Not Alone

Oh crap. They came back.
Not for long, but they came back none the less.

They came back to try and wreck the awesome new hope that has been with me (still is for the most part) as of late. They came back like unwelcome, yet familiar, creeps who steal and bully and really know how to wreck a party.

I know you guys know what I am talking about, I know they visited some of you guys too this weekend...

G. & I have a really great group of friends- we are five couples, pretty close in age and length of marriage. We are all pretty similar in so many ways, except one glaring difference, the other couples all either have two children (yes, a boy and a girl...) and the one couple who have a boy (our godson) is now trying for their second.

I know this because on Saturday night we had, yet another, bday party for one of their children and our friend was telling us (women) how frustrated she was that after 4 months of trying, she still wasn't pregnant. The others (including me) gave her the usual "oh, don't worry, take a holiday, relax, blah, blah, blah..."Some chimed in with the ever popular, "not me, just get that thing near me and I am knocked up"...blah, blah, blah...fuckin blah.

At some point, she did say she "felt guilty talking like this in front of me" (thanks) but that "she was an impatient person" and somehow that this made it more difficult for her.?!!?

Then, stomach clenched, G & I watched as they gathered up their children, put them in their pajamas for the ride home, gave out the loot bags (no loot bag here) and picked them up in their arms to head home.

By the time I got in the car, I didn't have anything bundled up in my arms, but I sure had a bunch of bullies on my fuckin back. They sat in the back seat of our car and taunted me:
"Still none for you eh?? Year after year, you guys get to go home alone, yup, to your quiet house, empty room that you foolishly still call the 'babies room'?? Ha!! How old would they be now?? Four and three?"

Needless to say, we started our ride just listening to them in silence. Then G. broke it by saying he knew it wasn't easy, but that they (our friends, not the gremlins in the back) loved us, and wanted the best for us. He went on to say that he was truly worried about me-my pain- and felt that at times, I suffered quietly, not wanting to let anyone know how depressed I might be.

I don't think I am any more depressed than anyone would be who had grieved the losses that we have had over the last 4 years.
I do not think I am any more depressed than anyone would be who longed for something at such a deep level that they couldn't imagine living without it.
I do not think I am more depressed than anyone who had given up their career in hopes of giving her "all" to achieve something that still eluded her.
I am no more depressed than would be cured by two pink lines on a pee test (mine or R's!!!)

I felt such an emotional hangover after Saturday's party that made me want to sleep forever.

Instead, I got up, prayed for our friend to have all that she dreamed of, meditated on Gods abundance and tried to remember all the possibilities that lay ahead of us.

R. reminded me of those possibilities Sunday as she read me her fortune cookie from the night before:
"Good News is Coming Your Way."

Perhaps she was reading this message as the gremlins were trying to make me buy their's.

To all those who got "the visit" this weekend: You are Not Alone.
I will be with you and as I remind you that although our pain is real, the hopelessness is not, I will be reminding myself the same thing.
It just isn't. It is like believing the sun doesn't exsist on a cloudy day. The sun does exsist, I just can't see it. But I know that if I took a plane above the clouds, there it would be. Shining bright.

There, thanks.
I am back.
Operation Happiness continues.