"Normal"

I'm feeling "normal" again, which is a new development. About two days ago I woke up and was like, "OKAY! ALRIGHT! This is life!" It's a good new normal, I'd say. We officially have three babies - one in heaven - and when I think of him or her I have a moment of getting that sensation like I'm going to cry, which I'm happy to have. If that feeling is what remains of the past four weeks, hey I'm glad it's there. It passes quickly and I feel lighter afterwards, like I'm just glad to get to experience what's right in front of my face at the moment. The deeper level of emotion and treasuring of my loved ones is apart of the new normal that is invaluable.

Three weeks ago, when I was still in the throes of gripping sadness, I had this horrible feeling that this is a mark on my life that will never, ever leave me. A dark feeling, like I was doomed. In my talking with several different women who had either miscarried themselves or were empathizing with me, a few of them said that their mom had had a miscarriage 25, 30 years ago and it was something they still thought about (their various mothers). Thinking of that stretched my mind to weird places. "Wait, so when Carter is 35 and Dakota is 33 I'm going to be sad about this event. It's something I will be thinking about when I'm in my 50's." It left me wishing that it had never happened.

"Why did this have to happen to us? I wish this could have been an easy pregnancy." I felt selfish thinking like that because I had been actively pushing my mind toward what a blessing the baby had been in the first place, God has a plan, we'll get through this stronger on the other said, God knows what he's doing, etc., etc., etc. But the fact remained that I just wished that it hadn't happened at all. That may seem obvious: "I wish I hadn't miscarried this baby," but after really digging deep mentally, emotionally and spiritually, it was a feeling which surprised me. Especially after so much "processing." Like I was being depressingly, sadly, horrifyingly honest with myself - not following up every sad feeling with a spiritual, "yes, but God has a plan!"

That is certainly not to say that I don't wholeheartedly believe in God's plan, it was just a pain that had to be felt. This is another weird thought, but in that book The Fault in Our Stars, a major quote that she obsessed over was, "That's the thing about pain. It demands to be felt." Now ain't that the gosh darn truth? Another reason I was shocked to have such a blunt feeling such as "I wish this hadn't happened, I don't care what lessons I learn in the aftermath," was my willingness to just feel sad. The last thing I wanted to do was push the pain away because a) it reminded me of the baby, and b) you always hear about people not dealing with their issues and then BAM, they manifest in different ways. I fully wanted to heal emotionally, even if that meant just being a sad lump on a log.

Anyway, after some time, I feel more "normal." Time does heal all, and thank goodness I have Chad to do it with. So cheers, gosh darnit!