The Important Thing Is to Get Up

I am incredibly sad today. Like, deep pit sad. Tight ball of grief in my chest, tears in my eyes (no Up required), unsure how to move on with my day sad.

I went to visit my best friend for a few days, but that's not why I'm sad. Mostly.

I left on Sunday, much later than I'd hoped (3:30ish instead of 1:30-2:00) because I was slow-moving and...sad. I haven't seen my friend since all things April, and her life is just so vastly different from mine. The three children probably have something to do with that: the exhausting hustle and bustle and chaos that fills her life and will never, ever fill mine. The contrast between the quiet and order of our little house and the beautiful cacophony and entropy of hers is always hard, but I was worried it would be harder now. Plus they are going on a beautiful Maine vacation up to Acadia, and I was putting together things to bring down and show them that were put together for us by my mother-in-law before I went for the first time in 2009, and that suddenly filled me with a dense gray fog because I realized I was going to help plan a trip that we'd hoped to do with our child someday, that I'd be sharing all the awesome places to go, the must-sees, the family-friendly hikes and activities...and we won't get to share that with our own child. It made me incredibly sad.

I feel like the past few weeks have been reminders of all the things I don't know what to do with -- sorting through picture books and keeping a whole bunch, but wondering...why? Who am I going to share them with? Who am I going to page through my tattered copy of The Little Ballerina with, a book from the 50s that was my mother's and is about a girl with weak legs who takes ballet lessons as therapy and then (totally believably) becomes the Sugar Plum Fairy in the recital, complete with toe shoes? Me myself and I, that's who.

(c) 1958

I'd probably be the awkward bee in the back

Maybe children who come visit. Will they care that this book mattered so much to me because I had weak ankles and took figure skating lessons to help as a little girl? That I could totally relate to Carol, although not the part where she becomes the star of the show because Grace is certainly not my middle name?

Then there's the Harry Potter books. I've read them all, multiple times, but Bryce never has. You know why? He was saving them to read with our child. I guess we'll read them together now, we talked about doing it as a Luddite Night activity come winter, but it's a sad thing to see the traditions you'd hoped you'd share with your own children become couple traditions that won't get passed on. I mean, happy that we can have couple traditions and share time with each other in this way, that is certainly special, but not the same as what we'd envisioned that's now gone.

I'm feeling the grief hard today.

My best friend said that it seems I've been spending a lot of time on the floor. Some of it is for physical comfort -- to lie on my back on the floor and do some spinal twists really helps give relief to my lower back/hips that are really bothering me lately. But I think she was talking about the facedown floor time.

She sort of has a point. I had a day where it took me the better part of an hour to get up off the floor. This day was when I found out that my friend was placed with a last-minute baby within days of me telling her about how we'd made our decision.

I went for a walk, but then after the walk...

Same pose, different floor.

The floor is very inviting.

I had a great time visiting with my best friend and her kooky family. The kids were loads of fun, and there were good times all around. I have no pictures of me with her kids, probably because I don't have to worry about putting them in a book that will entice someone to place their baby with me to parent. I enjoyed the experience, and didn't worry about having photographic evidence (which is always nice, but I'm sure there will be plenty of times in the future to take more pictures with those goofballs).

I survived the youngest, a 6-year-old girl, asking me about my "baby bag" (I use my diaper bag as a weekend travel bag because lots of pockets and it's quite nice), asking why I don't have a baby, asking if I'm a mother, asking why I'm not a mother... I was okay. I survived the Table Talk question card that asked "If you could live with any other family than yours, who would you live with?" and they all said "Jessica and Rice!" (They call Bryce Rice, and now Rice Pudding apparently. I can't say "Bryce" because they'll say, "Don't you mean RIIIICE?") Which was lovely, but also sad.

And then after a few fun days of child fun in the morning and evenings and adult fun while they were at camp (shopping, walking, and lunch in Rheinbeck! Climbing Mount Beacon! Lunch near Vassar! Sweaty morning hike in Locust Grove on the Hudson! A walk around the grounds at Hyde Park!), I drove home to my quiet house.

But it's MY quiet house with MY love and MY cats, and I was glad to be home and hug Bryce (aka Rice Pudding, a nickname he's not so sure about) and pet the kitties and go for a pre-dinner walk with the anticipation of delicious margaritas to follow.

And then at the end of the walk we ran into neighbors who'd been in the adoption process for four years, and they were pushing a stroller.

Because they were placed with their daughter through a different agency a month ago, the last week of school.

What the fuck, Universe? Are you TRYING to test the confidence in our decision? Are you TRYING to torture me with all the What Ifs and my sordid brain saying "oh, everyone who knows you and these other people are going to think you're a loser who gave up too soon, just look at what happens when you stick with it!" We couldn't have MISSED that interaction by even 5 minutes?

It put us both in a bit of a funk. I went over and said hi and was introduced to the beautiful little girl, and Bryce was just fuming that the timing put our paths together on this night where we should have been in a great mood, doing a little trip planning and snuggling up on the couch.

Instead we were both incredibly sad and ordered pizza and had one too many margaritas.

We are confident in our decision. It was the right one for us. But even Bryce said that these moments do make a body wonder if our decisions leading up to this were the right ones. Those pesky What-Ifs are a freaking plague. What if we'd started the process earlier? What if we'd gotten a second opinion earlier and gone to a different clinic and just gotten pregnant? What if we'd chosen a different agency? Did we make the wrong choices that led up to where we are now? I mean, so much of everything was a choice that I NEVER WANTED TO MAKE. I didn't ask to be put in these situations, in these circumstances that lead to one path or another. I do not regret our decision, which is good because I sure as hell am not going out to buy more baby gear so we could give it a go with another agency. We. Have. Had. Enough.

But these moments, so close together, sure as shit make you question things for a nanosecond before reverting back to the "OUR SITUATION IS DIFFERENT. We are NOT wearing the same shoes. I am NOT weak. I am NOT a quitter." mantra that is getting me through these things.

I am going to go for a walk so that I can reset myself today. I spent some time on the floor, mostly on my back (but a little with my face in the carpet, I'll admit it). The important thing is to GET UP. I think there's absolutely nothing wrong with sinking into the floor when it seems that cosmic forces effing hate you. But get up. Go for a walk. Do something to clear the fog away.

That's my plan, anyway (cue monster thunderstorm rumbles thwarting my plan...guess I'll walk up and down the street like a lunatic until it starts to feel too dangerous. Sigh).

Update: Totally thwarted by thunderstorms and heavy rain. Stopped now though, so three hours later maybe I can go for a bit of a walk before errands. Thank goodness for the hula hoop.