Putting up the tree, hanging ornaments.  The Boy is already somewhat more somber than I’d wish he felt, since he’s missing his girls: all in apartments of their own, out of the city, out of the country.  We had the usual happy bickering over Christmas music, and drank wine, and it was good, but I could not help but compare this to what I’d hoped it would be like back when I was pregnant with proto-sprog #3.  His due date was December 2, and it’s hard not to imagine what this Christmas should have been like.  There’s a hole in my holiday.

It’s a bit odd.  I carried him for fewer days than I carried two of my other pregnancies, and we learned via genetic testing that he had a chromosomal abnormality that was incompatible with life, so I can’t even bitterly regret losing him so early.  But still.  He was our miracle, our spontaneous pregnancy in the face of overwhelming odds, and we felt from the beginning that he was ‘meant to be’.  And learning about his genetics, also meant that I learned he was a ‘he’.  Which made him feel more real to me.  This was a hard one, and last night’s holiday decorating just brought it home to me – I wanted him here, in my arms, and that is never going to happen.  And of course I know that – obviously.  But last night I had to really own that knowledge, and it was a hard night.

And the uncertainty about this cycle just reinforces that.  And I’m scared.  And this holiday, it’s all about the baby, you know?  For unto us a child is given.  Or not.  Just like so much of life, it all comes back to the baby.  Or the lack thereof.

And I’m tired.  And so frightened.  And god knows I’m ready to be more joyful and less mournful.  But this is a hard place to be, staring at the hole in my life and trying to imagine that it’s ever going to be filled.  Or not.  Either one seems impossible to contemplate right now.