Melancholy

I thought I would take a break from posting Hope's story, after just getting through all of the heavy stuff surrounding the birth. I wrote most of that in the first two weeks after she was born. It was one thing I could sit and do just for her. I could focus, block everything else out and just do it, despite all of the activity and visitors buzzing around me. Believe it or not what I'm posting is the highly edited version, I have nearly 40,000 words on this here laptop. I never kept a pregnancy journal, so I wanted to go back and record all of those precious memories of our 40 weeks together, and of course those 20 hours we spent together before we let her go.....

It has just gone summer here, but it is cold. So cold we've got the heater back on. Anyone who knows Melbourne weather will know that's not uncommon. By next week it will probably be 35 degrees or something crazy like that. We like to mix it up a bit down here. Variety is the spice of life, afterall.

So the weather matches my mood today, melancholy. I'm Sad Sally and I'm married to Sorrowful Simon. It is all just sad, sad, sad here. Not much has changed in three and a bit months. I don't see happy on the horizon. Not yet. Especially not with Christmas on the horizon.

Despite the cool weather and rain today, the weather has been annoyingly very nice for the most part. The garden is coming along in leaps and bounds and within weeks, we are going to be drowning in tomatoes. We have grown tomatoes before, but not like this. There are dozens of them. Looking after them has been comforting for me. Something to nurture, feed, look after and watch grow. Something to do.

The letterbox is no longer filled with sympathy cards (they stopped some months ago) but of course the Christmas cards are now flowing in. Bunches of them, every freakin' day.

I guess some people don't know what to say. Others have said things like "we know this Christmas wont be what you expected". You can say that again. Far, far from it in fact.

My other friend having a baby has still not had it yet! She's 13 days past her due date and from what I understand, is being induced today. I feel selfish, but this is really just prolonging my agongy. Please just have the baby safely, get it over with and let me move on from yet another happy ending. Every time I hear my laptop ping with a new email or hear a text message come through, I assume it is that news. Today has been a long day.

My best friend visited today with her huge 37 week preggy belly and her rambunctious but totally adorable 2 year old boy. He is such a joy and I love him. It was of course very, very hard for me. But I can't hide from her forever. She was there the day Hope was born and one of the few people on this earth who met her, so I guess I just have to be brave and keep her in my life. Our relationship has taken a bit of a battering in the aftermath of all of this, but I'm not going to let one giant hospital cock-up (as I have decided that's exactly what it is) get in the way of the relationships I value the most. We just have to get through this, shall we call it, rough patch. Jealousy is indeed a curse. And it bites hard.

I'm going to have to suck up all my courage though to go and visit her when her baby makes his/her appearance in a couple of weeks time. I had set myself a goal to be pregnant again by the time her baby arrives to try and take the sting out a bit so I'm rapidly running out of time for that to happen. I pinned all my hopes on getting pregnant again quickly, just as we did with Hope. I should stop making plans as I'm rapidly learning things don't always go to plan.

Other friends of ours also came for dinner last night with their one year old little boy, one of the ones I had the party for last week. It is the first time I have seen a male since we lost Hope (other than my family). I don't know, I have felt a bit strange around men and I can't put my finger on why. I think I saw the men's faces at the funeral - they were so horrified and sad - most of them crying. I am so sad myself, I'm not sure I feel strong enough to be around grown men crying. And you know, childbirth is our game, and I have felt that desire to be around other women and other mothers so I can share my story, Hope's story and all the nitty gritty details. I don't think many men would really want to hear it. I guess as I never got to join a mother's group, I have been thankful that all of my female friends have been so wonderful to just let me talk and share, just as all women do with their birth stories. It was a birth just like any other, the only difference being death instead of life.

Sitting here watching the news and I've just seen a story about a 70 year old woman giving birth to a healthy baby. In India, I think. WHY? If anyone on this earth should be able to birth healthy babies it should be me. My husband and I just stared at each other. I really have to stop trying to make sense of things.

The universe is indeed a mysterious place.

Eeek - another new email just came through. Junk mail, of course. So the wait for Sad Sally to hear more happy news continues......

ETA: So it turns out that break from Hope's story wasn't a very long one. I have posted the next part, complete with photos, tonight. And I still have not heard news from my friend and her very overdue baby.