I would say it has been quite a long time since I last wrote a post in here. I have been seeing a therapist every two weeks and a physical therapist for my PFD every week (recently we progressed to every other week). I mostly am starting to feel better. I have good days and I have bad days. Some days I feel like my old self. And when I catch myself in that moment, it is surreal. And if feels wrong and sometimes I tell myself to snap out of it, and I know that I shouldn't.
I don't know what's compelled me to not write as often as I was, and to now all of a sudden open this blog again. I think it is the battle you face with grief. I think for a few months there, I was so focused on feeling normal again, that the mere thought about allowing myself to feel sad would set me backwards. I started meditating and I started positive affirmations. I think by doing this it didn't allow me to feel sad. But was it just pushing my grief to the side? I don't know. I think it might have because this morning as I did my yoga, something cracked open inside of me and I randomly started crying. And then I was compelled to write.
There are three women in my family who are pregnant now. My sister-in-law (who was pregnant at the same time I was with Harper... she was only a month behind me), and two of my cousins' wives. All three right in a row. When I first found out about my sister-in-law, I cried. I know that sounds horrible, but it was this instant thought of, "why not me? She already has a healthy toddler, why does she get two?" Then I found out about my cousin's wife through Facebook and thought to myself, well.. anyone else? And then literally two weeks later, at a family party, my other cousin's wife surprise announces her pregnancy. These two were literally married last June and are only 20 years old and are still in college. I feel like I am being slapped in the face. But how screwed up is it that I am taking these happy people's pregnancies personally? Like they are all done in spite of me or something. I am not liking this jealous person I have become but I am really starting to wonder when it will be our turn.
I don't like these low moments. I'm sitting here crying and the room is dark and the sky is overcast and cold. I have been tinkering with the thought of TTC again, but with PFD, and PTSD, it is proving to be a difficult task. I feel like I live in constant fear of infection. Even when I am not pregnant. I am terrified of something being wrong all the time with my body. PTSD is a cruel, life-sucking bitch. I have been trying to conquer these thoughts and replace them with positive ones, like "I am healthy" and "My body functions normally". But sometimes, that panic creeps in. What if I am not? What if there is some underlying reason why I feel so badly? What if I have an asymptomatic infection? I hate, hate, hate what incompetent cervix has done to me. I used to be so confident, so strong, so self-assured. I used to feel good about my body. Now, I feel like all of that has been ripped away from me.
Is this a random moment of relapse? I think to myself how the rest of my life will be. Will I spend the last year of my 20's, hoping desperately for a healthy, full term pregnancy? Will I spend all my thirties, enduring the same cruel cycle of conceiving, loss, and depression? Something makes me want to try again but I have no idea why. There's that little voice inside of me that says, "this time it will be different." And then there's the other voice that says, "what makes you think this time will be any different?" It is such a battle. And it's exhausting. I feel so much older than I really am.
My therapist suggested that one of the ways I deal with PTSD is to talk about the experience in detail. I know I have written about the losses in here but even the thought of going back and reading them scares the shit out of me. I feel like I'll be reopening a portal of depression. She said I could print out the entries and read them aloud to her. I haven't done it yet but maybe I will. I guess part of my problem is I try to sweep it under the rug.. and after doing this for so long, it builds up into this mountain and then it collapses, just out of the blue.
