Winter Solstice

Today, December 21st, marks my due date from my first pregnancy. I’ve been dreading this date for weeks, and at the same time hoping it would hurry up and get here so I could stop with the unpleasant anticipation.

My heart aches for the little baby who wasn’t meant to be. I was sure she was a girl (I didn’t do any genetic testing to confirm this), and after my miscarriage I named her Faith. I didn’t have much faith in anything at the time, but I felt like naming her Faith was a promise to myself that my faith would return.

As I type this, Chiquitito is moving around, kicking my bladder and generally making his presence known. It’s strange, mourning my lost girl while being so totally in love with this little boy who wouldn’t exist if she had stayed. I don’t know how to reconcile the two feelings, but I guess I don’t have to. The joy and sadness aren’t mutually exclusive, but it does feel weird, feeling both so intensely at the same time.

I can’t help wondering what things would have been like if all had gone well, and I was about to become a new mom right around now; Christmas would be very different this year. I have a feeling that these sorts of wonderings will stop once Chiquitito is born, since as soon as I meet him I know I won’t be able to imagine another baby in my arms instead of him. I am so grateful that I’m facing this day while already 21 weeks pregnant, but whenever someone asks me “Is this your first child?” my instinctive response is, “No, my he’s my second.” I never actually answer that way, but I always feel a little guilty when I answer, “Yes, he’s my first.”

I used to think that God sent us losses like these for a reason. The older I’ve gotten, the more I’ve questioned that line of reasoning, and now, after my miscarriage, I just don’t believe it anymore at all. There’s no rhyme or reason to why these things happen, they just do. My Christmas wish this year is that no one ever has to lose a child again, at any stage in life.

 If only my wish really could come true.