I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: I am a planner. I am not spontaneous. I don’t really love surprises. I need to mentally and emotionally prepare myself for everything and part of that for me is knowing exactly what is happening and when. I’ve really always been this way, but it’s especially important now because Lauren, in an average week, has a physician’s appointment and at least 1-2 hours of therapy. I coordinate her appointments with nap times, mealtimes, my work schedule, Barry’s work schedule (when he’s home), school drop off for Max, appointments for myself and all the other miscellaneous commitments I have in my life. There is not one day of any given month when I don’t have something planned. It’s busy, but I know where I have to go and what time I have to be there.
It is absolute torture for me not to know when baby boy’s heart is going to get too tired to continue beating.
Where am I going to be? Am I going to be at work? In the car rider line picking up Max? At a doctor’s appointment? In the grocery store?
How am I going to know? Will I feel him stop kicking? Will my water break? Will I start bleeding? Will it be at an ultrasound appointment where the flicker of the heart beating is no longer visible?
Will my husband be in town? If he’s not, or even if he is, what am I going to do with my kids when I’m at the hospital? How am I going to mentally and emotionally prepare myself for THAT?
Should we bring Max to meet him? Or will that be too much for a four year old? Will we regret him not meeting his brother? Is there even a right answer?
The other day I booked a vacation trip for Barry and me (Can I get an amen?). The first real vacation, aside from small weekend or overnight trips, we’ve gone on since our honeymoon. It’s in January. And I CAN.NOT wait. I keep thinking about how much we need to get away and how nice it will be to go away without kids for several days to just relax. I feel almost guilty about how happy I am to be taking a trip, because it will obviously be taking place after we lose our baby boy. I’m caught between wanting to continue being pregnant because I know he’s still alive, and wishing the pregnancy away because I know what’s coming. I just have no idea when. Or how. Or under what circumstance. There is a possibility, though ever so slight, that he will make it to term and be born alive. So three more months of this. This waiting. As I’m more noticeably pregnant, more people ask me about the baby. It is getting so hard for me to pretend like everything is okay, and sometimes I do find myself blurting out “I’m due in November, but the baby is sick so it could be any time now”. Or “We’re just waiting now….for him to pass away”. My gosh, that’s so depressing to say to someone who is asking you about your baby. And so awkward. But it’s true. At this point, and in every moment going forward, we’re just waiting. I almost feel like it would be better if I knew when it was going to happen. I don’t like surprises, and even though we know what’s coming, it will be the worst surprise of all when it finally happens.