It's in the Eyes

It has been quite hard lately, trying to be a "happy" person. My eyes tell the truth that my face won't though. I have sad eyes. Eyes of someone who feels incomplete and lost. Eyes of an old soul. Sad eyes. 

Someone had mentioned it to me before, but I didn't really think too much of it until I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. My god.. who is this person? What have I become? I see it in my husband. The other day I was thinking about how cute he was when he would rub my belly and look so proud, and now he doesn't look at me like that. I miss those rubs so much. I miss seeing the pride in his eyes when he looked at me and thought of our little family.

Now he looks at me with deep love, but the happiness is hidden down deep. He shares the pain and it shows in his eyes. To those who don't know, I don't think it would be noticable, but to those that do....what a difference... just how one day changes everything. 

But, we are making it. We are trying to live in a way that could make us happy and does in brief moments. We are mad about each other. Head over heels even and that is nice. It will be 15 years of being together next month, and for right now, that is enough for me.

6 months ago, and it still feels like it all happened yesterday

Today marks 6 months. 6 months of being a different person. 6 months of being held up by family and friends. 6 months of feeling empty.

As soon as I delivered Sophia, I felt empty. It was a huge shock to my body realizing how much she had filled me, both my belly and my soul. When she left me, I was left with a huge hole to fill. For 6 months, I have tried to fill the hole and it isn't happening. Some days, I feel more full than others. Every day is hard, just some are harder than others. Yesterday was a very hard one. 

I have been thinking about this so much lately. I think about my loss, our loss, every day, at least dozen or more times and the emptiness is almost too much to bare. And then I think, a man who loses his wife is a widower. A woman who loses her husband is a widow. A child who loses their parents is an orphan. I am a mother who lost her daughter, but what am I? There is so much shame behind losing a child. No one wants to speak of it and rarely acknowledges the shear loss of it all. 

This past week, I submitted my story to a site dedicated to Mothers and Fathers of babies taken away all too soon. The site is Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope. Put together by a group of women, they focus on making sure no one feels alone after going through such a tragedy. I felt is was important to share my story and show that I am not ashamed of what happened to me. If my story can help someone else who is in my shoes, then I am glad to have shared it. 

Here is my story: I am the face of Stillbirth

Seriously, just put me down now. NOW

I will admit it, I am at a low. Never an all-time low, we all know what that was, but a soggy low that is harder than hard to crawl out of. I am angry, bitter, and so incredibly heart-broken. We are coming up on 6 months and I don't even know how to even begin handling that. The Nursery is still in tact. I still go in there when I am upset and sob into the never-used carpet. I am a fucking mess. 

Please don't tell me that I need to go talk to someone. Unless that person has lost a baby that they tried for 2.5 years through IVF, only to lose at 29 weeks.... that person can't truly help me. Sure they can make me talk, or encourage me to get it out, but I still go back to square 1 when the session is over. I know it helps some people, but it just isn't for me. I need time. Yes, I am STILL devastated. I will be for most of my life... that I am almost sure of. 

No, I am not wanting to harm myself. No, you do not have to worry about that. I wouldn't want to put that on you. I just don't know how to get through this in one piece. I used to think that I wanted a baby, but really, I just want Sophia.

I think since starting a new school year, the stress is eating me alive. I miss my kids from last year, because they know what I have gone through and were complete angels when I came back last Spring. I miss them being there for me, like I was for them. Lord knows that is a new one. 

I miss being "normal". Today someone commented on me looking good since losing weight and asked how I had lost so much. I just kind of looked at them. I am sure it didn't look like a nice look. Another co-worker said because I wasn't eating. I said, "you are right, I haven't been eating as much".  Then the first someone asked why? and I just froze. I said I had had a shitty year and she kept going with the whys, and I said that my weight was a result of what happened in the Spring and she then asked, oh that still? I was pretty abrupt, just wanting it to be done. 

I don't like talking about my weight loss unless I am ready to do so. I have tried to be happy about it, but it still is a direct result of death. The person then emailed me later and even though I think she was trying to apologize, she remarked that I had been snippy and went on a bit. 

I don't need that. I am sorry if I came out abrupt, but you hit a very weak spot with me, and I told you as much. I even apologized if I was abrupt and wanted to leave it at that. Please just let it die. *sigh*

I guess I just need some emotional protection. Some interference. I need a filter that does the hard work for me and lets in the safe. I need to be whole again :/

Plan of Action

Seeing Dr. J is always interesting. He is so laid back and good to us. He started off by wanting to throw my whole record out the window and start over. He is so disappointed things haven't worked for us. He is such a good man. The whole appointment was us going back and forth with ideas, and he truly listened to what we had to say. We have decided to look into a few things before moving forward. 

