Judith Timson is one of my favourite columnists. And today's column in today's Globe & Mail, about Family Day, will show you why (boldfaced emphasis mine)(check out some of the comments on the website too):
** ** ** ** **
Statutory Holidays: A day off that's all relative
To celebrate Family Day, start with low expectations
JUDITH TIMSON
From Monday's Globe and Mail
February 18, 2008 at 3:59 AM EST
Happy Family Day?
Surely this can't be the correct greeting on this statutory holiday, newly minted in Ontario, and already existing in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
What about unhappy families, financially fragile families, severely dysfunctional families? Won't it be a slap in the face to those trying unsuccessfully to conceive? Aren't the sadly single going to mope on a day called Family Day? Aren't those satisfied singles going to be bored? The childless by choice a little cranky?
Really, they could have come up with a more imaginative name for this midwinter break. Manitoba's day off was supposed to be called Family Day, but they decided, hang that, and renamed it Louis Riel Day.
I thought we might have called it Humanity Day, and allowed ourselves to get in touch with something beyond our nuclear family boundaries. But maybe that would have been even more morally demanding than Family Day.
As it is, this is a day that could end up doing the opposite of what was intended - evoke envy and bewilderment or even political discontent. Economic analysts have already predicted the holiday will cost Ontario between $500-million to $2-billion. If governments really wanted thriving families, they could spend that arranging a tax rebate and more daycare spaces.
No matter what their family status, people I know are grappling with how to observe it.
On Labour Day, after all, while the media highlights work and union issues, we celebrate the end
of summer at a blowout barbecue or nervously get the kids ready to go back to school. On Thanksgiving, we dutifully give thanks. On Christmas we resolve to a) not drink or eat too much and b) get along with difficult relatives. Which usually renders that first resolution futile.
In anticipation of this day, however, a preschool teacher tells me even little kids are confused: "But why can't we go to school?" a determined child asked her mother. "Because it's Family Day," said the mother with an equally determined brightness, "and we're going to spend it together!"
Then there are the workaholics who dread having to explain to their spouses and kids that, yes, even on this pointedly named day, they still intend to march into that office.
True, every day is Family Day if you have a family. But this clearly takes it to a new level. Those with families now have to do something exciting, no arguments allowed -"We can't fight on Family Day," will be the plaintive cry, or "You should have seen the meltdown we had on Family Day," the regretful postmortem.
There's the inevitable commercial tie-in. One "Family Day" commercial beckons consumers to buy yet more stuff to renovate the family room. Enough stuff already. (Although Family Project Day - that has team-building potential.)
And inevitably CBC Radio invited listeners to call in to "discuss the changing meaning of the word family."
But here's my modest proposal.
Perhaps in honour of Family Day, those of us who have made it through 20 or so years of family life should invite one young couple on the verge of it over to discuss what family life really entails: from wistfully eyeing the stroller brigade to joining it, to marvelling through fatigue and fear at both the miracles and mind-numbingly repetitive daily tasks that make up family life.
"It's beyond hard," I would say with a slightly self-satisfied sigh, but of course there on display would be all those gorgeous framed pictures, glossy evidence of the fact that while there are no perfect families, there are perfect family moments. Like the one with the kids bundled into candy-coloured snowsuits, looking so cute next to that huge snowbank; or the carriage ride through Central Park with them as adolescents (the picture so winsome I conveniently forget the searing teenage battle we had right out in the open on Fifth Avenue).
Family life expands and contracts in thrilling and painful ways. It nearly buckles under stress and inevitable disappointment and loss. How do you honour that on a statutory holiday?
My perfect Family Day would begin with coffee - and lowered expectations. A conversation with either - or hitting the jackpot, both - of my grown kids in which they seemed even relatively content with their lives would be fine with me.
Today I picture those of you with young ones out skating or skiing, cheeks rosy, and then enjoying the creamy warmth of a hot chocolate. And later, with maybe a few fireplaces ablaze, a nice casual dinner with friends or family. No special menu, no special toasts.
But if even that's putting too much pressure on you, no worries. Maybe Family Day is just a day in the life, after all - a time to simply kick back, take a deep breath and say - thinking more of the long run than this one short precious day off - this isn't half bad, after all.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Family Day: A rose by any other name...
