Marching On

Oh, March.  As a young girl, I always anticipated March as it neared.  Each flip of the calendar took us one day closer.  Magical March always brought such joy and happiness.

I wish it was the same now.

Instead of being excited about March, I look at it differently as an adult.  With age comes disappointment, loss, fear, struggles, and trials.  As much as you hope, they are the things that your mom can't just kiss away.
When I was younger, I looked forward to my next birthday, Spring Break, flowers beginning to bloom, things beginning to grow, the weather getting warmer, wearing green and drinking green beer on St. Patrick's Day.

I wish it was the same now.

Those things still happen, but they are different now, just as my world is different now.  Age, time, circumstances, and life have taken some (okay, a lot) of that youthful innocence and naivete away from me.  Although I know that March still brings us the opportunity to create new memories, I am also haunted by some existing memories.  Another year without a baby, another wedding anniversary without a baby, another year to remember our honeymoon when we created our first baby, another year to remember our first bfp, another spring break to remember my third and last miscarriage, another year without my grandmother, Mary and another several weeks in the push to successfully prepare my students for state-mandated testing like I did in the past when I was pregnant.

Yet the grass will begin to get green and flowers and plants will begin to grow and bloom.  We will still have a week of respite to re-energize ourselves to get through the rest of the school year.   It will get warmer outside.  We will celebrate my birthday.  We will celebrate our anniversary.  We'll dig out something green for St. Patty's Day and maybe enjoy a green beer.

We will continue on this path called life.  But it won't be the same . . . at least not to me.

A Woman's heart is the most delicate and astonishing thing God ever made. It holds the secrets of eternity, corridors to divinity, treasures of solitude, bounties of loyalty and silence to be heard . . .

borrowed from Eternity is relentless!

I've been in a "quotely" mood lately, so check out  my Quotes Page for more.

Behind Closed Doors

There just isn't a lot for me to say these days, but I was thankful to be reminded of this by my daily devotional phone app:

"But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."  Matthew 6:6

On Children

I heard about this quote today and looked it up.  There are some really important points that I think IFers (especially IFers) see/understand in a different way.  It's something I needed to hear.  I'll be adding this one to my "Quotes" page.

On Children
 by Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Inside the Glass

I'm struggling with the "what-ifs" right now.  I can't even put it into words and have it make sense.  Unfortunately, this mental game I'm playing in my head isn't a good one.  The cyclical "what-ifs" aren't good ones but more of me having an attitude of failure, the attitude of a fatalist.  They are all thoughts revolving around us becoming a family - however/if/when that is supposed to happen now.  Oh, how I wish I could turn all of these thoughts around into an attitude expecting positive outcomes.

Racked with fear, my mind and my heart race.  Sleep doesn't help.  Walks in the crisp, wintry air doesn't help.  Meds don't help.  Alcohol doesn't help.  Comfort food doesn't help.  Sex doesn't help.  Mental escape doesn't help.  All of those things that good addicts and other escapists use are no good for me.  While some may alleviate it for a short while, I feel that my insides are blanketed.  I see through the same eyes, using the same mind, and depending on the same heart, but everything on the insides is blanketed in . . . whatever this is.

It's not depression.  I know too well what that feels like.  It is a lonely, lonely place.  A solitude that nobody - not even those closest to me - can quite comprehend.  Just a place where I find myself more often than not.  Is it fear?  Yes.  Is it grief?  Probably.  Is it sadness?  Maybe.  Is it fear of loss and/or failure?  Always.  Is it fear of success?  Most likely.

So here I sit inside the glass.  From this perspective I can't tell if it's half-full or half-empty.  This glass may have absolutely nothing in it, but I just can't tell.  I can see everything outside the glass, but I don't know if any can see me from out there.  I can scream from within the glass, but I don't think anyone can hear my silent cries.  Every now and then, I hear tapping from the outside of my glass.  Excitedly, I think it might someone coming to help me, to throw me a life preserver, or to save me.  Yet it is most typically just another person who needs something from me.  Ha!  They think I have something left to give???  So, instead of trying to figure it out, I just keep sitting here.  In my glass.

Paralyzed.

Wondering.

Hoping.

Fearing.

Praying.

Dreaming.

But not doing a damn thing about it.

Irony

Here in Dallas, we are iced in for the fourth day in a row.  I think I'm ovulating, but no matter how much time DH and I spend "keeping each other warm", we won't get pregnant.  Dang, I'm a teenager's dream!  Go me!


Bottom line:  We are stuck at home . . . together . . . but we have wine . . . for now!