It’s taken me time to get to this place. Years, in fact. But as time passes it has become clear to me that this isn’t going to go away. Thoughts once fleeting and almost curious in nature now linger and take root – hurt, even. They stay with me. And I with them.
Perhaps, I should explain.
I am barren. I was born that way. For convenience, and to avoid more detail than is desirable to divulge, let’s just call it… a chronic problem with the plumbing.
It was not a shock when it was finally diagnosed. I’d known – or suspected – since my early teens. It was one of those “nothing can be done, just how it is” kind of things that one encounters in life and hurl into the “NOT FAIR” category. But actually, in some ways, finding out for certain was actually a relief for me. At least, I knew.
I was young…. 21 at the time… and couldn’t care less. I’d never really dreamed of having children, so it didn’t seem too much of a loss to me. I understood well enough the implications but having the mind of someone who’d only just begun to explore life and adulthood I couldn’t fully grasp the ramifications of it. There were so many other things so worth while in life… why should I becry this one thing?
Inevitably, time and life matured me, altered my perceptions and – whether forced by necessity or invited by opportunity – taught me that life is never as simple or as diverse as one might think.
That’s what brings me here. The fact that this is something I have to find a way to live with… or perhaps more accurately… something I have to find a way to live without.
Right now, I have no idea how it could ever have seemed easy or convenient to me.
Dear Scattered Rayn, thank you for your honest post. I can so relate to your gathering grief. It takes you somewhat by surprise, and never really goes away. It just matures as you mature. In each stage of our lives, we discover new ways that we are living without.
Thank you for putting into words what I feel.
By: fawngilmorekraut on November 10, 2009
at 3:45 pm
@fawn
Thank you so much for your comment. No, for your presence and … for understanding. It means far more than I’d ever realised when I started this blog.
You know… this is actually the first time I don’t feel entirely alone with all this… thank you.
Rayn
By: Scattered Rayn on November 10, 2009
at 7:15 pm
You are far from alone Rayn. Though it does feel that way sometimes. When there’s a death of a child, the whole community grieves with the mother. But our grief is unknown and not understood. I grieve the loss of the children I never knew. It feels like death within my own womb. The loss of a whole life time of relationship that will never be.
A few years ago I began to stop dismissing this as irrelevant, and began to embrace the loss that I was living with. I saw how many strategies I employed to avoid the pain. But pain is part of the beauty of life. I decided to enter in. Wow. There is no bottom. But there is light.
By: fawngilmorekraut on November 11, 2009
at 7:23 am
@fawn
You’re right. About everything you said, about how it feels and how it affects, but mostly about how it cannot just be dismissed. I, too, am beginning to see if not strategies then at least … reason… events… reactions that have made it harder for me to face, and been an excuse to look away.
I thought I’d come here – started this blog – just to have my say. To express opinions and maybe vent a bit. But I’m beginning to realise that there are more wounds that need to be bled. Some of them probably for the first time.
Thank you, fawn… for being part of this.
By: Scattered Rayn on November 11, 2009
at 11:09 am