Nothing is Quite Perfect

Today, I saw baby Jones move! Wow. The heartbeat, once again, is 158bpm. Yey! Thank you, God. Here's how it went:

She come in and talks to me. She asks me about Sunday (see Surviving 12th Week). She says she wants to have a "look." She tells me they found three small fibroids during my last exam (Boo, WTH! Not feeling that). She informs me that they may grow as the pregnancy progresses. (Sounds like some garbage. Those fibroids need to stay on their end.) While doing a "look see," she tells me that my pelvic exam came back questionable. (Boooo! WTF!) She wants to do a colposcopy next time. She had to remind me what that was. It's the scope to look up close at my cervix (Booo, again!) This doesn't register very well. I'm really tired, I'd been nappying before she came in the room and I've got a speculum in my business! I have her repeat the info and ask a few questions (not enough questions, I'll likely be calling her tomorrow).

We move on to the baby. OB pulls out the heart monitor thing that looks like a kid's microphone and starts looking for the heartbeat. Nope, nope, nope. I got a tinge nervous when she couldn't find the heartbeat with that stupid thing. I'm sure she could tell. Then she brought in the portable ultrasound and we were in business! I saw the baby move(!!!), I saw the heart fluttering, I saw the 158bpm read on the screen. Nice, steady, little heart. Good job, baby! Funny thing, after finding the baby, she went back to the stupid "kid's microphone" contraption and found the heartbeat again. So, so nice to hear this baby's heartbeat. Seeing the heartbeat is nice but hearing it is gorgeous. It's like, "say hello to my little friend" but in a good way. LOL! I have now seen my baby wave a hand, I think, and have heard her heart(no, I don't know the gender). Almost perfect!

Of course, I was a bit shaken by the fibroids and the abnormal pap (BOOOO!). In fact I was upset! I finally cried in my car with my head on my steering wheel after I parked behind DDH. That helped. I was angry and frustrated and tired of cervical drama (1999, 2008 and now this?). I was just outdone. I talked to a friend who has had baby losses. That helped. I left DDH and drove around campus. I talked to another friend who has had many threats upon her cervix and uterus. She also helped. I parked and cried in my car some more while she and I talked. I talked to my husband. I called my girlfriend back. We laughed and talked more. I also talked to my big/little sister/mentor. That helped too.

The talks all went well. Besides swearing and crying, there were good words/phrases like:

Hope. Nothing is ever perfect. We'll get through this. It will turn out fine no matter what. We don't have to wait for things to be perfect to live a good life. I still believe. In the midst of the worst things I can imagine, I still believe. I can't help it. I just do. I believe that I am loved by God. I have to keep going. We cannot judge our success by what we do not yet have. We are still alive. There is more good to come. We are not failures. Even if it's not better right away, even if something goes wrong before it get's better, I can still get there. I'm not dead yet, so I have not used up all my chances. I am living the life I am supposed to live and it's not over yet. This is a process.

It's a lot of hodgepodge with no true background story but I trust that you will get from it what you need to get. I know all of us can become disheartened by our not quite perfect lives. - Good spouse, no money. Great money, no spouse. Awesome baby, personal issues. Great opportunities but paralyzed by fear and struggling to seize them. Supportive friends & family, crippling self-esteem. - It's never going to be quite perfect. We can't always wait until we feel better to get on with life. We have to start and trust that the healing (or whatever you are needing) will happen on the way. You will never be perfect (life will NEVER be perfect) but on your best day, you are like Lucky Charms leaving joy and prizes in your wake. On your best day, you have a halo of sunlight about 5 feet in diameter and you warm everyone you meet. On one apostle's best day, he healed people with his shadow! It is important to note, that on your worst day, you may forget the miracles and this, my friend, is why we have community and scripture and the Spirit to remind us. Nothing is ever quite perfect but perfection is not a criteria for miracles!

We still have our whole lives to live and to love and to do God's work. So, we forge ahead. You with me?

Pregnancy Paranoia at 11 weeks.

There is a certain amount of paranoia associated with pregnancy. Most of it, in my case, is associated with baby loss. I had a subchorionic hemorrhage in the first trimester of my first pregnancy. Thank God Lawrence was just fine.

My second pregnancy was ectopic. I KNEW I was pregnant but my period started on the right day. I was sad about being mistaken but the longer I bled, the more I knew it just didn't look right. It continued past the normal 7 days, and continued and it became clear that I was pregnant or had been and that something was very wrong. It took me a really long time to recover mentally from that loss. I even had a name picked out. Around the time I lost this baby, another friend had just started telling folks that she was pregnant. It was beautiful and difficult. She had unknowingly chosen the same name for her baby that I had chosen for mine. I was really looking forward to the birth of her baby and then at 40 weeks, he died. It was so crazy! I lost mine to an ectopic pregnancy very, very early and she lost hers to a crazy thing that no one could have foreseen at 40 weeks.

I have entered the 11th week of my 3rd pregnancy. I am so thankful that the only complication so far is a painless UTI. I look forward to the months to come. I won't say that I'm fully cured of my paranoia though. But I do have plan for dealing with most things that could go wrong. I've gone over some of it in my head, at least. My biggest concern in this area is my big boy, Lawrence. I haven't told him yet and I won't. I want him to just notice that I'm pregnant. I am not telling him, ainly, because I wouldn't want to have to tell him sad news if something happened. I know, all kids get sad news, he has even been to a few funerals and a wake but this is different. So I have decided to wait until he figures it out. I think he is going to be a great, big brother. I just need some more time to "feel" safe and to look pregnant.

Grow, 11 week-fig-sized baby, grow.