the ghosts that we knew

We got back from Nebraska late yesterday afternoon, originally we had planned on being home that morning but it just didn’t work out that way.  Concert was a gigantic ball of awesome, amazing and a bunch of other positive adjectives.  The only downside – venturing out into the masses reminds me how much of a “not a people person” I actually am.  I have no problem judging people as douchebag hipsters and there were plenty in attendance.   However, even with all that  it was still an awesome way to celebrate my early birthday and a great first concert experience for my hubby.  How that man managed to go 33 years without going to a concert though is beyond me!!

When we left Monday morning the hubs had just gotten off work so I ended up driving while he slept – 3 1/2 hours of nothing but straight road and corn fields and no conversation – at one point I felt like we were about to star in our very own version of “Children of the Corn”.  However, it did give me time to think or as the case usually is over-think.  I tried my damnedest not to think about our upcoming (hopefully) IVF treatments, about our miscarriage or even about infertility in general.  However, trying is not necessarily succeeding.   It’s always there isn’t it?  Clouding everything, effecting every thought.  I can try to out think it, I can try to drive away from it but it follows us.  I think it will until it’s all finished in one way or another.  In less than a week I will be 32 years old – it seems strange to me to say that.

I remember being 17 like it was yesterday, I remember being filled with sadness and with hope and a belief in tomorrow. My life is currently so completely different than I had thought it would be, that doesn’t mean it’s bad – in some ways it is better and in others it just is. However,  in one way or another no matter how bad something seemed like it was in my life it always seemed to work itself out, infertility is the first thing in my life that hasn’t done so.  I know that IVF gives us a chance to have a child but it doesn’t cure infertility, it doesn’t magically remove a medical condition.  I sometimes wish I could go back in time and have a nice yell at my 17 year old self – scream at her for her arrogance and punish her for her belief in “everything will be okay”.  Then perhaps warn her about the mistakes she will make and guide her towards the right choices that came later if  they came at all.  Life doesn’t work like that though, we don’t get a reset button.  Everything- every choice, every good thing that happens along with every bad thing, every thought, and even every mistake guides us and forms us.  They make us who we are, blemishes and all.  I know that this upcoming year will be a hard one, I just hope that it will also be a happy one.  I want to be done with this journey of infertility, I want a happy ending.  I don’t want to be haunted by the ghost of “what if” and “why not me” anymore.  I don’t want to lose anymore babies I want to see one finally be born – healthy and happy and loved.  I am impatient – I guess that is one thing I still have in common with 17-year old me, a desire for tomorrow to be today.  I have always ached for the promise of tomorrow while having a cautious eye on the past, some days I have probably forgot how to live in the present – that has been especially true these last few years.  I think all of us are a bit guilty of that though, it’s one of those things you could probably file under “infertility” symptoms.  No matter what, I will be grateful to be turning 32, I will be grateful for another day on this earth, another chance to get it right.

 

“So give me hope in the darkness that I will see the light
Cause oh that gave me such a fright
But I will hold on as long as you like
Just promise me that we’ll be alright.
But the ghosts that we knew will flicker from view
And we’ll live a long life”