I was reading the blog of a Nestie who has lost 3 babies, all in the first trimester, but babies nonetheless. I am so grateful I have never been through that, and so devastated for her.
I know it isn't the same, but I still mourn what could have been. When I was 17, C and I had a condom break at the wrong time of the month, and I went to a local clinic with sliding scale pay and got Plan B. I feel in my heart that I prevented a pregnancy, I could feel her presence even in the few days between her conception and what would have been implantation. She was in my dreams, and for many months and a few years after that, I would find myself thinking about how far pregnant I would have been, how old she would be, what she would look like. I wonder what it would be like to have a 7 year old and J at the same time. Would I have gone to college and graduate school? Where would C and I be now? I guess it's probably time to let her go, since she never "really" existed...and maybe she will come back to me someday.
I keep hoping, desperately I fear, that this mental state is temporary. I keep praying that it is only PPD, because that goes away. Right? I want it to go away. As time passes, though, I think it isn't temporary. I am going to be like this forever, and there's nothing I can do about it. I can take my meds, I can go see my midwives for follow up appointments, I could go see a shrink. It doesn't matter. I will always be a mess, I will always have heart palpitations, panic attacks, OCD, depression. I wish it would just leave me alone. I want to feel comfortable in my skin again, all the time, not just occasionally. I can't stop this. I can't control this. I hate this. I shouldn't be allowed to feel this way, I have a good life. I have a husband that loves me, a wonderful baby, a wonderful family, two wonderful dogs. What is wrong with me?
There's a game someone at work found that we've all been playing. It is fantastically addictive. The goal is to make a disease to wipe out the entire planet. It is called Pandemic 2, if anyone cares to attempt it. It's on website called Crazy Monkey Games. Good times.
I've taken my first (little) step toward getting certified to teach middle school science. I found the CO state website detailing the requirements, and printed out a page that lists the coursework I need to have taken. Now all I need to do is go though my transcripts to fill it out, and see where I am deficient. I think all I need is a physics class and 2 environmental science/astronomy/geology or something like that classes (though my honors thesis was in ecology, it doesn't count because I didn't actually take any courses specific to that field), which I *should* be able to get paid for by my work since we get a $2000 a year tuition reimbursement for things related to our job. I think I can swing it right... So maybe starting next Spring I can start working on it! I want to stay at my current job till we have baby #2 though, since by Oct of 2010 I will be able to take 12 weeks of paid leave.
Why middle school science and not high school? I have a number of reasons. One, a good friend of mine used to teach middle school. She had originally planned to teach high school, but she discovered that in high school you teach subjects; in middle school, you teach students. I want to teach students. My own middle school sucked. We were treated like criminals, all of us. I want to show my students that even though everything seems crazy (since really, adolescence is about as crazy as it gets), they can succeed and there are adults that can show them some respect and that care. I want to be the one to plant that little seed of "Oh, so that's how that works." Also, I have taught college students. I found them incredibly depressing to teach, because they are idiots. Not all of them are, but by and large I was disappointed in the entitlement they seemed to feel, the fact that most of my students couldn't write a sentence to save their lives. The few "stars" I had did not compensate for the many others that made me sad for the future of the world. High schoolers are too close to college kids, I think I would be disappointed in them, too. Middle schoolers are intelligent enough to understand a lot of things, but not so far gone that I would feel that my attempts to impart knowledge were futile. We will just have to see what happens with this!
Here are some roses in my garden.
I call this one "Imperfection."
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