Not nearly hipster enough to blog

Reader warning: "I am that thing worse than a cautionary tale: I am a horror story, an example of something terrible going wrong when you least expect it, and for no good reason, a story to be kept from pregnant women, a story so grim and lessonless it's better not to think about it at all." - Elizabeth McCracken (in An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination)

Well sooner or later - if all my wildest dreams come true, if the virtual guarantees of surgeons and specialists half-way across the country really hold up - you'll be onto me and my new wardrobe anyway. I had said to a friend weeks ago, "I'm not sure what I'm waiting for" - some magical moment where God put in His bid for a guaranteed success too maybe? - "but it feels better waiting. God-willing this will be a long 9 months, so I don't want to have to subject too many people to walking the WHOLE thing with us."

And so, although I am not nearly hipster enough to blog, here I am. Blogging and pregnant. 18 2/7 weeks pregnant...but who's counting? I'd love to have lovely little chats with some of you dear friends and sound all ignorantly blissful and excited and "plan-y" and "sure thing-y" about it - those were the days. But it seems easier to let you read what's really going on in my life instead of living the prettier, more polite version, with me over the phone or over coffee. So this is our announcement to you all...a blog...who would have ever thought? We totally live in "the future." (Wow, that comment made me sound super 30ish.)

So for you who found this blog online somehow, desperate in the middle of the night to hear something from someone besides "time heals all wounds" and "God always has a plan" and "God is good all of the time" and "you're such a strong person" and everything but the only thing you actually want to talk about which is the too short story of your sweet babe, let me introduce myself - at least, the part that interests you:

The loves of my life:

Kevin - my ezer kenegdo, the lifesaver alongside me, married since Oct '03

Elias - our firstborn, our first lost, at 18 3/7 weeks in Dec '07

Elianna - our second, our first to cry, our second to bury, born at 22 3/7 weeks in Jan '09

Tahlia - our oldest, our gift, our sweet girl, born and adopted in May '09

Maura - our littlest, our biggest "why", with a heartbeat until 9 weeks and miscarried at 11 weeks in Dec of '10

and now, "New baby" (Tahlia's words) - Due November 5th, 2011, kicking me since last week

And so there's maybe more to say about this pregnancy than there is for someone whose list of loves isn't quite so dark. And both my before-life and my since-life personalities cater better to being honest without having to look you in the eye than pretending cheerful things while sitting beside you. And so I'll let you know how things are going. You can still ask. You should in fact. But I also need a place where I can share when the answer to your question is raw and ugly instead of pink and blue and fuzzy.

Lastly, to answer your final question. We are doing well. Baby is growing. My body is well and normal for the first time in a pregnancy. The surgical procedures I had in Chicago 18 months ago are doing their job. And so I am simultaneously 1) taking inventory on our baby supplies and my maternity clothes and all of the things that will be necessary now until one lovely day this fall when my baby is born and lives like it seems to work out for 99% of the population, and 2) pinching myself back into the reality of how ignorantly blissful that all sounds...and who am I of all people to accept bliss when it comes to childbearing as even a possible option?

Believing...hoping at least, that this is the day of vengeance of our God...

Isaiah 61

 ¹ “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me,

      Because the LORD has anointed Me
      To preach good tidings to the poor;
      He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
      To proclaim liberty to the captives,
      And the opening of the prison to those who are bound;
       ² To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD,
      And the day of vengeance of our God;
      To comfort all who mourn,
       ³ To console those who mourn in Zion,
      To give them beauty for ashes,
      The oil of joy for mourning,
      The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;
      That they may be called trees of righteousness,
      The planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified.”