Saturday, Apr. 16, 2011 11:08 p.m.

18 weeks of rambling

I haven't written a proper entry in about a month. I'm torn about this fact. I feel like this is a time in my life that I want to document and remember...but everything about it feels like a private affair to me. I feel guilty and wrong sharing about it. The excitement is great, and the observations and changes are many - but it's also such a natural occurrence of life that many others experience...and it's not something I feel completely comfortable talking (aka "bragging") about either.

So I just don't talk about it.

A lot of people know now. At least all those that I see on any type of regular basis. There's still plently who don't know...and don't need to know. I'll announce the birth on facebook, when we officially add a new member to my and K's family, but never before. I'm just so sick of reading all the pregnancy posts on there, blah. I think, also, that part of me finds an ironic humor in only announcing the birth, and I wonder if some people will question if we adopted or why we suddenly had a child since they didn't know I was pregnant. Who cares if people believe that we adopted? Let them think what they want.

I don't really talk about it in public though. Even to people who know about it. I answer their questions, yes, and smile, and tell them we're excited (which we are) - but I never bring anything up about it; I don't point out that I'm not drinking at dinner, I don't self-righteously say I can't do things or remind people that come late summer I'm not going to be very comfortable, or yada yada. I just say NOTHING about it. I think it makes people more comfortable that way too - they can still treat me as a normal person and carry on conversations about normal person stuff. I keep going back to the thought that starting a family is a very private affair in a marriage. I didn't talk to most about our trying-to-conceive efforts; no one (thankfully) asks about the details of the night we actually conceived; and very very few will ever hear the details of the birth experience. So why in the should I force people to constantly hear about the pregnancy part of family-building unless they are legitimately curious and ask about it?

It's interesting how quickly time passes in pregnancy. I mean, 9 months is not a very long time in the first place. In the grand scheme of things that is. We were trying for almost 3 times the length of a pregnancy. Remembering that the wait to get here was 2.5 times the time I'll spend here continually keeps me humbled.

I'm 18 weeks now. 2 more weeks til the halfway point. Insane. The first trimester, no matter how long you've been trying, is largely spent just trying to wrap your head around the idea of being pregnant. And then, with the fear of miscarriage and the fact that most people around you don't know yet, it's more of a waiting game, a 'maybe' stage. So by the time you're already 1/3 of the way through, you really only feel like you just started being pregnant. Or at least that's how it was for me.

I've just been waiting for it to feel real. Waiting to be at the point where I can officially start planning for things. When I can really start to get excited. When I know it's really going to happen.

My body isn't changing as rapidly as I thought it would. I'm only just now beginning to show, but it's still easy to hide. I haven't gained much weight. I'm somewhat uneasy about my body. I feel as though I've been gaining weight, I don't feel pregnant, so I look at myself in the mirror and am conflicted. I'm accustomed to telling myself I need to lose a pound or two when my jeans start to get tight, and this is still the main thought in my head...but then I have to remind myself that I'm "supposed" to be getting larger. But it's an odd things to accept when you've always viewed yourself in once way only.

A couple times the past week or so K has suddenly pointed out that I'm looking pregnant. I know he says this with giddyness, knowing that it's his child that is changing the body of his wife - but it makes me feel a bit odd. Do I really look pregnant? Or just that I've gained weight? I can't tell and I don't know if I should go with tighter clothes to try to show it off, or looser ones to hide it.

I also feel awkward when we go out with friends. I feel like they are all trying to check out my stomach and if they can catch the bump and if I look pregnant yet. I'm still smaller than most people expect, and it's strange having people look at your stomach. But I can't blame them though. I do/did the same thing.

And everything is still so mild. I have nothing to complain about; I think people expect pregnant women to complain about more stuff. How can I complain about anything? This is such an amazing experience. I don't think most people fully recognize the humbling awesomeness in having this capacity. It truly means so very much to be given this chance. I will never ever take this for granted.

One thing that changed immensely is mine and K's relationship. We were always in love and always happy, but times do get hard at times, and infertility is such an alienating ordeal. Silent brewing frustrations would topple over into other arguments. It's a difficult place to be. But now - now we have excitement, something to plan for, something to be optimistic about the future for. We together made a living being, albeit tiny at the moment, and this knowledge entwines us together forever. It's an even sweeter reward knowing that we didn't know if this day would come. It'd be a completely other entry for me to explain how much and how deeply I love him, but I am officially head-over-heads in love with my husband. And I thank God for this amazing man. And for the journey we took to get where we are.

I've started to feel it. It doesn't feel like I thought it would. The descriptions of "flutters" or "butterflies" is misleading. It's not soft or ticklish. It's like a muscle twitch, and then almost like a tapping. I oddly can't say that it was as miraculous as I thought it was going to be - it's more like "oh, so there really is a thing inside of me moving around?" Because even though it is apparently around 5 inches in length right now, I still don't quite get how anything that large is inside my body. Let alone that it is ALIVE and moving around in there. It's a very, very strange thought.

Another odd thing that I thought might be different is the bonding thing. Almost everything I've ever read makes me seem like women have this immediate bond with the fetus growing inside them - but to be honest, I don't feel a particular bond. I'm excited about being able to have a child, but I still don't feel especially connected to the one inside me. Perhaps it's because I'm not feeling it constantly yet? Or perhaps it's because I don't know the gender and don't have a fetus name and am just calling it "it"? Or perhaps because that's just the way I am and until I see it in person in the real world I won't fully accept it? Who knows?

But I will say that if I were to miscarry right now, that while I would be sad about the loss of excitement - I don't know if I would feel like I had lost an actual child. Maybe if I saw the body I would then. I don't know. Yes, I know that I'm not supposed to think thoughts like this, but I think all kind of thoughts and sometimes it actually helps me to imagine hypothetical worst-case scenarios and how I would handle them...than to not think about these things and instead stress over them.

Anyways...

This is a long entry. I am getting tired. I've been writing for an hour. It's rambling, but rambling is what I needed to do.

Maybe I should write more about this, or maybe I should write less about this. I'm not sure either way. All I know is that even if I don't speak of it much, that I am still cherishing every minute of the gift that this is.

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