Pinchy’s been quiet for the last few days. It freaked me out a bit at first.
A bit?
Possibly an understatement.
I *may* have freaked out a lot. It’s hard to say for sure in retrospect. Ray would know better than I. Now, in reality, I know that there is no reason that I should go crazy over this. I know that at 22 weeks movement is inconsistent. I understand that. I’m not stupid or foolish. But still…
I can’t look in there and just check on things. Poke the kid to see if he wakes up. Put my ear close to his mouth so I can hear him breathing. Instead I resort to drinking HFCS laced, ice cold carbonated, caffeinated drinks, playing loud music, begging and praying. It seems to work eventually, but the moments of quiet cause my breath to catch in my throat. I know that every mother fears a loss, but I know how long and how rocky and how arduous the road to this magical point has been and precisely what it is I have at stake here. It’s just a different experience. I can’t say I fear it more than my friends with normal fertility. I have no idea what it’s like to be them and to go through this without the lens I have, but all those years of struggle and desperation have mounded up inside of me and they don’t just go away. The uncertainty is hard. Someday in the near future, I’m sure a company will rent out personal ultrasound machines so as to make a buck from this universal panic. I don’t know that I’d use one if I had access to it. There is part of me that knows that just trusting it will be OK is the lesson I’m supposed to learn.
I’ve determined that what really has happened is that the little guy has grown enough that he can’t quite nestle in the little crook he was in. I had been feeling him low in my tummy, right above my pubic bone. Sometimes to the left or right, but always down low. Now I’m feeling him everywhere but down there. In fact, I think he’s practicing his Karate right…NOW.
