This week has been one of the better ones that I've had in a month. Some of the weight I've been carrying around has felt like its been lifted or at least lightened a little. Until today. Today, I have felt irritated and angry. The slightest things set me off. I recognize that these emotions are irrational but I cannot seem to control them. I began to wonder, "why today?" And then I remembered that tomorrow I have my post-op follow up appointment. Tomorrow, I have to relive one of the worst days of my life. Tomorrow, I have to look at pictures from my surgery and ask questions that I need answers to because I was too groggy from anesthesia when the doctor came in and talked to me after surgery. Tomorrow, I have to discuss further testing and my body's ability to carry future children. I'm angry today because I wonder if my world will come crashing down again tomorrow.
Technically, it's already tomorrow. I have a lot to do before my appointment. First of which is sleep! I'm going to keep my mind occupied until then and no matter the outcome, I'm going to spend tomorrow evening with my family and friends, being thankful for the life I have even if it's not the life I imagined a month ago.
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Friday, June 13, 2014
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Words on a Screen
Every night I go to bed with a pit in my stomach, a deep, dark abyss of anxiety mixed with grief and depression and every morning I wake up to the same thing. During the day, when my mind and attention is focused on something else I don't notice it as much but it's still there. It's a physical ache constantly reminding me of all that I've lost, all that I've been through. I feel at war with my emotions. I wish the pit would go away but I don't want to forget.
I wonder. I wonder what gender my baby would have been. I wonder if this might have been the baby that looked a little more like me and a little less like Ryan. I wonder what we would have named him or her. I wonder what Christmas would have been like with me being only a couple of days away from a c-section. I wonder what the new year would have looked like being a family of five. I wonder who this child would have grown up to be. I wonder.
I had a bad day today. I had a bad day yesterday. Neither incident had anything to do with my ectopic pregnancy or surgery. It's just that once something really awful happens to you, even minor inconveniences seem like major problems. I don't want to keep score but I find myself counting the crappy things that have happened to me since my surgery. I could list five right now. I know what your thinking. Jessica, count your blessings. Don't focus on the negative, focus on the positive. You have so much to be thankful for. You want the truth? All I hear is blah, blah, blah. Literally, right now, the thought of someone saying that to me is making my heart race and I want to hit something. It's not that you're wrong. I do have so much to be thankful for and I probably should be counting my blessings. I just can't. Not right now, not in this moment, anyway.
What kid on the planet isn't obsessed with Frozen right now? I know that my Abigail is. I hear a rendition of "Let it Go" several times a day. She sings it with such conviction. I want to be Elsa. I want to freaking let it go but I can't. Maybe it's because it's too soon or maybe it's because I'm stubborn. I don't know. There isn't really a step by step guide on how to go about this. I just know that I want to shake the oppression but I'm not really ready to let go of it, just yet. I don't want to feel bad anymore but I don't know how to feel anything else right now.
Writing/blogging let's me breathe. It helps me to deal with and better understand what I'm feeling. I'm usually unaware of what I'm going to say. It's when I feel "heavy" emotionally that I turn to the computer and my fingers fly across the keyboard. When I'm finished, I feel a little lighter and I sleep a little better. Maybe one day, you'll come to my blog and find a recipe or a more uplifting post but for the time being, I can't promise anything more than what I've been giving you. This is real. This is me. This is who I am at this moment in time. I'm surviving only by the grace of God and my words on a screen.
I wonder. I wonder what gender my baby would have been. I wonder if this might have been the baby that looked a little more like me and a little less like Ryan. I wonder what we would have named him or her. I wonder what Christmas would have been like with me being only a couple of days away from a c-section. I wonder what the new year would have looked like being a family of five. I wonder who this child would have grown up to be. I wonder.
I had a bad day today. I had a bad day yesterday. Neither incident had anything to do with my ectopic pregnancy or surgery. It's just that once something really awful happens to you, even minor inconveniences seem like major problems. I don't want to keep score but I find myself counting the crappy things that have happened to me since my surgery. I could list five right now. I know what your thinking. Jessica, count your blessings. Don't focus on the negative, focus on the positive. You have so much to be thankful for. You want the truth? All I hear is blah, blah, blah. Literally, right now, the thought of someone saying that to me is making my heart race and I want to hit something. It's not that you're wrong. I do have so much to be thankful for and I probably should be counting my blessings. I just can't. Not right now, not in this moment, anyway.
