Back to Square One

Yesterday I saw a new Psychiatrist. The last one kind of pissed me off so I found a new one. After discussing my loss and describing my grief and resulting mood swings, he asked me a question that I still can't get out of my mind. He asked "What was your family life like as a child?" I asked "With respect to...specifically?" (I had no idea what this had to do with grief over the loss of my daughter.) He replied "Having a family, getting married. Was it ever discussed at home? Did your parents expect you to have a family?" I replied "Not really. It wasn't expected and it wasn't really discussed. I thought I didn't want children until about 5 years ago when I was 35." "Do you have a lot of guilt about that?" I replied "yes." He said "How much of that is driving this need to have a child?" WTF? Here's how I heard it: "Why did you wait so long to have your first child? What the fuck is wrong with you???"

Do I have a lot of guilt about waiting to have children until I was ready? I didn't get married until I was 36! At 37 we began trying to conceive and 18 months of infetility treatments later, I conceived. 9 months later, I lost my daughter just 12 days before her due date.

YES I FEEL GUILTY. I feel like shit. I've wasted my fertile years and worry that I'll never have a live child of my own. I always thought there would be time. I thought once we stopped using contraception, we'd get pregnant. I was stupid and naive. Yes, I feel guilty. Thanks for bringing that up for me to obsess over, again. I am 40 and still trying to conceive using my own, old eggs. I am desperate to have a live child. Desperate to have my daughter back, alive. Desperate to turn back the clock and make things right. I can't sleep at night worrying about the future.

I can't get those questions out of my head. He validated my fears and worries, my regrets. He gave them clout and made them significant again for me. It's back to square one for me.

Aching, Missing, Sad

When will I feel like living again? Will this empty, aching sadness ever leave me? At times I feel like my chest will explode with the heartache and emptiness of losing my daughter. I have no will to live and wish I could just disappear.

When Kara died, something inside me shattered into a million pieces. Some pieces are lost forever. I will never be the person I once was, I am forever changed. I look in the mirror and don't recognize the tired, sad face looking back at me.

How do people live through this? I'll never understand how one gets through the grief associated with the loss of a child. I am lost and bereft, miserable in my existence. I have failed as a human being, as a mother. My child died before I could give birth to her - how can I live with that? My arms are empty and my heart aches with the loss of my baby. I wish I could just disappear and be done with this life.

The Holidays

Today is the day before Thanksgiving - the first holiday without my baby. When I first attended my babyloss group, everyone talked about the 'firsts'; first Thanksgiving, first Christmas, first Angelversary. At the time, I didn't think I would be so affected. I was in so much pain that I thought Christmas and Thanksgiving couldn't possibly be this bad. They're just another day once you've lost your child.

Yesterday I went Christmas shopping, intent on getting to the malls before the crowds. What I found was so much festivity and Christmas music, that I felt the pit coming on hard & strong. My chest seized up and I felt paralyzed by my grief. I felt like I wanted to die and for a few minutes, wished I had. How can I live like this without my child? Breathe...breathe...

The holidays loom large and dark. They cloud my vision and force me to reevaluate my existence yet again. We were supposed to be enjoying our first holiday as a family. Instead, I am searching for my purpose in life without my child. I am fighting anxiety over the promise of empty holidays without my child. I am trying to wake up each day and get through another hour, another day, the pit always nearby.

Infertile and full of grief

I'm still struggling with finding happiness in this life anymore. I can't concentrate, find no pleasure in anything, don't want to see friends, have no interest in socializing. I don't find pleasure where I used to, and it's an unbalanced feeling. When will this change for me? I thought maybe if I were to get pregnant again. But no, we're not to be so lucky this month.

We just learned this morning that our 1 embryo tested abnormal, so the cycle has ended. So have my chances of conceiving until the next cycle, which is mid-January. Although I've tried to prepare myself all week, it still comes as a crushing blow. There was a tiny flicker of hope in the back of my mind, that burned even when I knew the chances were slim. Infertility combined with the loss of my infant daughter is a crushing combination and I don't know how people get through this. Waiting and waiting, trying again, waiting and waiting, only to be disappointed over and over again. And I get older every day.

I miss Kara every single day. Her beautiful little face brings me to tears - I have a difficult time looking at her pictures without losing myself and falling into the pit. Last night, my husband told me he cares about nothing anymore and if he could lay down next to her and just die, he would happily do so. Sadly, I feel the same way every minute of every day. It's a battle just to find the will to live every day. I don't know how long I have to live like this.