could say any friendship is fertile - if it's a good one - but I'm not really using the word in that way. I'm using it in the baby making way. I hate that my beautiful daughter Maya died. I hate that she is not here with our family like she should be. I hate the fact that I have balanced translocation. I hate IVF. I hate failed IVF cycles. And I hate the effect that all that has on my relationship with fertile friends.

The fact is - I feel alone.

I know eveyone is alone when it comes down to it.... that is what my friend K was trying to tell me..... "you're not alone in that". But it is different. She told me that becoming a mother did not change her friendships with other women who are mothers. If that is so, why does becoming a mother of a child that has died, and not being able to conceive again, change all my friendships with other mothers? K admitted it. There is a big gaping hole between us. Not because either of us put it there or want it.... it's just there because of circumstances. But the thing is, while she is angry about the effect it has on our relationship (me too - we are good friends) I am angry because I now have that gaping hole in all my friendships. My sister who has recently had a child, my close friends have both had babies, and now another close friend is pregnant.

What is that hole? What is that seemingly unbridgeable distance that has appeared now?

It is many things. From the side of my friends (I speak only from what people have said to me) they have to overcome their own feelings of non-worthiness ("I don't deserve to be pregnant/have a child"), of clumsiness ("I don't know what to say/how to be around you"), of questioning how to make a space for their celebration or day to day life with baby ('how much should I say about my pregnancy/child?") and though no-one says it this bluntly, their's the good old guilt. ("Being around you makes me feel guilty for being pregnant")

From my side, I have to overcome the deep pain at being around someone who is pregnant or with a child. Let's call a spade a spade - it fuckin hurts and I have to pretend in front of you that I am OK when I am so not OK, you don't see it but I always go home and cry on my own after seeing you. I have to deal with your clumsiness which never used to be there... that hurts too. I have to find a way to handle all the comparisons that continually rear their ugly head. When I see your child, I only think how big my daughter would have been. When I see your belly I think how far pregnant I should be if my last IVF attempt had worked.... I am sorry my friends.... but I struggle to see you on your own terms. I see, or more accurately, I feel your life as the photo of my negative...... What is a baby in your arms is a dark hole in the negative. What is a pregnant belly in your photo is deep blackness in my image.

And what of being a mother? To you breast feeding is OK/a pain/ have I drunk enough water?/ my nipples hurt. To me - who has had milk stream from my breasts but never had the experience of holding a child to it, breastfeeding is pretty amazing. I long to be able to give to a baby in that way. It seems mystical and profound. I could go on in the difference of my perception of being a mother and your experience. And you can't tell me my perception is not true -even though it may not be your day to day experience. Some truths you only know in absence rather than presence. But it is another part of the gap that now exists between us.

So my question is this? How do we be friends? How do we find a way to continue to participate in each others lives? I find it so hard. It hurts me to the core seeing the difference between your life and mine. Seeing things move forward in your life where I have stalled. Seeing your child grow while my experience of being a mother is visiting the grave of my daughter and looking at photos that are now a year old. Watching your family get bigger (and with such ease!) while we struggle to have one living child. Trying to be genuine in my sympathy for your day to day drama's, while in my head i think "well it's not that bad" and "I would give anything for that to be my problem"..

I do not know the answers to these things.

I do know that I do love you and do not want to loose your friendship. I just don't know how to keep it.

It's 12 o'clock in the midnight

2007-07-29T00:37:00.000+10:00

to borrow a phrase from my sweet mother in law. Her first language is Malayalam.

I'm up not because I am having "infertile thoughts" or greif thoughts, which is the usual cause of late night cyber-gazing, but because I have a shitty cough that won't leave me alone and it seems to be worse when I lie down. So I need to sit up.

I just watched some films on the International Infertility Film Festival with some beautiul little numbers by Mel who writes sweet sweet songs - a little bit sad too. It is good to see the energy of this journey being put into something beautiful. I made a "film" - I guess you would call it taht. I will try and put it up here one day. I made it around the one year anniversary of Maya's death. It was a film that tried to hold the tension of faith in the face of imense greif. Doubting God's love because of pain while being renewed by God-given beauty. It was a series of photos and images that I both taken and downloaded, set to a piece by Gavin Bryar called "Jesus' blood never fails me yet". The music is a voice of a tramp singing a line from a hymn "Jesus' blood never failed me yet, never failed me yet, never failed me yet. For one thing I know, that he loves me so." The sample is looped and an ochestral piece is built behind this loop into a very powerful piece that holds faith and pain and beauty.

I'll put it up sometime.

The closure of Spuds Bistro

2007-07-26T10:22:00.000+10:00

Do you know how hard it is to find a good local in Sydney?

Well. We had the perfect one. The Harp at Tempe. Walking distance (extremely important for a watering hole), live music, nice range of beers on tap, and the all important quality-yet-not-pretentious-food at Spud's bistro, served by the affable but slightly distant Pete. It was what I look for in an evening at the pub and it came up trumps every time.

When traveling along the very bumpy and unpredictable road - life post the death of your child and inability to conceive again - one looks for landmarks to assure oneself that you really and truly are on earth and although it is much darker and harder than you remember, it is the real deal. In short, predictability. Like the kids with autism at school. Life is coming at a pace that I am not sure I can cope with, so I'm going to hold on to all things comforting and well..... predictable. Which is why it is soo confronting when the Bistro at your local changes hands. I AM SORRY BUT I DID NOT GIVE PERMISSION FOR THIS! And (because it always is about me) I take great offence at a lack of community consultation about this.

So now I feel that another one of my little props that supports me through my life has melted, dissappeared, been knocked from under me. Spud's was a garuntee man. It was perfect - the emotional comfort of an Irish stew and mashed potatoes cannot be underestimated. And the fact that it was always going to be there when I needed it was an anchor in turbulent seas.

I just can't believe that Pete would pack up and leave me like this!

Coming 'round the mountain

2007-07-23T18:50:00.000+10:00

If the mountain is that unbearable depressions I've been in. Today i think I came round it. Scusi for citing a ridiculous song but I have just spent my afternoon creating some visual representations of songs for the kids with autism that I work with. Including that song. I carefully cut around the legs of 6 white horses (what would we do without google images?) and you should see the princess with the pink pajamas!

THe point being..... I actually felt GOOD today. Not just OK, but good. It was very strange. So strange that i actually felt elated by the experience. Maybe that is what one of the other teachers was trying to say to me. What she actually said was "you look inflated" and I wasn't quite sure how to receive that one. She did clarify by saying "well last week you looked deflated". Ahhhhh, my life as a balloon. I don't know why today was good. I mean, I have a cold coming on and got a nasty headache half way through the day. But it was just good. I felt like i knew how to do life. Not just survive it, but enjoy it the way you're meant to.

Some sweet moments from school today..... the little lovelies really got into the music I did with them. Singing "I'm being eaten by a boa constrictor" whilst pulling a collapsable tunnel up over their little skinny bodies was quite fun. There favourite was when i jumped in the tunnel with at least a couple of kids (squishy) and we all did it together. They thought it was hilarious - which was a bit of a win seeing as kids with autism aren't meant to be that social.

ONly had a tiny wee cry while walking the dog. But it didn't stick. The good mood came back.

Must be God or something.

Hope for Restoration

2007-07-19T23:56:00.000+10:00

"In that day" says the Lord, "I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they will be my people. I will care for the survivors as they travel through the wilderness. I will again come to give rest to the people of Israel."
Long ago the Lord said to Israel: "I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself. I will rebuild you, my virgin Israel. You will again be happy and dance"

Jeremiah 31