Down The Rabbit Hole

I realize once again that I have been neglecting this space that used to be so integral to my life.  My blog started out as just a way for me to let off some steam, where I posted about bullshit, links to news stories or something funny I found online, pictures from our travels.

But then we started trying to get pregnant and my blog took on a whole new importance in my life.  It became the way that I processed my thoughts.  For a couple years, I had so much going on in my head that I needed to get it all out onto a page on a regular basis in order to maintain any kind of sanity.  I found that I could write about my feelings surrounding the sixteen months it took to get pregnant the first time, the devastation that was my first miscarriage, the failed IUI, and the year it took me to recover SO much more clearly than I could express them verbally.

Even more profoundly, the support I received from the people whose blogs I found, or who found mine, was really my saving grace. In my dark times I knew I was not alone in my crushed hope, the ache in my heart, and the empty feeling in my womb. That there were women out there who knew how I felt because they had suffered it themselves made the pain a bit less acute. Seeing how strong other women were after their losses inspired me to pick myself back up off the floor and try again.

And then I got pregnant with Áine and I let my blogging duties slide.  I wrote a bit about why a few weeks before she was born. And since she was born I’ve been so elated and dazed and harried that blogging has been the LAST thing on my mind.  I’ve posted a couple updates, a handful of pictures for the folks who have stuck with me over the past few years and sent their good wishes for Áine’s safe arrival.  But for the most part I’ve been pretty lax about blogging, and about visiting the blogs of my friends in the online infertility community.

Today I was perusing some old posts and read some old comments and found myself thinking, “oh yeah, I wonder whatever happened to…”  So I visited some blogs I haven’t been to in a while and was reminded that some people are still trying, still fighting for what I have now been so blessed with.  I read their words and it broke my heart all over again because I remember what it felt like to get bad news from my doctor.  I remember curling up onto the couch in a ball and crying harder than I’ve ever cried in my life.

And it made me feel like an asshole for all but abandoning this space and for not being a better support to the people who supported me.  I still hesitate to write about how happy I am with my brand new daughter, because I don’t want to rub salt in the wounds of anyone who is hurting.  But I also feel like disappearing, or not being honest about the joy I have now, would be an even bigger insult.

So I’m going to write about my life like I did before.  The subject matter will be a little different and the posts may be a bit sporadic, but I am going to make the effort.  If I don’t post writing, I’ll post pictures (more about my photography later).  It’ll be good for me as well, give me a chance to write again, to sharpen my mind back up (I hope – being really tired for months on end tends to turn the brain into mush).  I also have a whole new headful of thoughts and feelings to process: about being a mom, a wife, and a woman who is not quite sure where to go from here, but is looking forward to the journey.

She’s going to kill me for this when she’s a teenager.