I am sure I will write several posts on this topic, as I imagine my emotions are going to be all over the place for the next while.
But I feel the need to document how this first trimester has been.
I wrote about the physical things in the first trimester in my last post, but now I want to talk about the emotional side.
This has been a roller coaster the past 3 months. Sometimes, it was really, really hard.
Not only am I going through the normal first trimester crap (nausea, barfing, exhaustion, mood swings.. etc.), but I am experiencing some of the hardest emotions I have ever felt. It's hard to even put them to words. But I will try.
When I found out I was pregnant, I screamed. I cried, I laughed, I ran around. I was so freaking excited. About a week later is when things started to get weird. I think it was all triggered by us moving into a new apartment. I have said several times that the reason I haven't loved living in our new place is because it's smaller and not as nice as our old one. But after a lot of reflection, I don't think that's the reason at all.
We moved into our old apartment because Madelyn was coming in a couple months and we needed an extra bedroom. I fell in love with that place. It was open and bright and new and perfect. I loved decorating Madelyn's nursery. Not everyone knows, but the week before she died, Nathan and I spent the entire weekend decorating her nursery, putting together the furniture, and getting everything ready for her arrival. All her clothes were washed and put away. She had blankets and sheets on her bed. Her walls were covered with crafts I had worked on. Her bookcase was stocked with books. Her room was exactly the way I had imagined it.
When we came home from the hospital with no baby, the decorations came off the walls, and I couldn't look in the closet and in the drawers to see the perfectly folded baby clothes that she would never wear. But the furniture stayed up, and the clothes and books stayed in their place. I couldn't give up. I was going to have a baby. I was going to bring it home to that room. And we were going to meet Nathan down town for lunch every day. And go on lots of summer hikes. I was going to have my dream. I couldn't let it go. I became obsessed.
As we finally realized we had to leave that apartment, I started to realize I had to give up my dream. We took apart her crib. We packed up her clothes. I cried for days.
The day before we moved, I found out I was pregnant. As we got settled in our new place, I began to realize something: this wasn't my dream. My dream was bringing Madelyn home to our old apartment at the beginning of summer. Not bringing home some unknown baby to a different apartment (where there isn't even a nursery to decorate) at the beginning of Fall. Everything was wrong. "This baby isn't going to be Madelyn." I cried for days as those words repeated in my head. I was shocked at how shocking I found that realization.
I wish I could say that I have fully coped with giving up this dream and that I am just now a completely normal, happy pregnant lady. But I'm not. Things have gotten a lot better. It was so fun to hear the heartbeat and to get to share the news. That certainly lifted my spirits a ton! A lot of the time, I feel pure joy and excitement, but there are also times where I just feel strange. My dream is still Madelyn. I pray that I can completely move on, and I know I will, but right now, I just want her. I am slowly building a connection with this new baby. I know when I know the sex and feel it move, it will be even stronger. I am so freaking glad to be pregnant, and to get to have this baby. But sometimes, all my mind can focus on is how unfair it is that I don't get Madelyn. I miss her so much. I built my dreams and my future around her. And I will never hold her. Not in this life, at least. That's so unfair. That's something that should never happen to a parent. My parents love when all their kids are home. My dad always talks about having "all his kids under one roof." I won't ever have that. There will always be someone missing. It's the worst hole to carry around; a hole that can't be filled.
I also have trouble getting excited sometimes because I feel like I will never get to bring a baby home. Nathan and I had to wait so long to get married, and I had been ready for babies for years at that point. It seemed so surreal that we were pregnant with Maddie. It didn't seem fair that we got to have a baby. I would always say, "I just can't believe that we will have a baby here with us in a few months!" And then we didn't have a baby with us. Just a lot of pain. I cannot convince my mind that I will be having and keeping a baby in October. It's like I feel like I am destined to always be pregnant, and never have a baby. Always a bridesmaid, never a bride. But a much more twisted version.
We find out the sex next week. I am so excited for that. That's when Madelyn really became real, and I am hoping the same thing will happen with this baby. I should be feeling those little kicks soon too! Although, feeling the baby move will bring a whole new can of anxiety that I don't even want to think about. Things get better the further the pregnancy moves along. There are more excited days and less tears. I hope you won't think I am a horrible person for this post. I don't mean to sound like an ungrateful pregnant woman. I know I will love this baby more than I can ever imagine. But letting go of my Maddie is harder than I ever thought it could be.
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