Where does the time go

We will walk on a hill
Red hats and blue coats, and everything still.
Snow will cover until
We can't tell the sky from the ground.
Where are the buildings, the old wounds of mine?
Did I ever once cry?

Waiting for you to arrive,
Where does the time go?

                        - The Innocence Mission

Last week, I found myself in the first of my antenatal classes (session one: early labour & pain relief). Because of the house move takes outside the boundary line for my previous clinic, I was forced to change GP surgeries (farewell, Dr Best Friend) and thus am a little late in gettig signed up and started on the classes.  Consequently, I was the second-most pregnant person there.  Also, seemingly for the number of weeks, the largest.

The new surgery is located in a slightly posher area of the city, so the attendees were similarly rather upscale.  All the other women seemed to be tall & well-groomed, lots of shiny hair and manicured nails, wearing cute little trendy tops over relatively neat rounded bumps.  One girl even had on lovely spangly silver sandals.  I on the other hand, am short and presently look like I am carrying around an oversized beach ball in my midriff.  It probably didn't help that I was wearing a slightly too small shirt that day, and it was straining over the bump.  Also I could not get comfy on the hard plastic folding chairs provided, and sat squirming for an hour and half while all the other madonnas reclined serenely. 

The midwife went around the room and asked everyone to say what we liked and didn't like about being pregnant. I was next to last, so had plenty of time to listen to everyone else's catalogue of joys & woes. When it came to my turn, there was part of me that wanted to shout: "How can there be anything bad?  What's not to like?  I'm still walking around on cloud nine that this has happened all!"  And then of course I stammered something about there being highs & lows throughout (morning sickness early on, total sleep deprivation at present- but happy! very happy!) Then I realised that traitorous as that feels sometimes, it is the truth- and one of these days I am going to learn to stop apologising for having normal reactions to the essential discomforts of pregnancy. 

Fortunately, I did not have time to dwell too much on the never-ending dichotomy of the pregnant infertile, because the demonstration of a plastic baby rammed into a life-sized plastic model pelvis was so riveting.

Some of you have noted the apparent swift passage of time- as you might expect, because it's been happening to me, some days it feels like months gone in the blink of an eye and other days it seems as if I have been pregnant f-o-r-e-v-e-r as well.  There was a large chunk of time round about the halfway mark where it seems like the days were dragging, that everything was suspended in molasses, and all I did was wait- wait to move house, wait for a scan, wait for a test result, wait to go off on maternity leave, wait for the baby to arrive. Lately though it seems as if I am trapped on the fastest luge run in Olympic history, and it all seems to be going way, way too quickly.

I remember extremely well when I was in the waiting room of infertilty- where everything seems to take longer than it should- tests, appointments, the start of an IVF cycle, the two week limbo.  It seemed then like everyone around me was popping out babies with lightening fast speed.  Friends produced one child, then two- in the time I was taking to even produce two lines on a pregnancy test. And I watched as all their milestones passed, feeling like such a spectator, a wistful bystander. When you're stuck in the trenches with no end in sight, everyone else's nine months (and all the days thereafter) seem to go by so seamlessly.  I know now from the other side that it doesn't really quite work that way, but the memory is still so fresh in my mind.

If there is one thing that I take away from the whole experience of infertility, it is that feeling of watching precious time slip through my fingers, with all that pent up expectation and longing. And so even I could never possibly sum this up in a few sentences for a roomful of glamorously pregnant strangers- the best thing about this pregnancy is that I feel, I really do begin to believe, that there will be something at the end of this- that there is finally something to hope for. 

Comments

[thalia]

I'm so glad that's where you are. You're certainly close enough to have good reason to believe you're in the home strait.

I outed myself re infertility to my antenatal class and didn't even get a blink, they all just looked blank and moved on to the next woman. Until the class leader had a go at me about how given my age and blah and blah I should be taking better care of myself. Cheers. I think your approach sounds a lot more sensible.

[Gil]

The passage of time is the bane of my existence at the moment. I, like so many others, am still stuck in the "trenches" and just trying to get through month after month and not break down. It's a very difficult burden to bear, this infertility thing. And it is, for some reason, not socially acceptable is it? That is probably why you didn't want to jump from the rooftops in that general discussion about the highs and lows of IF... heavens knows who could or could not relate. Either way, I'm so glad for you that things are coming together and I wish I could slow down your time so you could enjoy the specialness of the moments you are in. Enjoy them as much as you can though, for all of us!

[laughing mommy]

Your beautiful writing took me back in my mind to my first pregnancy (unexpected also) and the horrible waiting and feeling that if something happened to the pregnancy I would go back to being infertile again.

The words "pregnant infertile" sums up my first pregancy (at least in my mind) perfectly.

I cannot wish you enough happiness and joy and a perfectly healthy baby.

[Jill]

Everything you are feeling sounds just right. Try to get some rest...I know, a ridiculous thought.

[Misty]

I am very happy for you. I hope the birth is quick and easy. Have you toured the hospital yet? I wondered if they had labor tubs, those are so wonderful.

Just by happenstance the song playing on my iTunes just now was Flowers in the Window by Travis. I smiled reading your post, because the song seemed to fit.

[carosgram]

Are you in the house? Is the phone hooked up? Good to read you again. By the by, part of the joys of pregnancy is the complaining. It is part of the club rules. Enjoy every aspect of it.

[laura]

Wow. I get it. And there will absolutly be something wonderful at the end of this for you. Be careful not to let the time with baby slip through your fingers. I found that I often 'wish away' the current baby phase, hoping for the next. Sit and dwell in each wonderful moment.

[Lut C.]

Very well put. That time spent in depression was such a waste, but I couldn't help it at the time. What scares me is that if something goes wrong now it will be back in flash. I don't dwell on that too often, and am glad to see you too are feeling happy and hopeful more than anything else.

8 more weeks and a house to finish! Gah!

[Em]

This post brought back the feelings that I haven't thought of for a while. Baby Akimbo is 14 months old and I take it for granted, much to my shame. I remember thinking everyone in my NCT class was different. They got pregnant easily and never even questioned it wouldn't happen. And that home straight - such an exciting, scary and magical time. There is everything to hope for.

[Amyesq]

Wow, that you are in that class at all is just amazing and wonderful. Not so much longer now.

[Kell]

Have been reading for years, commenting occasionally.. sometimes I check in less these days; but I still come back to make sure all is well! Wanting to wish you the best for the future, enjoy the amazing ride. xx

[Nic T]

NCT Classes - such a luxuriant joy - I loved mine, or the fact that I got pregnant enough to go! I remember that poor dolly being shoved through the pelvis too... I didn't refer to my fertility probs in teh NCT class until I knew the people a bit better - it may be that they did understand more than they showed at the time. Now I have a bump and I feel people's eyes on me, as I mooch around in my little maternity outfits, I know some people will be hating me as I hated bumps when I had lost mine; I want to wear a T shirt acknowledging this fact, even if I can't feel their pain to the same extent any more. Anyway I suppose I'm saying that as we all know you can't assume people don't understand any more than you can assume they do, if you know what I mean. Hoping the baby does a shimmy and gets lined up for a nice clean exit!