Promise of the Somewhere Between

And just like that, sometimes your heart is just relieved of all of the anxieties and worries you've placed under it.

Just like that.



Although I've never been "opposed" to adoption, and I 100% believe in it and think it's a beautiful thing, IUI's and IVF and the good old fashioned way of making babies are a whole lot cheaper options, and that had always kind of been my plan. But post-last-days-of-being-29-heart-attack-freak-out, I stumbled into this documentary, and just watching the preview alone? I felt this sudden sense of peace and calm. And I got that just off the preview.

A lot of you who know me in real life probably don't know this, but my family kind of looks like the United Colors of Benetton. My sister's kids are Mexican, my cousin's on my mom's side are black, and my dad's family is Chinese. I just never think about it. It just is.

My aunt's second husband immigrated from China in the late 50's or maybe early 60's with a little boy. (The mother abandoned them or something. The story has always been somewhat unclear.) My aunt adopted and raised him and she and the husband had several children together as well. The oldest son who came from China is my cousin, he calls my aunt his mom, and he just IS my cousin. I never think about the fact he's not biologically related to anyone. I don't actually have any memories of meeting his dad at all and they have been divorced for 20+ years. It probably occurs to me about once every 10 years that technically, we're not actually related, and usually I remember this when I start to make a comment about how alike we are and it must be our genes. Erm.

He married a Chinese woman (pretty sure from China) and they have three children together.  My other [Chinese] cousins also all have [interracial Chinese] children. They all had red egg parties and did all of the usual cultural stuff. Mixed with you know, German traditions. The oldest son's wife used to pick all the honey off our honey baked ham every year, which always pissed off my aunt, and always made off with the expensive $4 cookies my dad would bring from the pricey bakery, which annoyed him. All in all we're a great big happy Chinese-German-Mexican-Afghani (cousin's husband) family.

Anyway. I watched this preview, just the preview alone and I just exhaled this huge sigh of relief. All of that pressure just blew out of me. I don't know why. I've never really felt strongly about adoption, and I can't really say that I do now either, but I feel like I was spiritually (and quite condescendingly I might add) patted on the head and told "It's going to be just fine. There's a whole plan in play no matter which route you go here. Whichever way you go, it is TOTALLY cool. Go on little grasshopper. Take your time. [pat, pat.]"

L o n g,    s l o w    e x h a l e.

I looked all over the internet to find a free copy of the film and I found TONS but all required I download an extra media thing to watch it, and I was spooked since I've had such had luck with this computer that I'm afraid to download any software on to this computer, so it took me 24 hours to commit since I'm having such financial issues, but as a sort of birthday gift, I spent $2.99 and rented the movie on Amazon. It's wonderful. It's called "Somewhere Between," and if they make it free on Prime I'm going to be pissed.

But right now I'm just so grateful I got to watch it because it was beautiful. I'm also, once again grateful for Sex and the City, my favorite show ever, and Charlotte, who adopted a Mandarin baby herself in the series finale. (With her Jewish husband after discovering she was barren with her Scottish 1st husband, who refused to explore adoption or fertility treatments with her.)  As Charlotte said after she and Harry had been disappointed once again in their journey to try and grow their family together (failed placement- yes, they showed a failed adoption placement on a show called "Sex and the City" for those of you spooked by the title) she smiles, kisses him on his cute balding forehead and says, "Honey, that wasn't our baby. Our baby is still coming. "

I've re-quoted that a million times to friends who were trying to conceive, and wiped tears from girlfriends eyes after negative pregnancy tests and chemical pregnancies and lost babies.

That wasn't the baby you were going to get to raise. Your baby is still coming.

My baby is still coming too.



This post was sickeningly positive, and in order to even the score, I'd like to say that someone said something nasty to me about my relationship with Matt that pissed me off. So there. (sticks tongue out.) It all evens out. I'm still glass half empty after all!

Dreams

Since the interview, I've been having some seriously weird dreams. First, it started off with this really intense dream about me being in labor with my baby. (A baby I am definetly not pregnant with at current time.) It was this really long, intense dream... I can't say much more about it than that. I remember I was wearing blue, and my hair was up. I think I was having a girl, and I was holding a pillow. I don't remember pain or anything, I just remember this feeling of calmness. We had things we were doing to get ready, and somebody was helping me with that and I was holding the pillow and standing around the house waiting- in labor. It was very strange.  My only real guess about this is that I have  alot of friends who are pregnant right now, and I have alot of interest in natural labor, but I've never dreamed about something like that before. Weird. A couple friends on facebook said I should write it down. It might be one of those pre-deja-vous things... Of course considering how I feel about having babies because of this whole experience with Matt, I don't know if that will ever happen.

