Part 2: March Forth

Time marches on, unconcerned with grieving and readiness. Time will march on without you. Time has marched on without me for a while now. Today I'm catching up.

I became an aunt at 7:14 today. An occurrence the approach of which has terrified and exhausted me and entrapped my emotions for the past 7 months.  I've built it up in my imagination to mythical proportions and placed undue amounts of significance on the anticipated moment. My heart ached every time I thought of seeing my parents as first-time grandparents to a baby other than my own. I imagined the moment my mother saw her first grandchild as life-changing and able to be matched by nothing ever - not the birth of any future baby of mine and certainly not my adoption of a child. The latter fear gripped my mind for the better part of the afternoon, even as I was sending jovial texts back and forth to my sister as she was in her hospital bed waiting to push her child into the world.

And then it happened. And I lived. And reality was much less magical than my imagination. People were happy - it was a wonderful event - but it was not the mythical fantasy I had feared. I have a nephew. He's a real person who is a part of our family now. I'm one of only two aunts he'll ever have. He's not just someone else's baby - he's my nephew. He will never fill the gap left by my own lost children - he is not my child - but he will fit into my life exactly the way he is meant to. And I will be his Auntie Kimmie.



Me and Daniel

Originally I felt like the only way I could make a hospital visit was if Randy and I could be there alone with my sister, brother-in-law, and baby. I didn't think I could handle seeing my parents or grandparents there and possibly not even friends of my sister that i don't even know. I needed some privacy. Luckily, my parents are angels and understood this implicitly. They had me text them when we got to the hospital and they retreated to the family waiting room to give us the space we needed. After a while I felt like I could handle it, so I invited them in. We ended up staying for 3 hours. I finally felt a part of the family again, and it was such a relief. Infertility is hard enough, but having it rob you of family is a crushing blow. Things will never be the same as they used to, but today was a glimpse of how we might cobble together a new family reality.

I don't attribute tonight's success to any supernatural or magical forces. I think it is born of months of therapy, the support of an amazing family, and the transition from having a pregnant sister to having a sister and a nephew. I have long anticipated that things would get much better once the baby was born, as it has in similar situations with my pregnant friends. Every woman experiencing infertility has her triggers - the certain things that are particularly soul-crushing to her. For me, its pregnancy more than babies. This is not because I want to be pregnant more than I want a baby. I think its because a pregnancy is the first step down that road, my next step - my elusive goal. I can't even fathom the baby part because its so far away and seems so unattainable to me right now. Just getting to the pregnancy has defined my life for five long years. And also, now that the baby is born he's not just a reminder of my failures and struggles and illness - he's my nephew. He's here. And I'm going to get to know him.