The Last Night. (37w3d)

A few years ago, I did a guided meditation-- as hokey as it sounded to find my "inner temple," I was looking for some spiritual guidance, and I liked the idea of creating my own mental safe space that looked and felt beautiful and comforting.

What I came up with, sitting on the floor leaning against my bed with my eyes closed, was  a small lake surrounded on three sides by a grove of trees. At the far end of the lake was a cave with a large rock set to either side of it, and above the cave was a tree-- it was like the cave was built into the side of a sloped hill. A gentle waterfall came down the front of the cave's entrance.

I walked across the shallow lake, stepping on smooth stones at the bottom of the clear, ankle-deep water. I approached the entrance to the cave... and then, to my right, I saw something I wasn't expecting.

There was a little dark-haired girl, probably about six years old, sitting on the rock swinging her legs. She smiled impishly at me. Behind the rock, there seemed to be another child, but I couldn't see him or her-- it was someone shy and hard to get a read on.

I was confused, since the whole point of an inner temple was, according to my book, to have a personal and private inner space to visit to find peace and contentment, but I figured letting my mind wander freely and see what it saw was all part of the point of the exercise, so I walked through the waterfall and entered the cave.

When I stepped out of the cave, I passed under the waterfall again, but this time a sharper spray of water hit me. I looked up and realized that the impish girl had kicked a spray of water at me. I chuckled and said, "Uh oh, I'm going to get you!" and started to climb the rocks on the side of the cave.

I got to the top of the cave by the tree, but she was a bit too far off by then for me to catch her. The other child had already scampered away as well. But before the little girl completely vanished, I heard her call behind her-- "You're not supposed to meet me yet!"

Needless to say, none of this was covered by the book, and I opened my eyes feeling a bit surprised and confused. I thought back on the experience for a few minutes and came to the conclusion that, as strange as it seemed, I may have been envisioning future children.

"You're not supposed to meet me yet."

This phrase carried me for a while through infertility. If it was at all possible that there was some chance I'd had a prophetic vision of some sort, even though I felt silly even admitting it to myself because normally that sort of thing just isn't my style, then I felt like I could survive the seemingly endless cycles of wishing, trying and failing. "Yet" meant that there would be a time, someday, where I could meet that little girl, and the elusive child who was always hiding behind her.

I didn't forget about the vision, but after a while, I put it away for a bit. Sometimes it just felt like something I couldn't really trust, and maybe it was stupid and I'd just made it up anyways... who would take a guided meditation into a magic outdoor temple with a lake full of stones seriously, anyways? Maybe someone flaky and gullible and desperate, but not me. I'd been through enough already and was starting to feel like the measurable and practical was more reliable, even if it was far too often disappointing.

When we finally got that first positive test, I held my breath through a series of blood tests to establish a safe, doubling-or-more beta that showed a viable pregnancy. I released that breath a little at our seven week ultrasound, when two of the smallest little dark circles popped up immediately when the probe went in and I shouted out, "There's two!" I released a little more of that breath at our eleven week ultrasound to check for Down syndrome markers-- an ultrasound I requested specifically so I could see the girls again-- and again at eighteen weeks when we found out we were having two little girls, and again at twenty-two weeks after a car accident on the highway prompted a non-stress test... There have been a series of tests and ultrasounds and Dopplers to measure the girls' health and heart rates and growth, and all served to give Husband and myself a chance to relax just a bit and know that, right now, in this moment, the girls are okay. And it was enough to help me, at least, to the next day.

Infertility makes you a little paranoid. I really haven't trusted my body at all during this whole process-- I can't help but feel like there's no possible way I could be a viable host to two small creatures that will come out as actual, breathing, moving people who will someday have preferences and opinions and autonomy and will not be a physical part of me anymore. But somehow, we've made it this far.

Today we had a routine non stress test, and despite having great heart rates and moving around quite a bit, Susie wasn't having the fifteen-second heart rate accelerations the doctor wanted to see. They sent us over to the hospital for a biophysical profile ultrasound, and after two hours of rolling from one side to the other trying to get pictures of the girls, and another hour combined of miscellaneous waiting around, we were sent home. Then the doctor called us five minutes after we got back and told us that while Susie looked pretty good, Lulu's growth was declining. One ultrasound months ago had both girls at the 70th percentile, the next had Lulu at the 35th, the last had her at the 19th, and at today's she was only in the 2nd percentile. The doctor recommended that we move our c-section from Tuesday to tomorrow morning.

So... we did. And then we looked at each other like, "Wow, what did we just do?"

We'd been preparing for this possibility, and I was pretty sure this was what would happen, so I worked hard to suppress my usual need to be emotional and analytical about everything (obviously failing now) and tried to find a peace with the whole "your life will change forever tomorrow" aspect of this decision. I maintained zen for about an hour while calling my mom and other family while Husband posted on Facebook.

After that first hour, the doctor called again with "some bad news." She said, "while they have room to schedule you for a c-section tomorrow, the girls will be born a little early still and it turns out the special care nursery is totally full. We have to move your c-section at 10am at Hospital X to an 8:30am appointment at Hospital Y, which has a NICU. Is that okay?"

What could we say? We said yes.

But it threw me. I had a vision of the hospital that we knew, the one our doctors went to, the one we toured and got pre-op paperwork on. I knew the visiting hours, the procedures, the rules... I have friends who delivered there. I thought I would deliver there. It was enough to shake my zen a bit.

Then I looked online to try to find out anything I could about Hospital Y, and it turns out they only let visitors in from 1-9pm. Our surgery is at 8:30am. I called and asked if my mom could come in, and was told "Grandparents and siblings can visit, but not while you're in the recovery area," and that I'd be in the recovery area for "maybe a few hours."

I managed to hold in the tears until I got off the phone with the nurse. Poor Husband left to pick up dinner and I was fine, and he came home to me all messy and blubbering into half a roll of toilet paper.

A few hours have passed since then, and Husband has been amazing and got me into a shower to clear my head (mentally and physically-- I was so swollen and stuffed up from crying that I couldn't breathe well enough to eat my dinner). I talked to my mom and made sure everyone knew the new location and hours, my mom calmed me down a bit, I ate some food, and now... I guess it's all fine. I mean, parenthood means things aren't always predictable and reliable, right? Maybe this is just part of me learning that. I don't like it, and I know tomorrow morning it'll have me feeling a lot less secure and comfortable than I was hoping to be, but I'll get through it.

Either way, in less than twelve hours, I will be a mom. And I will finally be ready to meet my girls.