What kid on the planet isn't obsessed with Frozen right now? I know that my Abigail is. I hear a rendition of "Let it Go" several times a day. She sings it with such conviction. I want to be Elsa. I want to freaking let it go but I can't. Maybe it's because it's too soon or maybe it's because I'm stubborn. I don't know. There isn't really a step by step guide on how to go about this. I just know that I want to shake the oppression but I'm not really ready to let go of it, just yet. I don't want to feel bad anymore but I don't know how to feel anything else right now.
Writing/blogging let's me breathe. It helps me to deal with and better understand what I'm feeling. I'm usually unaware of what I'm going to say. It's when I feel "heavy" emotionally that I turn to the computer and my fingers fly across the keyboard. When I'm finished, I feel a little lighter and I sleep a little better. Maybe one day, you'll come to my blog and find a recipe or a more uplifting post but for the time being, I can't promise anything more than what I've been giving you. This is real. This is me. This is who I am at this moment in time. I'm surviving only by the grace of God and my words on a screen.
Sunday, June 1, 2014
People Are Important
I've never been what you would call a people person. Even in high school I preferred to stay at home, put on my pj's, and watch TV rather than going to the movies or dinner with friends. I'm not saying that I didn't do those things but there were just as many times as I turned down offers as times that I accepted them. I thought of myself as an extrovert but the older I get the more introverted I realize that I am.
Being a stay at home mom has only made it worse. My oldest is going to be 7 later this year. Once I had her, I stayed home and pretty much had no social life. My husband worked weird hours so it was mostly me and Abba all the time. When the opportunity to be in a social situation arose, I found it hard to communicate with others. My brain felt mushy and I realized that I didn't have a lot in common with most of the people I found myself around. These awkward situations, pushed me further into my shell, so to speak, and it truly became difficult to make friends. The amount of effort it required to make a friend and be a friend just wasn't worth it in my opinion and I wasn't a people person.
As a teenager and young adult, I was self-confident. I felt like I knew who I was and I was OK with that person. I honestly didn't care about what people thought of me. Now, at 31, I feel more insecure than ever. I still feel awkward in most social situations, I still find it difficult to make and maintain friendships, and I have to fight hard against the urge to stay cooped up at home and never go anywhere other than the grocery store. I find myself wondering what people think of me and actually caring. I'm no longer sure if I like me.
I constantly feel like a failure as a mother. That feeling is exacerbated by my ectopic pregnancy. I struggle with feeling like I failed the child that was taken from me. Rationally, I realize that I can't control everything that happens in my body but a lot of our feelings are irrational, right? People keep telling me to grieve. But how can I? I have two other children who depend on me and are always around. My husband works a job where I may only see him a couple hours total during the day. I'm responsible for everything and everyone in my house. If I cry, my oldest constantly asks if I'm crying and why I'm crying. It's just a rough situation all around. These last two weeks have felt like hell and it doesn't seem like that feeling is going to let up anytime soon.
Before my husband returned from deployment and I moved back to Fort Polk he suggested that I send a Facebook friend request to the wife of another soldier in his unit that lived on our street. I had only met her once before and while she seemed nice, I didn't really know her. Being the introverted, non-people person that I am, I cringed at the thought. It would be so weird, right? To receive a friend request from someone you met once and probably don't even remember. He had to convince me to do it but I did. I typed a short message to go along with it, trying to be as un-weird (is that a word?) as possible. I felt sick. Why are things like that so hard for me? Anyway, being the nice person that she was, she accepted my request and sent a nice message back. Whew! Maybe she didn't think I was as creepery as I felt.
What I didn't know or even expect was that friend request would change my life. We hit it off after a few awkward moments when we first met in person. Our husbands came back from deployment and I figured that it would kind of be the end of things. Maybe we'd get together once in a while on our own but I doubted that the husbands would be involved. Truth is, it's very rare for Ryan and I to actually like the same people. Ha. I know that sounds bad but it is what it is. I was wrong and I'm really glad. I'm thankful for all the texts, Facebook messages, and so forth that I've received from family and friends since my surgery but nothing beats having a physical presence in your life that helps you out, comforts you, lets you sob uncontrollably on your living room sofa without judgement, and after seeing you ugly cry, still wants to be your friend! I can't imagine having gone through this without the extra support and care of our friends.
Whether you're a people person or not, one thing that I've learned is, people are important. You may not always like everyone you meet. There are some people out there that make me want to stay in my shell and not take the chance. But without taking a chance on people, you risk never having your life changed by others. No matter where life takes us or where we end up, I will never be able to reflect upon this time in my life without thinking about the friends who made it easier. I'm sure they don't even realize they are doing it. Half the time when my heart is hurting and I'm feeling sorry for myself, my phone goes off with a text to see how I'm feeling, or a funny picture that makes me laugh, or a well-timed friendly "insult". And most evenings, four lounge chairs at the end of a driveway are healing my heart and nobody knows it but me.
And now all of you! Ha ha!
Being a stay at home mom has only made it worse. My oldest is going to be 7 later this year. Once I had her, I stayed home and pretty much had no social life. My husband worked weird hours so it was mostly me and Abba all the time. When the opportunity to be in a social situation arose, I found it hard to communicate with others. My brain felt mushy and I realized that I didn't have a lot in common with most of the people I found myself around. These awkward situations, pushed me further into my shell, so to speak, and it truly became difficult to make friends. The amount of effort it required to make a friend and be a friend just wasn't worth it in my opinion and I wasn't a people person.
As a teenager and young adult, I was self-confident. I felt like I knew who I was and I was OK with that person. I honestly didn't care about what people thought of me. Now, at 31, I feel more insecure than ever. I still feel awkward in most social situations, I still find it difficult to make and maintain friendships, and I have to fight hard against the urge to stay cooped up at home and never go anywhere other than the grocery store. I find myself wondering what people think of me and actually caring. I'm no longer sure if I like me.
I constantly feel like a failure as a mother. That feeling is exacerbated by my ectopic pregnancy. I struggle with feeling like I failed the child that was taken from me. Rationally, I realize that I can't control everything that happens in my body but a lot of our feelings are irrational, right? People keep telling me to grieve. But how can I? I have two other children who depend on me and are always around. My husband works a job where I may only see him a couple hours total during the day. I'm responsible for everything and everyone in my house. If I cry, my oldest constantly asks if I'm crying and why I'm crying. It's just a rough situation all around. These last two weeks have felt like hell and it doesn't seem like that feeling is going to let up anytime soon.
Before my husband returned from deployment and I moved back to Fort Polk he suggested that I send a Facebook friend request to the wife of another soldier in his unit that lived on our street. I had only met her once before and while she seemed nice, I didn't really know her. Being the introverted, non-people person that I am, I cringed at the thought. It would be so weird, right? To receive a friend request from someone you met once and probably don't even remember. He had to convince me to do it but I did. I typed a short message to go along with it, trying to be as un-weird (is that a word?) as possible. I felt sick. Why are things like that so hard for me? Anyway, being the nice person that she was, she accepted my request and sent a nice message back. Whew! Maybe she didn't think I was as creepery as I felt.
What I didn't know or even expect was that friend request would change my life. We hit it off after a few awkward moments when we first met in person. Our husbands came back from deployment and I figured that it would kind of be the end of things. Maybe we'd get together once in a while on our own but I doubted that the husbands would be involved. Truth is, it's very rare for Ryan and I to actually like the same people. Ha. I know that sounds bad but it is what it is. I was wrong and I'm really glad. I'm thankful for all the texts, Facebook messages, and so forth that I've received from family and friends since my surgery but nothing beats having a physical presence in your life that helps you out, comforts you, lets you sob uncontrollably on your living room sofa without judgement, and after seeing you ugly cry, still wants to be your friend! I can't imagine having gone through this without the extra support and care of our friends.
Whether you're a people person or not, one thing that I've learned is, people are important. You may not always like everyone you meet. There are some people out there that make me want to stay in my shell and not take the chance. But without taking a chance on people, you risk never having your life changed by others. No matter where life takes us or where we end up, I will never be able to reflect upon this time in my life without thinking about the friends who made it easier. I'm sure they don't even realize they are doing it. Half the time when my heart is hurting and I'm feeling sorry for myself, my phone goes off with a text to see how I'm feeling, or a funny picture that makes me laugh, or a well-timed friendly "insult". And most evenings, four lounge chairs at the end of a driveway are healing my heart and nobody knows it but me.
And now all of you! Ha ha!