1. Endometrial Biopsy the month before a Transfer. Studies have shown that by disrupting the lining, it may help with implantation. At this point, we are up for anything.

2. DH going to a Urologist to see if we can get numbers up. Even though we went straight to IVF, we want to see if there could ever be a possibility for IUI because that is covered completely. 

3. Using GSN on all embryos at 8 cell. It is a new technology somewhat like PGD and will cost an extra $5,000. RE would stim me very hard to make as many embryos as possible. He already apologized for what it would be like. Yikes. 

4. Gestational Carrier. Each time I do a transfer now, I am putting my life at risk because of how I developed Pre-eclampsia. I am the one that brought this up to the RE and he agreed that if we had a carrier in mind, he wanted to talk to her. I was ok with this, until I put it on the table, and now I am freaking out about never being pregnant again, even though I know it would be best. 

5. Transferring to both the GC and me at the same time in hopes that something would work. He seemed intrigued by my idea and said he would think about it. I honestly think he would go with it if he could.

So there you have it. We will be working on some of these as the year goes on, but won't do another IVF until next summer. Many, many things to work out in the mean time. Not sure what to think or how to even go about it, but it's a plan.

A Blog with Substance

Apparently I have struck a cord with some readers and tricked them into thinking I write about subjects with substance. Said reader then granted me a "Blog with Substance" award. To her, Rachael, I say thank you. There are some conditions that come along with the award. 

1. Thank you to my Nominator: Rachael, There's No Crying in Baseball,  thank you for the lovely award. I am glad I have touched you in a way that has brought this on :) You are such a sweet Gal, and I enjoy having you around :) Thank you, Sweetie!

2. Sum up your blogging philosophy, motivation & experience using 5 words:
Infertility, Comraderie, Friendship, Support and Loss

I am supposed to nominate other blogs, but I just don't have it in me today to pick out the top 10. I have a great list of lovely ladies in my blog roll that I enjoy reading about. Please visit them and join in the support.

Godmother

A few weeks ago I was asked to be my niece's godmothers. I accepted with honor, but in the same breathe missed everything I had lost. This little girl is such a light in my life, but such a reminder of my little girl. Today was the Baptism. It was beautiful and the proud parents and grandparents were beaming. As happy as I was for all of them, my heart ached so incredibly. Tyler was definitely a pillar today as we watched my family beam. He is absolutely amazing to me. I am so so terribly lucky to have him as my husband. 

This week we finally go back to the Doctor for our WTF appointment. Instead of talking about what went wrong, we are going to look into what we can do alternatively in the future. I am so not ready for our last IVF to be upon us, so we are looking at what else we can possibly do. Hopefully it goes well and we get some ideas. 

Have a good week everyone. ((hugs))

Lately

Lately I have been taking a long hard look at myself. I have come to the conclusion on many things. 

1. I have put everything I have had into getting or being pregnant for 3 and a half years now. 

2. I have an extremely strong marriage and an angel to show for it. Very bittersweet. 

3. My body has changed due to being so pregnant, but I can't talk about it without people being uncomfortable as they look at their child and then look at me with sad eyes, knowing they have something to show for the changes and I don't.

4. I have given up so much for this dream and I feel like I might have lost quite a bit of myself in the travels.

5. I need to stop trying for a good chunk of time and give myself a life for awhile. 

6. I hate having to be so god damn strong, but I know that if I weren't, I would be a puddle on the ground of some psych ward. 

So yah.....I am looking into a Master's Program. I want to get my Educational Technology degree... Tyler thinks I should get my MBA after seeing me deal with 50 fifty-yr old Frat guys at the game yesterday trying to bully our seats away from us. We have thought about moving. We have thought about so many things. Now it is time to start doing. I have one more IVF left and then I am done. Whether this is done with a surrogate or not, who knows. I don't trust myself enough to get pregnant, and if by some miracle I do, I don't trust myself to keep it through 9 months. Life is like a bingo wheel right now, and I never know what will be called out next. 

I am doing ok. I am just fed up. Fed up with being thrown under the bus left and right. Needing good things to come my way and for things to stop being taken away. Thanks for listening.