It's quite amazing, really, this turnaround I seem to have gone through. It feels as though a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders and that I am so much lighter. Life seems brighter and more hopeful now.
I have even connected with the couple of neighbours I've been keeping my distance from this week as I was unable to handle their pregnancies for quite some time. One has reached the three month mark and I have asked her to look after our daughter when I go to do a couple of one day courses on autism next month. I even said I would offer to babysit her baby once it arrives and I'm genuinely looking forward to that. The other neighbour has a three week old newborn. My daughter and her three year old said hi to each other the other day so we ended up popping in for a little while. I could see the new Mum-of-two was struggling a bit so I will pop in with a dinner or some baking sometime soon.
Myself and a couple of friends held a stall at a market today - our second one in a couple of months. I didn't make any sales at the last market but today I sold seven out of the nine paintings I was selling so I am pretty rapt! The market was a family fun day so there were loads of families arounds - lots of bumps and families of twos or three roaming around. I do still get that initial pang of jealousy and have to remind myself that perhaps another child wasn't part of Gods plan for me. Obviously I don't know that for sure yet. But up until this point, for whatever reason, I wasn't meant to have a second child.
I read an interesting article in a magazine recently in the waiting room at the vet's when I was taking our cat in to have a free dental follow-up. (He had three teeth removed last year). A Malaysian woman had close to twenty five children (!) within a very short of time and claimed it was God who decided how many children we should have. A while ago I may have resented that comment but now I think there is some truth in that. I do think some positivity and faith doesn't go amiss when TTC but really, we as women are basically powerless around falling pregnant.
I feel 2009 is a bit of a healing year for our family after the going-ons of the last year or two. We have respite care in place for our daughter with the neighbours which means my husband and I can go out for dates every couple of weeks. We were granted respite care because of our daughter's ASD. She absolutely loves the neighbours and doesn't want to leave when she goes there! They have three children older than her who she is besotted with - a seven, nine and an eleven year old. Valentines Day my husband and I just went for a walk for an hour - just the two of us and it was great. I know we have needed to do that kind of thing for a while so it's good we have regular date time in place now.
Yesterday some other neighbour's boys popped over for a play. They are six and eight years old. Our daughter loved racing around the garden with them too. There is no shortage of children around in this neighbourhood, that's for sure!
Because our daughter is an only child and also has ASD, I feel I am more open to kids dropping in and have more of an open-door policy than I might have been had she had a sibling. It's really important to me that she gets a lot of opportunities to socialise. She is doing really well connecting with a variety of children and adults.
At the same time we hang at home, just the two of us quite a bit and I do cherish our mother-daughter times. The older she gets, the more blessed I feel. Particularly when two infertile friends of mine have both bought new pets recently. They both seem so excited by their new furry children yet I cannot help but feel sad for them, knowing that may be the only form of mothering they get to experience. I am blessed and so, so lucky to have my daughter. I have always felt this but even more so as she approaches her fourth birthday. I am so fortunate to have been able to be an at-home Mum for the last four years - I have loved it!
Finally I feel as though I am operating from a place of gratitude, rather than a place of resentment. But I have worked hard to get here, and it hasn't been easy. But my persistance has been worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment