Off to the land of MOTs

Tomorrow we're heading up North to catch up with the in-laws for a week. (our extended family live throughout NZ/Australia), hence the constant trips. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone - it's been a good eighteen months since we saw most of them. In particular it's going to be so great for our daughter to catch up with all her cousins - there are nine including her.

I am a little concerned as to how much I might be triggered by my SIF stuff. The first night we are staying with my sister-in-law who is a MOT - with two children younger than my one. We haven't met her second child before. Then the second and third nights we are staying with a very good MOT friend of mine who has two children who are also younger than my daughter. This is the MOT friend I've had a lot of jealousy around (and still do) and this trip will be the first time I will be meeting the baby that I have envied for the last nine months (eighteen if you include the pregnancy). I'm hoping it will be a time of healing and acceptance. Another sister-in-law recently had a baby which is only a month or so old. Her firstborn daughter is almost seven years old. The age difference interests me since my daughter will be five years or older if and when we adopt a child.

I think it's very brave of me to be staying with MOTs - it shows how far I've come. But I am prepared for the backlash (I think!). There are four lots of families to catch up with cousin-wise all up and all except one have siblings. (two to three). We will be mixing with them all a bit and this may or may not get to me. I'm glad that we're booked into a motel for four nights too - just the three of us. I may experience MOT overload - who knows.

I've painted paintings for three babies born recently - even personalising them with their names on. This shows me I am able to feel joy for others and their new arrivals. I'm convinced I'm not the grinch I used to be around newborns. I'm not quite as bitter as I once was - for the most part anyway!

The marriage counselling has started and it has been pretty intense. But I'm so glad I initiated it. I feel such big shifts going on within and eventually this will be reflected externally around me. It really feels like a time of just being - especially as a couple. It was so great that our counsellor was able to offer true empathy for the pain of SIF. A lot of tears were shared during the first session. It amazes me how the grief is still there. I feel like my levels of acceptance around not being able to conceive another child are improving as time goes on yet the pain is still there. I've just managed to find/create a new life out of the pain.

I haven't had AF for a couple of months. To be honest I haven't been keeping tabs. Interestingly I have run out my herbal supplies and am due to have a phone or internet consult with my herbalist within the next few weeks. I am hot-flushing like there's no tomorrow and am back to having quite severe mood swings. Yet because I don't want to enter a deep depression again I am doing everything in my power to keep me on top of things. I've been doing a few more RPM classes than usual at the gym and I think they are helping stablise my moods a bit!

Apparently the two referees I nominated for the assessment application for adoption have gone out. It is going to be so interesting isn't it seeing what happens from here. Some days the thought of a baby in my arms so feels like the right and natural thing - no matter if she or he is bological or adopted. Other times I just don't know about the adoption thing. The open adoption side of it is probably the biggest thing that scares me. It's kind of like when you get married, you take on the in-laws. When you adopt a child in New Zealand, you take on that child's family. How that relationship runs is determined by you as the adopted parents but it's still kind of bizarre to think of another family coming on board, even if contact is minimal.

I have had some into-the-future thoughts going on such as thinking I could keep going to the gym and put our baby into the creche that they now have there. Obviously I wouldn't have given birth so my fitness won't be affected! How wierd! One week doing an RPM class and coming back another week with a babe in arms (maybe!). Who knows. The creche thing never felt right with our daughter - and now it all makes sense given she has ASD. I would naturally go with what felt right with our next child - if we have one.

I did feel a bit of grief around my daughter's first week at (Morning) Kindy this week. But now I've accepted it and have decided just to make the most of this new "me time" that I have. I have certainly loved going to the gym a few mornings - instead of at night when I normally go. I feel so very proud to be a Mum of a four year old who is doing so well at Kindy. The older she gets the stranger the thought of going back to the baby years seems. It is almost as though there is some distance now between what was once a very desperate dream - and what is what I now consider an old dream, that I'm not sure fits with us or not anymore.