New beginnings...and happy endings.

I rarely go back and read my old posts. I'm not that brave. I think it's mostly because I don't want to remember how I felt. I'm afraid of those feelings. Even though I was the one feeling them and I have already lived through the days I wrote about, I just can't put myself back there. They were the darkest days, the worst days of my life...so far, ever, I hope.
As much as I like to pretend that I have dealt with all of the bad shit, I know I haven't. I know I skated. I kept myself busy, I spent alot of time pretending I was 'ok', to the outside world. It's a fabulous coping mechanism, really, if you don't mind sequestering the biggest parts of your self and then putting on a show, 24/7 for like, ever.
Truth be told, it's exhausting. I found that alcohol helped with the tiredness, at least at night when the tiredness seemed to evaporate and sleeplessness would take up residence instead. And really the tiredness isn't a sleepy kind of tired anyway. It's more of a physical and emotional tiredness that makes your body feel as though it weighs a ton and makes the idea of being around people for any length of time seem about as appealing as cleaning locker room toilets with your bare hands.
I remember going to lunch with my sister(hi sis) in January after taking my poor dead cat's body to be cremated and just hanging out and laughing. It was the first time I actually felt good being out, which considering the events of that day, you know, the dead cat, you'd think I would have fallen apart altogether. I had only recently shared the existence of my blog with her and so we were able to talk about it, something I never could do IRL since no one else knew about it. I remember her saying how she would never know how to keep a blog or what to write, except, "Woke up, got drunk again." and the way the words tumbled out of her mouth, the tone, the tenor of those words, it just tickled me and I started to laugh, a real from down in the gut laugh that made my eyes water and my sides hurt and I kept laughing long after she and I had said our good byes that afternoon. And it made me both happy and sad. Happy that I could still laugh like that, that I could still feel like that and sad that those feelings would forever come as a surprise to me now, given that they were buried so far beneath the heavier more omnipresent feelings of grief and isolation.
I guess the sudden awareness of the total compartmentalization of my emotions hadn't really occurred to me until then. I hadn't even realized how much effort I was putting into 'being me', into proving to everyone that I was 'fine'.
But here, in the blogosphere, I didn't have to do that. I could just be. I could write and spill what ever thoughts or feelings I was having. I didn't have to censor myself. And I didn't. Which returns me to my point. I rarely go back to see what I wrote, because I don't want to remember the feelings. Tonight, NYE, I made an exception. I went back to see where I was a year ago, to see what's changed.
Alot.
Obviously.
Okay, to be totally honest, I didn't read the whole post because it's about my son and his release of a whole ton of his grief and in keeping with my proven coping skills, I can't read it because I don't want to remember how fucking awful that was either.
But I did read the rest. This is what I read.
It was a year ago that I started to hope. Not just for the laughter that I would share with my sister, but for a new baby. The quintessential dream of a db mom. And so it was that we spent most of 2008 trying to bring that hope to life. As did most everyone here in DB land.
It wasn't easy. Not any of it. The trying, the failing, the trying again, the tests, the days it all seemed so all consuming, probably because it was, and then it happened. And it was nine months of pins and needles, of hopes and fears, of denial and reality all colliding, spinning wildly out of control and any attempts at managing it were futile. I spent the greater part of 2008 with my head in the sand, not only suppressing the db stuff but also the pg stuff. More and more of my life had become so overwhelmingly emotionally oppressive that I now pretty much ignored about 95% of my own existence. The result of which, besides my slipping mental health, lots more of those real fancy gray hairs we all love so much. Sigh.
BUT.
He's here now.
A year ago, I don't think, no I know, I would not have believed me or anyone else, if they had told me that I would have a new baby in my life come NYE 2008.
And I would have been wrong. Now he lays sleeping on my bed, making quiet cooing noises as his tiny hand flutters every once in a while, waving at some vision in his head perhaps. And better still, as of yesterday, well actually now two days ago, when he is awake, he will smile at me. A big toothless, all lips and eyes, smile. And if he really wiggles and kicks and waves his arms, he will even let loose the tiniest of baby words, surprising even himself, so much so that he immediately silences himself so that he can hear himself better, only to become frustrated that the sounds stopped. And all the while, I sit, mesmerized and tearful, that I got this miracle. That this tiny creature has fallen into my life. That the quiet hopes of a broken heart somehow led to this life. Words can never tell the whole story of him, at least not words I know.
2008 was a hard year. And it was a year of hope and miracles. And it was a year I will never forget. Not ever.
And now as I sit in the early morning hours of this new year, I wonder what 2009 will bring. I have new hopes for this year. Hopes for my 3 living children to be healthy and happy. Hopes for my heart to continue to heal. Hopes for more laughter than tears this year. And hopes for many healthy babies to be born to my friends here in this place. Hopes that 2009 will bring to them what 2008 brought to me and and to Ashleigh and to Julia and to Sarah...and many more.
I know there are no guarantees, but I have to hope.
And so I will.
Happy New Year to all of you. I hope it brings you all a new beginning and of course, a happy ending.