We've Come A Long Way

Saturday morning... the smell of cinnamon muffins and hot coffee, baby's sleeping, all is well. The only thing missing from this picture is my poor husband, who is on his 8th straight day of work at the new job. Hopefully they can resolved their staffing issues soon and he can get some days off.

Remember when Saturday mornings used to be my belly shots and progress reports? And even before that it was often a time for peeing on pregnancy tests. It's crazy how all consuming TTC and pregnancy are... then childbirth is like the blink of an eye (at least in hindsight it is!) and here we are. The whole process seems somehow surreal when I stop to think about it. That second line on the pee stick - that was Miles. That little peanut on the 8 week scan, Miles. The kicky little bean at the NT scan who I fervently hoped would be normal and healthy - my baby boy, napping just two feet away from me now, as healthy and happy as I could have ever dared to hope.

I sometimes think about all those fearful feelings and moments of panic during my pregnancy and how it all ended up being such perfection. I remember sitting in Dr. J's exam room with Mr. Ibis, terrified as we waited to hear a heartbeat for the first time. I remember the time I went to work and breathed in epoxy fumes and freaked out that I'd damaged the baby in some way. I remember how much I wished I could just fast forward through that anxious time when he was inside, invisible, unknown, when his life seemed so fragile and tenuous and frighteningly mysterious to me. And here we are.

It does not escape my attention how lucky I am. At times when I think of losing our first baby, I wonder a little, how could we have been so sad, when we had this coming our way? As if we could have somehow known that Miles was destined to be. And of course we didn't. We didn't know, really, if we would ever have a baby at all.

I think of all the women out there still soldiering on through the two week waits - especially the ones with lost babes in their hearts - and I so wish I could promise you all, one year from now you will be holding your baby. One year from now you will be shopping for diapers instead of OPKs. I wish I could say that for sure. I can't. But I will say this: it's so worth it. All the failures, all the fear, all those moments of laying back on an exam table and fearing the worst, and the end result is every bit as wonderful as I'd imagined it could be.

When you enter Nebraska on the interstate coming from the East, you see a big sign with a simple motto: The Good Life. Indeed it is.