Last night I had another odd dream... about reconciling with Matt. THAT is definitely not something I ever considered consciously. In my dream... we were all there talking.. the wife, him, some friend of theirs, in some beach house.. but it was a beach house with grass, like one you'd see on the east coast. And for some reason I was sneaking around it, and they come back to the house, and it's fine that I'm there, like the wife plops on the couch like she knew I'd be there, tired and we all talk. I sit next to Matt and he's holding my hands and trying to kiss me and I tell him no because I don't want to hurt her. She finally walks away and then the police come, who, interestingly enough is some random guy I went to high school with- Matt Fry- who I don't even know if he works in law enforcement. He comes and leads us outside, unbeknownst to Sydney and we all walk quickly around the outsode of the building and he advises Matt on how to leave her, and they talk about the abuse he has gone through, from one cop to another.  Then he runs to the back door of the house to get all of his stuff as quickly as possible before she makes a scence and it gets out of hand.

...I guess my subconscious found some loophole? He's being abused and that made him do it?? I don't know, I woke up confused. In all these months, I have never considered this ever, I have never wanted that, ever. The guy in that body in that house is NOT the person I was with. He just isn't. That person is gone and he has been since August 3rd, he died. He can't ever come back. One of the things I've struggled with in therapy is the statement "He's not coming home." I'll tell her I just want him to come home, and she'll answer with that and I just lose it. It's a really powerful statement to me and REALLY upsetting. I can barely stand to hear it. I don't know, I guess, last night, in my dream, my subconcious found a way to bring him home in a way that would be okay. (I don't even know if that would be okay, but it was okay with me in the dream.)

I don't know what to say. That's just what I dreamed.

"I want a Baby" on Lifetime

Did anyone else catch this? It was a really cool special. I'm only a couple minutes in, but I"m totally hooked. I haven't seen it before, but it's not marked as new, but it came out in 2011. Since I'm a tv addict, I'm surprised I missed it if this isn't the premiere. I had a hard time finding any trace of it online, and there was nary a mention of it on Lifetime's website until I hand went through their tv schedule and found it, which had no information anyway.

The show follows several couples trying to expand or start their families through IVF, adoption, surrogacy, anything else you can think of. It's really detailed, shows costs, closes up of injections, everything. Up close and personal of how it really is. The woman doing surrogacy lost boy/girl twins she seemed to have conceived naturally and now can't carry children herself. The IVF'er works in nursing in pediatrics or the NICU or something (just missed it). It's a great show. If you can track it down, watch it!

Hope

First, one of my good friends went into labor with her baby girl night before last.

She had a baby boy.

...

We have all been having lots of fun with that one. I don't think anyone is ever going to get tired of talking about it. And I cannot WAIT to hear about it directly from "Mommy." :) Young man doesn't have a name yet, but I am SUPER excited to hear what it will be, and I had lots of fun combing every baby website I could think of trying to find little boy stuff the night he was born. (Yes Shirlene, your mailman will be attacking you, courtesy of me. Sorry! It was compulsive. I hope it helps with the enormous task you now have at hand trading your beautiful hot pink baby girl stuff in for boy stuff! Really, I think of the receipients of my shopping binges as victims more than anything else. LOL)

...

I was driving home, in heavy fog the night after this sweet baby snuck into this world. Some song was playing on the radio and I just felt overcome. (Per usual.) I put my hand on my belly and cried. On the one hand I could almost feel the spirit of Shirlene's pregnant motherly body becoming my own- meaning, I could almost imagine myself being with child at that moment- I could almost feel it, dream it, picture it. Almost. Something I haven't been able to do. (You have to give me credit for admitting this because I feel nuts saying it like this! What am I, some kind of new age hippie taking on 'spirits'? LOL I hope you can get what I am TRYING to say... Not very well I might add...) At the same time I instantly felt robbed because I just can't. I can't be a Mom. I can't be someone's mother because in order to do that I have to allow myself to trust and love someone as a spouse first. And trust that person enough that I would allow myself to bring an innocent child into our marriage and into this world without doubt that anything would happen to it. At this time, I don't for a second believe that.

Driving in the car, in the fog, not being able to see ahead, and just totally living in the moment, for just a second... I felt that "someday baby" in my belly... and cried for having hope. But I couldn't even fully feel the hope because even as I was feeling that emotion, I was also feeling the anger of what had happened, the mistrust I have of both other people, and of myself, and of my dis-desire to return to those sweet dreams I have so coveted my whole life.

At the same time, I am so grateful for each of these sweet new babies that are born every day, and the people that are brave enough to give them life. I am so proud of you for taking on the task of motherhood and everything that it entails. I dream that I will one day dream of that life again. I am grateful for your faith, trust and love in the world and your relationships when you chose to bring these babies home. I aspire to you. I aspire to your faith.





...

After listening to this song play over and over and over again on the promos on cable I admit it, I was hooked and I sought it out on YouTube so I could listen to it's full length. Taylor Swift's channel has apparently been malfunctioning or been overused or something for the last two days because I haven't been able to get anything by her host (even by other artists) to play for the last two days. Since I've been up all night the last two nights editing Shirlene's maternity pictures and posting the pictures over on my work blog, I needed the music and have devoted some serious time trying to get the darn thing to play. In desperation, I turned to You Tube artists. And I think I found something I might like even MORE than the original. Really! This is a duet sung by Julia Sheer and Tyler Ward, with the latter on guitar. They are great and I really love her voice.