Life and Death

I haven’t posted in a while and for good reason. I’ve been pretty sick for the last couple of months and exhausted to boot. However, there’s a good reason for that, too. In late February, I found out I was pregnant again!

I am very excited but, after the miscarriage in November, very cautious as well. It’s been hard to be fully happy about it because I’m always afraid it’s going to end. Well, I’m 11 weeks along now, almost into the second trimester and feeling a little more optimistic. I was about 9 weeks along when I miscarried last time. People know now, and I hope there’s no reason to bring bad news. I am ready to be a mom to a second child again. There is so much to think about, but I’ll probably put it most of it off for a while.

It has been fun, though, to buy some maternity clothes (I am a few sizes smaller than I was when I got pregnant with DS and already showing a bit!). Other than that, all those wonderful first trimester symptoms have kept me home a lot and in bed a good deal of the time. We’ll see how long the nausea, etc., last this time. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the whole thing!

I have my first appointment with my midwife Monday. I’m hoping to hear the heartbeat for the first time, which will be terrific. Besides all my symptoms and my growing belly, it will be a very concrete way of saying, “Hello, little one!”

We are planning a homebirth, and I’m thinking more and more on the possibility of waterbirth or at least laboring in the water, where I find great comfort.



On a more somber note, in the past two days, two friends of the family have passed away.

Max was a friend of my extended family and was always a “grandfatherly” figure towards me. He always had a smile for me and was very sweet, even when I was an ornery kid. He lived next door to my own grandparents for many, many years and was just an extended part of the family. His wife Jean, a very sweet and loving woman, has lost her son-in-law, daughter, and husband now in the past year and a half. My heart goes out to her and the rest of her family.

Evelyn was a friend of my husband’s family. She had a vivacious personality and was very opinionated, but she was also very giving and generous even when things were tough in her life. She always brought a little something over for DS whenever we visited my husband’s parents and also helped them out as much as she could. She had a heart transplant (in her 70s) a couple of years back. She just died today, and it was very sudden. She knew something was wrong, but it apparently did not seem too severe, so she went to the doctor and hospital. The doctors knew there was some heart damage but were still trying to determine what the exact problem was when she died, quite unexpectedly. (This is the story I got from my husband, who talked with his mother just an hour or so ago.) She will be missed, and we were very sorry to hear about her death. It also reminds me of how you just never know when someone is not going to be here the “next time.”

Treasure every moment.