Knitting again

*This is a follow-up post to Knit together*

As anyone who has experienced it can attest to, the time between miscarriage and next conception passes painfully slowly. At it's worst, sex changes from a leisure activity to a science experiment, and every subsequent period feels like another miscarriage. You don't just want to be pregnant. You want to STILL be pregnant. Each day that passes brings your original due date closer, and on the darkest days you feel like you will never be pregnant again.

And then one day, you are.

We got that coveted positive result one Saturday afternoon, and my spirit soared. My hands were shaking, I couldn't stop smiling, and my husband was thrilled. We called a babysitter and went out to dinner and a movie. I happily ordered a non-alchoholic drink. But I didn't start knitting again.

I made my first doctor's appointment. I told my family. I started taking prenatal vitamins. But I didn't start knitting again. And then, about 7 weeks in, I started bleeding again.

It was a Thursday afternoon. I was home with Nik, and my husband was at work. Nik went down for a nap, and I laid down for a little while, too. When I got up, I had to go to the bathroom. When I looked into the toilet, it was full of blood.

I was frozen. I just stared at the red water, not believing what I was seeing. We hadn't even talked about the possibility of it happening again. I walked out of the bathroom, in a cloud of numbness. I went to the phone, and called my husband, my mother, and told them what I knew. I called the local health line, who told me to call my doctor. I got an appointment for the next day, and he told me to rest, and wait and see. My husband called his parents. I called my workplace. Everyone was quiet. Everyone wished us the best. Everyone knew there was nothing they could do.

I didn't cry.

I bled for 3 and a half days. It went from red to brown and stopped. I couldn't believe it stopped. My doctor said it was a good sign and scheduled an ultrasound. I went back to working, with strict instructions not to do any lifting, to take it easy. After a week back at work, I got my ultrasound, and my husband and I got to see our baby's heart beating on June 18th, 2010. But I didn't start knitting again.

Something about being let down leaves a scar, like losing a kind of innocence. I married the first man I loved. I never had to go through a heartbreak in my courtship years. I know what is it to have my heart broken now.

I didn't really talk about the way that I was feeling. I didn't even really FEEL the way I was feeling. But I could see it in the things that weren't there. No pregnancy books by the bed. No talk to Nik about the coming baby. No browsing in the baby section of stores. No knitting.

As my waistband got tighter, things started to slowly change. I dug my maternity clothes out of storage, washed them, and hung them in the closet. I dusted off the pregnancy books on my bookshelf, and put some new ones on hold at the library. We started to talk to Nik about the baby that was coming after Christmas. And, finally, I took out my knitting, and added on just a few cautious rows.

Baby steps, right?