Not Used to Being Delicate

It’s a frustrating conundrum – the wanting to talk to someone about my feelings, mixed with the need to keep it a private hurt. I can’t tell my girlfriends or my mother, can’t share with them the constant longing for my baby girl. How do you talk about something like this with someone who’s never been through it? They can’t care as much as I want them to, their lives don’t revolve around this loss, their minds don’t constantly harp on what happened. I tried to talk to online support groups, but I’m too private of a person. Who the hell knows who I’m talking to online, could be some psycho pretending to be an almost-mom like me.

Almost-mom. I spent 6 months of my life preparing to be a mother, reading every book I could get my hands on, talking to my own mama, looking up various mom-related topics online. Scott bought me a Mother’s Day present, and I felt like I deserved it. I was so looking forward to seeing what it felt like to breastfeed, rock a crying baby to sleep, kiss and cuddle the child Scott and I made. I wanted to see what our combined genetic makeup produced – would the child be artistic? Would she love nature? Would she hate math? It feels like I went back in time somehow, after all that preparation and dreaming, I’m just a woman with no baby and no pregnancy, just a plain woman.

Another thing - I’m not used to being delicate. Usually I cry maybe once or twice a year, I dole out practical advice to my emotional friends and family. Physical pain is no problem; I've been paintballing, been hit with a line drive in softball, I’ve had arthritis for 9 years, never took any serious pain meds. I’m self-sufficient to a fault; Scott has a lot of patience to deal with my constant need for independence. Now, I start to worry if he’s 15 minutes late from work (what would I do without him?). How do I reconcile my previously tough personality with this ruined little girl I am now? Tears flow at the least provocation, this isn’t me at all. I don’t know how to fix myself.