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| Pregnant with Dylan, 2010 |
We're trying to have a second baby. We've been trying since October, actually, but it isn't something you tell people until you succeed. Maybe that's why women who have been trying to have a baby feel like someone has stuck a knife in their gut when they see another one of their friends is pregnant. Our first reaction: fuck you, bitch. Our second: I'm so happy for you!
It's hard to make a child for anyone who is actually trying. I don't think those who accidentally get a BFP truly know the heartache of month after month of seeing only one line appear. I don't even think our significant others know the real extent of our emotional roller coaster. My husband thinks I'm absolutely crazy for stocking up on a 50-pack of pregnancy tests from eBay and actually running out of them in a month.
I've learned to put myself in a bubble. I've acclimated to the heartache of failure so that I no longer let it bother me. By the end of each month I am so tired of constantly wondering whether or not we might be pregnant that I find relief that I have a full carefree week when my cycle starts again.
This secretive baby making makes me question our society. The protocol is not to talk about the tough times, the heartaches, to announce the presence of a baby only when we are sure that the fetus has made it through the first risky trimester. Who are we protecting? Ourselves? Each other? I can't keep such a secret. Twenty minutes after we got our positive result when I was pregnant with Dylan, we were telling every member of our close family at a birthday party. Because they are our family and families are there for each other. Although I do understand how intimate a secret having a baby can be and I get that. I get that sometimes you want to hold that little secret for a little while longer before telling the world. I can see the romance in this. I see both sides.
Our society practices this hush-hush policy on a million topics. Homosexuality and abortions being the main two which pop into my mind. Only recently have women been stepping up to admit that they have had an abortion. Ben Fold's song Brick? About his girlfriend getting an abortion. But most of us ignore the things we don't want to hear and focus on the pretty music. Gays? They exist? Put them back in the closet and tell them not to come out again until they've figured out how to blow the opposite sex like the rest of us properly married Christian folk. If society had its way fifty years ago, even African Americans would be kept a secret if they had the option of hiding the black from their faces. If you are different you need not apply.
And look where we are.
We do not support each other as a culture; we judge.
We bully.
We tell people that because they don't fit the mold they should not be allowed to love, or to live, or to be proud to stand up for beliefs. We fight for a country with equal rights for all and then we place duct tape over the mouths of the ones fighting for freedom.
I call BS.
So I'm going to tell you that we are unsuccessfully trying to have a baby. And that's okay. Sometimes the good things come to those who wait.