Darla (She’s a Maineiac) and I first connected over her recounting of tough experiences that have nevertheless failed to roughen her soul. Her words are as open as they are transporting; through them, you’re gifted, for a moment, with the opportunity to see the world absolutely, exactly as she sees it. Be warned: You might not want to go back to seeing through your eyes after seeing through hers.
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Loving Spirit, Mind and Body
“I’m serious,” I breathed deep as my trembling hands held out the stick for my husband to inspect. “It’s positive.” Again. My body heaved with a sigh that sunk straight to my core. The look in my husband’s eyes mirrored mine. Disbelief. Fear. Hope. I felt his arms envelope me and I was soothed for a moment by their comfort. “Okay,” he whispered. “It will be okay.”
“I know it will,” I smiled. “I just know it.”
I giggled through tears as my three year old son leapt off the couch with a whoop and danced around us singing, “I’m getting a baby brother!”
As the next few weeks dragged by, I found myself almost holding my breath, like somehow by sheer willpower I could stay pregnant this time. I gingerly crept around, careful not to overexert myself so I might hold onto that blissful feeling of a little life blooming inside of me. The thought of repeating that dreadful moment when I felt my baby’s tiny flickering light slowly drain out of my body and soul only to be lost forever was almost too much to bear.
I had felt the familiar deep sting of my body betraying me years before when we’d tried for two years to get pregnant with our firstborn, my son. At the age of 30, I was diagnosed with severe endometriosis during surgery to remove a giant cantaloupe sized cyst along with my right ovary and fallopian tube. I cursed my defective body. How could it have failed me so cruelly? Feelings of anger and jealousy found their way into my heart as much as I tried to shamefully push them away. My bitterness only burned with more intensity as I watched my friends and family get pregnant with relative ease. The surgeon said my remaining ovary was covered in endo adhesions and scar tissue. The chances of getting pregnant were slim, but not impossible. I was done with the heartbreak. We began to explore other options. Yet, the very month we gave up, I got my positive and my beautiful boy was born on a chilly autumn night that September.
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