Things Left Unsaid

First: Ethan is fine. That boy is a wonder. He sails through surgeries and medical procedures and keeps on smiling. He frequently inspires me to stop being so damn whiny and mopey. But he isn't ready for his canonization yet as far as I can tell, because he's nowhere close to completing that miracle.

But, yes. He's doing well. Thank you for asking.

Oddly enough, the worst part of the whole surgery ordeal was our hotel. It's a long, rambling story - especially the way I tell it - so I'll leave it at this for now: I never lodge formal complaints about bad service, never-ever-ever, and yet I've written a three-page letter to the manager. I'm sure I'll bore you with all the gory details eventually. But for now, I'm tired.

I feel like I've been tired for more than half of this past year. And for much of this time, I've been hiding it. I'm tired of being tired. And I'm tired of hiding it. I'm tired of pretending I'm fine all the time so I don't have to explain the things left unsaid.

When I wrote this post, after much debating, I took something out of my first draft. The original last line of that entry was: "Wednesday morning, I got my period." I took it out because, eww, gross, telling random strangers about your period? Why would they want to hear that?

But yet I hated taking it out. I felt it was important to the story. For four weeks, I was on a hormonal rollercoaster. Exactly four weeks after the D&E, I suddenly felt human again, and four weeks and one day after, I started my period. In my opinion, that sentence was key to everything else. It explains why I found solid ground, seemingly out of nowhere.

When I wrote this post, I was leaving something out. I didn't mention that, not only was it eight weeks after my D&E, it was nearly four weeks since my period. More importantly, my cycles are normally shorter than four weeks. If my cycles were back to their usual length and routine already, I was already a day late for my period.

But I ignored it. I focused on the miscarriage and my recovery from it, and pretended I wasn't wondering at all about the symptoms I had been having. Even though they were constantly on my mind.

And when I wrote this post, I talked about Ethan's surgery and my recent busy-ness. I mentioned my recent fatigue, but didn't explain it. Just left it out there as an excuse for my sudden drop off the face of the earth.

Until now.

I'm tired because I'm pregnant again.

No, we didn't plan for this to happen so soon. My doctor recommended three months after the D&E before we tried again. But we weren't "trying". I wasn't sure how long it would be before I'd be ready - emotionally, mentally, physically - to try again. "Trying" was the last thing on my mind. This pregnancy, like my first two, was a surprise.

I know with that statement I have just moved into the category of Annoying Girl Who Has Multiple OOPS Pregnancies And Brags About It, even though bragging is the last thing I'm trying to do. I'm almost ashamed by our freakish fertility. I have followed stories of women struggling with infertility, online and in real life. I know how painful it can be to watch others try and get pregnant easily, never mind being caught by a surprise pregnancy. Never mind being caught by a surprise pregnancy, THREE TIMES.

(I don't say "pregnant by accident", because none of my children were accidents. We wanted them, and welcomed them, even if they caught us off guard.)

But yes, I'm pregnant. I'm not holding my breath that anything will come of it, but there it is. It's something that has been going on in my life that I've left unsaid, even though it's affecting everything else. I have no focus at work. I'm exhausted. I have no energy to do anything at all. I barely muster up enough energy to read other blogs, never mind write in my own. This post alone took three days to finish.

I have a lot of feelings about this pregnancy, good and bad, and I'd like to get them all out of my head eventually. I'm about 9 weeks now, and hope to get out of the first trimester exhaustion soon. Between the last pregnancy, the in-between hormone shifts and this new one, I feel like I've been in the first trimester for six months now. It's getting old.

There has been very little joy surrounding this pregnancy so far. The reaction of most of our family and friends was something like: "OH." I can't blame them, since it was pretty close to our own reaction. No one wants to get too attached just yet. I think our family is afraid to get our hopes up by showing any excitement.

I had an early ultrasound, at only five weeks. There was a properly sized sak and - as expected - no heartbeat yet. But even seeing a heartbeat would have been no consolation to me. I've seen one before and it didn't mean a damn thing.

My symptoms so far have been a constant mild nausea, supreme bitchiness, and fatigue. Also, a mild depression that won't seem to lift. It's been a rough few weeks. There has been more than one moment when I thought, "If it doesn't work this time, I give up. I don't think I can go through this again."

But I'm trying not to think about that too heavily right now. I'm just trying to get through today. Then tomorrow. We'll see what happens after that.

This morning, I have my first official prenatal appointment. I'm sure it will be very similar to the LAST first official prenatal appointment I had - talk about the treatment plan, maybe schedule some additional ultrasounds. Poke and grope and measure. All the usual fun stuff.

And then, tomorrow, we go back to Boston for Ethan's post-surgery follow-up. We're registering him for school the day after that. CG starts daycare next Monday. And on, and on, and on.

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It's been a hard year, and was a stressful Thanksgiving, but deep down, I knew I had a lot to be thankful for. Even if I left most of it unsaid.

News Flash

This may come as a bit of a surprise. But... did any of you know - it's the MIDDLE OF NOVEMBER?

I'm not joking. I sweartogod.

The past two weeks have gone by in a blur of business and busy-ness. I started a long and rambling Halloween post (shocking, I know) but when I actually had the time to sit and write, Blogger was giving me heaps of trouble. By the time it seemed fixed, I was back in busy mode. Besides, at this point, Halloween is so last month.

I've been busy to the point that I'm barely keeping up on my reading. This is the first night in weeks that I've been up past ten, and you should know by now that 10:00 PM is the threshold for Mommy time in this house. CG goes to bed at 8:30 or 9:00 and Ethan and Jete retire around 10. As soon as that happens, the computer and the TV both go on, and I enjoy the familiar humming of technology.

Lately I've been too tired to even turn on the PC many nights. When I do muster up some energy, it's just a quick check on a random handful of blogs. MAYBE I'll muster up a lame comment or two, but no way do I have the energy to write a real entry on my own.

I'm forcing myself to put clear sentences together now because I'm sure I'll be offline for even a little while longer. Our main focus right now is Ethan's upcoming surgery. I call it Number Two. (Get it? Ha. ha. HA.) Partly because it's his second surgery this year, Number One being back in August. And partly because it's Part II of the hip-work he had done last March.

Compared to the ghosts of surgeries pasts, this is supposed to be a small one. Jete, Ethan and I head to Boston on Tuesday, and if all goes well, we should be home by Thursday. The surgery itself should only take about two hours. No casting. We're keeping our fingers crossed that it will be a nonevent.

It's funny how your first born child - a mere four years old - can be having surgery and yet, it isn't that big a deal. Naturally we're concerned, and we'll be worried sick for those two hours, but we're relatively calm compared to the last time around. We went for our pre-op appointment last week (an entry in itself) and despite the torrential downpours, five hours spent waiting to see doctors, and five hours spent on the highway, it was almost ... relaxing.

(I said almost. We're kooky, Jete and I, but not crazy.)

We'll be working of course, right up until the last possible minute, since we've got zero vacation time left for this luxurious visit to our state's capital. Somewhere in there I'll have to pack. And get referrals. And notes to the hotel to prove it's not a pleasure trip, so please give us the piddly 5% discount, okay? And spend time with CG, who's staying at home and will most likely punish us for weeks to come for abandoning him.

Please. Try to contain your jealousy. You can't all live a glamorous life like me. I'm just lucky, I guess.