October

As I rolled over in bed to check the clock at 5:00am before getting up to for potty break #3 of the night, I realized that today marks the beginning of October, a month that is doubly meaningful for me this year.  Of course you all know by now that Baby Dos, our Rainbow Baby, will be arriving this month (only 6 days from now, in fact).  But what you may not know is that October is also National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Month.  For those of you who have been reading my blog for awhile, you might remember my posts for Carly Marie's Project Heal: Capture Your Grief 2012.  This photo blogging project, Capture Your Grief 2013, starts up again today.  I am going to try to participate and post a few pictures, but I won't be as actively involved as I was last year, for obvious reasons.

As we close in on the final days of this pregnancy, I have noticed a major slide back into many of the PTSD-related symptoms I had in the early days after losing Virginia.  The insomnia is back with a vengeance.  I've been waking up in the middle of the night, unable to go back to sleep, lying awake and starting to ruminate over the past, or worry about what the future may hold for our little family.  The hours of 3:00-5:00 are the darkest of the night for me.  The day we found out we lost Virginia, I had woken up at 3:00am to pee.  Once I climbed back into bed, I realized that I hadn't felt her kick or nudge since at least the day before.  I got up and laid on the couch, drank some juice and had a blueberry muffin.  Nothing.  Then I downed a couple glasses of ice water.  Still nothing.  I tried to fall asleep again, reassuring myself that everything was fine, and I'd be able to hear her heartbeat at our monitoring appointment that morning.  But of course, we all know how that ended.  So when I wake up in those early hours of the morning now, I immediately put my hands on my stomach and wait for movement.  Baby Dos is really good about sleeping when I sleep, and she typically doesn't get really active for the day until mid-morning.  So oftentimes, getting those nudges and rolls at 4:00am is not an easy task.  I'll poke and prod at my stomach, even drink water I keep on my nightstand.  But I refuse to get up.  I refuse to eat, to drink juice or ice water, to lay on the couch.  Because all of those things are triggers, and it's set in my mind that if I do those things, she's not going to move, and we're going to have the same devastating outcome.  So instead I lie awake in bed, changing positions every couple minutes until I finally feel a slight roll or punch.  And then I keep poking at her, just to make sure what I was feeling wasn't just a fluke.  Eventually she gets aggravated by being tormented, and will start moving consistently.  But even then, the insomnia doesn't just go away, because by that point, I've gotten myself so worked up and anxious that it would be next to impossible to fall back asleep again.  I talk to the baby silently in my head and thank her for giving Mommy some reassurance.   I beg her to just hang on for a few more days.  Please, sweetie, just stay alive until we can get you out.

I hate that the end of pregnancy has to be like this for me.  These last few days are getting harder and harder.  I just want to to be able to breathe again, to hold a live baby in my arms and know that she's ok.  I'm ready to stop living in fear.  I'm ready to meet my baby girl.

Six.more.days.