39 steps away from something

Odd weekend, mixed in so many ways.

Saturday we spent mostly up at my parents, with my sister and her dp and kids. Lots of fun, it being Rowan’s extended birthday event; all the kids played very happily all day and Rowan seemed to get hauled into the melee very happily. G’s dp made ginger biscuits for them all to decorate and they all tumbled about on trikes and so on, playing cafes, bothering my dad and me, hassling Max for food etc etc etc.

My dad and i spent a good bit of time designing a postcard for BM, with me hiding behind my laptop when the unbelievable cuteness of baby Ella just got too much to bear 😕 So lovely, so unbelievably painful at the same time; an incredible mixture of emotions for me and possibly us. I think the thing i found hardest was Josie’s fascination with her, her gentleness, her eagerness to cuddle and her acceptance of me holding Ella and cuddling her off to sleep at various times through the day. I think i’d expected Josie to throw a wobbly and claim me desperately – and when she didn’t, when she seemed to love and adore her on the spot, something in me pretty much broke. I really hope i’m going to start to feel better about this sometime soon; right now i’m beginning to understand how people used to die of despair in novels and i’m beginning to understand how people go just mad enough to take babies that aren’t theirs.

But it was therapeutic too, i loved cuddling her, i’m just not reconciled to my fate, or history, or my feelings. Feelings are, as my counsellor pointed out, just feelings. You can’t stop them, or changed them, or outrun them – they just are. And i don’t feel any better about a babyless future than i ever have, only now i get to feel worse too. And there isn’t anyway round that. Not even another baby would change it.

So fairly emotionally exhausting, not least because my parents and sister are clearly worried sick about me and it is a bit overwhelming to find people doing concerned glances over ones head 🙁 They want me to talk, i can’t talk, they feel shut out, i feel abandoned by absolutely everyone and everything – and the worst of it is i know 95% of that is in my head. But, well, feelings are feelings. If ever there was a “vale of despondency” that is where i’m stuck. No doubt i deserve it.

Today started rather badly when Fran decided to re-live a well told story from family history by sticking a coathanger in her mouth, up through her cleft and out through her nose. And then of course started to panic, scream and try to drag it out by pulling it forward through her lip 🙄 All of which was particularly grim and frightening for her and took quite a bit of teeth gritting (on all sides) before i could work it free again. The gap is a heck of a lot smaller than it was when she was 2 and it really hurt her and she was dreadfully shocked. Thing is, she just can’t have done it absentmindedly really, she must have meant to and something about her body language really alarmed me, like she deliberately done something traumatic that was cleft related to get attention. Sort of self harm of the soul, or something. 😯

I managed to clock up 39 orders this weekend, which i would blog a photo of but i’m utterly spent by packing them, so i’ve packed, Max and the girls have done woodwork and made a rabbit run and a picture frame, they played with electricity circuits, played with K and B who visited and discussed fossil fuels, energy use, clean energy production, gravity and endless other things they want to know about.

I’m guessing this week will be hectic, so i’m going to go into self-preservation mode, blog only about education (which i am going to set about properly!) and stop clicking on things that make me cry, which is going to involve the trimming out of places that have baby photos and tickers and scan pics i think. No point torturing oneself.