Back to the beginning

January 22, 2010

I've been stuck back in "the beginning" the last couple of days. The very beginning. Back when I had just found out I was pregnant. When I started experiencing these crazy symptoms that I thought were pregnancy related. Back when I felt sick all the time after I ate. Back when I saw blood.

It's when I go to the bathroom that I flash to that time. My body feels the same right now (as the result of one final attempt to go off my Cipro before I see Dr. G again), like I did in the beginning. It's really quite strange to me. I feel as if I could just blink my eyes and I would be back in time. Maybe it's because it's January. That was when I began to wonder if things really shouldn't be like this. That was when I was told at work that I looked pale and I should go home. That was when I went to my doctor and told her about the blood, wondering if I had hemorrhoids, wondering if there was just a tear, running tests on my stool samples to see what was going on. Nothing? Whew. What a relief! The tests came back negative. It could be something GI, but they wouldn't be able to do any more tests on me until after I delivered anyway. Okay. So I wait. That was when I wrote in my journal, "I don't really feel pregnant yet. Right now I feel like I have this medical condition called pregnancy."

This strange time/space continuum I feel stuck in has me thinking . . . what if I could go back? Can't I just go back in time? Please can't I just go back in time? I would do it all differently. I would say, "No, really, some thing's not right." I would go talk to a GI. The GI would tell me I have ulcerative colitis and put me on steroids. I would have caught it in time. I would have caught it in TIME! I would carry Harper to full term. She would be born alive. I would save my colon. Can't I just go back in time?

But it wouldn't have happened that way anyway. Even if I could go back. The GI would have said, "We can't scope you to see what's going on because you're pregnant. The risk is too great." Even if the GI would have decided to treat me for UC without actually knowing, I wouldn't have responded to the treatment. That was why my colon had to go. My body wasn't responding to the treatments.

So I'm stuck in the here and now, trying to be content. Trying to be grateful. Trying . . . Reminding myself that at least it's not that hell of a past that I'm stuck in. And there's this part of me that's changed too. This part of me that used to think about the future, used to plan and wonder and dream and fantasize about what the future held. I don't know where that part has gone. It makes me sad. I feel like I'm missing a part of myself. How do I get that part back? Is it just time? Time will pass and I'll be able to let go of the memories and focus on the present and then maybe the future too?

I get a little panicked sometimes when I think about the fact that this April it will have been two years since Harper's birth. Two years. I don't want time to pass. I feel like it's taking me away from her. The closer I am to her in time the more understanding people are of me holding on - the less crazy I feel in my grief - the more justified I feel in my grief. I don't know how to let go of the belief that people are judging me for still grieving her. Maybe if she was acknowledged more I wouldn't be so scared. Right now, there are very few people who talk about her existence. Rarely does anyone but me bring her up in conversations. Am I her keeper? Does she only exist because of me? So I have this bond, arguably one of the strongest bonds there is, with this being who hardly anyone but me got to experience a relationship with. How lonely is that in grieving her? In remembering her?

Ahhh . . . I'm stuck. I don't know where to go. Face forward Abby. Look ahead. Look ahead.