Then & Now

People often look forward on New Year's, but I do not. I remember.
I will always remember what I was doing on this day.

Six years ago today I had my first embryo transfer. I was scared. I was nervous. I was trying to be optimistic. But, quite honestly, I was over it all. I had so much anxiety that there would be a natural disaster or we would have car trouble and not make it to the clinic on time that I could barely think straight. My spirit was dying, I felt all alone, and those words don't even begin to describe how desperate and hopeless I was feeling at the time. But I definitely remember it.

It was a scary, anxiety-soaked IVF cycle due to my own mental health. I was barely hanging on. It was really bad. I was doing IVF after three back-to-back unsuccessful medicated IUIs. I never wanted to do IVF but had decided to try anyway. I traveled with my medications and syringes to my sister's house five hours away for an early Xmas celebration with my family. I traveled home and had my egg retrieval. I waited and waited and waited. They got a small number of eggs, fewer fertilized, and only two were still going strong on the day of transfer. So that's what we transferred. On New Year's Day. 2015.

Six long and short years ago.

So much has happened since then. Not motherhood of course, not for me. But everything else. 

(Selling my house I bought for my children. Going back to school for a new career. Losing my dog. Getting divorced. Enduring a pandemic. Moving four times, within two states and among two big cities and two small towns. Getting a full-time job in my old career. Finding a part-time job in my new career. Developing an unshakeable inner resolve and self-confidence. Landing a full-time job in my new career. Quitting that full-time job. Currently recovering from that experience. And soon I will look ahead as to how I want to financially support myself next... I finally live where I want to live so I will take it from there. Er, here.)

So, yes, the future is open.
But, for me, today isn't about that. 

Today is about remembering. And honoring what wasn't. And honoring what came from that.

I carry my losses with me daily as my grief ebbs and flows. 

I honor and feel my feelings without judgment. (Ok, I try to anyway lol.)

There is now room for light. 

I have energy for enthusiasm. 

I love myself and I like my life.

I am here now.

*****

After sitting in our dark holes for however long we need to, 

(and while still grieving) 

We Can All 

RISE 

from the ashes of our destroyed dreams 

and create a life we want to live.