Last week exploded like an egg in a microwave.
It started when I got The Phonecall from my producer-bosses asking me for the new draft of my episode within a matter of hours.
This was followed by another meeting with notes for rewriting over the next 48 hours.
Day then followed night in the strange floating world that is Rewriting Scenes Very Fucking Fast. It was uncomfortable and I consumed way too much coffee and chocolate but in a strange perverted way, I enjoyed it.
'You were in The Zone' one of my fellow writers observed, and yay verrily I was there, I did the tour and I bought the postcards.
I didn't even get the Second Phonecall, it went straight to messagebank but the gist was: my baby sister K (aged 29) had gone into labour 4 weeks early.
The baby was breech, she went to have accupuncture on Monday afternoon to try and turn the baby and within a couple of hours she had a foot in her birthcanal and a nightmare car ride to the hospital ending with an emergency c-section and...a divinely beautiful little tiny girl.
Cue Tricky and I dashing to Newcastle as soon as I had submitted my script, seeing Tiny Niece, blubbering over baby sister K and her husband for good measure and all the other things one does when a new baby comes into the world.
Our sister AJ is coming from New Zealand on Monday to stay for two and a half weeks. She is bringing lots of sensible sleep advice and her three kids meaning Tricky will be well and truly clubbed with the Cousin Stick...he will have met four in a fortnight.
In between the arranging and the phonecalls, the photos and the release drafts, the show and the baby, I find myself musing over how unpredictable life can be, my life for instance, and how that's not such a bad thing at all, although can be difficult if one wants to schedule a legwax say or an apppointment with the dentist - which may explain why I've never done the first and the second was two years ago .
As I held Tiny Niece and marvelled at her tiny ears and imagined nibbling off her tiny fingers (oh come on, don't say the thought has never crossed your mind) my sister K said to me...'do you feel like doing IVF again?'
'Of course I do,' I said, 'of course I do.'
And of course I don't, the last thing I feel like doing at the moment, in this crazy all-at-once dreamworld is pinch an inch and date the dildocam (and if I can't schedule my dentist how will I schedule Dr Lovely Accent) but I do, yes, feel like holding another tiny dancing baby that I call mine, and of course that sad soft yearning will never really go away.
Whole lot of nothing going on
2 months ago
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9 comments:
Another beautiful bitter-sweet post. Congratulations to K and her husband. My cousin who lives in NZ has just had an emergency c-section and a few days in hospital with her beautiful little girl, but they are safely home too. So we can both breathe easy.
congrats on the arrival of your niece! What a scary labor story tho...
Sounds like a super, chaotic week- hope this one is a bit better paced for you.
As for IVF. I still resent the eff out of it. That we had to go through mentally & physically such hell with absolutely no certainties, well it still just makes me weep.
Thinking of you...
Congrats on your tiny, beautiful niece! I'm glad she got here safely and that everyone came out okay. Whew.
And yes. Yes to your last sentence. Oh yes.
Your last sentence brought tears to my eyes and a lump.
Congratulations on your niece. Yes, I also have imagined biting off a tiny finger -- I suppose it is part of the awe of how small and how delicate, like a gourmet piece of candy.
Congratulations on the arrival of your little niece.
Congratulations on your new baby niece. I know that yearning... I got that when my youngest daughter was three... I have four kids. :)
I have always wondered if my fertile friends who are "done" ever feel the yearning like I do. I don't talk about it with them as I kept my IF quiet.
I hope things are settling down and that Tricky is enjoying the cousins.
Do you think the yearning ever goes away? I can imagine myself being 85 and holding a new baby and still longing.
Congrats on the birth of Tiny Niece. May she grow big and strong and become a right pain in the ass for all her naughty nephews...
As for the longing:
Holding a newborn now feels strange, funny. They seem so small (even though our twins were not even half the size of a regular newborn at birth) and helpless. But yes, that longing is there. Even though I have my hands full with our 10 month old twins, and even though I never want to have to go through IVF again, the longing still stays.
When my first "postpregnancy-period" showed up last week, I still felt kind of sad. Not because I am not pregnant right now, because I sure don't want to be, but because it's become so normal to feel sad at that time of month. It's become a part of me.
I also feel sad knowing that every "first time" will be the last as well. Okay, we get double the first times for everything, but things happen so fast that it still feels like one. And every "last time" is a definite last. I want my twins to grow and to learn, and I can't wait until they say their first words or take their first wobbly steps, but they will only be this small once. I want it to last forever. Or to experience it again in the future. I want to get another try at the whole pregnancy-thing, to do it "right" this time around, to keep a child with me for more than 32 weeks. Want to hold another precious newborn against my chest and know he/she will stay with us forever. But I won't. And that makes me sad.
I, too, wonder if that yearning, that sadness, will ever go away...
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