Dh & I (& a couple of million other people) are currently in the middle of enjoying our first-ever government-mandated February long weekend. "Family Day" is the first new holiday instituted by our provincial government since Labour Day became a holiday in 1894, more than 100 years ago. (No work tomorrow, woohoo!!) That long, bleak, long-weekendless stretch between Christmas and Easter is no more.
My American cousins have long celebrated "Presidents' Day" on this weekend. When I was in university, there was "Study Week" (also known in some circles as "Ski Week") during February, and March/spring break during my childhood school days -- but most adult Canadians have long gone without a statutory break during the frigid grey winter months between Christmas/New Year's Day and Easter (which could fall anywhere between mid-March and mid-April).
About 20 years ago, the province of Alberta declared the third Monday in February to be a provincial holiday & called it "Family Day" -- inspired, supposedly, by then-Premier Don Getty's family troubles with his son & his regrets at having not spent more time with his children. Saskatchewan got into the act a few years ago, then Manitoba, & now Ontario. The new holiday was the brainchild of our Premier, Dalton McGuinty, during last fall's provincial election (how convenient!).
Typically, the implementation of the new holiday has left much to be desired -- because the new holiday was announced so hastily last fall, and because of labour laws & union agreements, etc., not everybody will get tomorrow off, & there has been much grumbling about that. There has also been much musing in the press over what exactly one should do and eat on Family Day -- as the Toronto Star put it today, "How to invest an invented holiday with meaning."
And there's been a lot of rumination about the nature of families themselves, and the labelling of the holiday. As columnist Jim Coyle noted in an article in the Toronto Star this week:
Beyond the political, of course, there is the personal. Even though dh & I like to think of ourselves as a "family of two," we are not a family, in the eyes of some people. Many people still consider "family" to be a (married, heterosexual) couple with the requisite two kids (preferably one of each gender). Anything that falls outside that definition... well....
Even those you might think would be most sensitive to our pain can sometimes be so wrapped up in their own struggles they don't realize the hurt they can cause. I can remember wincing as a client of our pregnancy loss support group, crying over her loss and her subsequent struggles to have another child, insisted that she & her husband were not a family, not a "real" family. To her, a family equalled husband, wife and baby, and anything less than that was lacking. Who was I to argue with her, particularly in that setting and in my role as facilitator and listener?
For anyone for whom family -- of origin, or creation -- has been a source of pain and not comfort -- for the thousands (millions?) of Ontarians who, like dh & me, have experienced the pain of infertility & pregnancy loss -- "Family Day" is invested with an entirely different meaning than the rosy picture the government has tried to create. I'm sure when Dalton got the bright idea for this holiday & encouraged families to "spend more time together," he wasn't thinking about dh & me standing in the pouring, freezing rain at the cemetery in front of our daughter's niche this afternoon.
I would have much preferred a name that smacked less of political pandering to the "family values" crowd & something tied more to our history and heritage. In 1996, Prime Minister Jean Chretien declared Feb. 15th as National Flag of Canada Day, or Flag Day, marking Canada's adoption of the red & white maple leaf flag in 1965 -- but he neglected to give us the day off to celebrate. Manitoba is calling this holiday "Riel Day." Even though Louis Riel is still a controversial figure in Canadian history, more than 120 years after he was hanged for treason, at least it's a nod to our history and something to get people talking about it.
But then, a rose by any other name... etc. etc. A holiday is a holiday, no matter how you label it. And Lord knows we need a break at this time of year, in this country. So if you are lucky enough to have a long weekend, whatever it's called, I hope you're enjoying it!
My American cousins have long celebrated "Presidents' Day" on this weekend. When I was in university, there was "Study Week" (also known in some circles as "Ski Week") during February, and March/spring break during my childhood school days -- but most adult Canadians have long gone without a statutory break during the frigid grey winter months between Christmas/New Year's Day and Easter (which could fall anywhere between mid-March and mid-April).
About 20 years ago, the province of Alberta declared the third Monday in February to be a provincial holiday & called it "Family Day" -- inspired, supposedly, by then-Premier Don Getty's family troubles with his son & his regrets at having not spent more time with his children. Saskatchewan got into the act a few years ago, then Manitoba, & now Ontario. The new holiday was the brainchild of our Premier, Dalton McGuinty, during last fall's provincial election (how convenient!).
Typically, the implementation of the new holiday has left much to be desired -- because the new holiday was announced so hastily last fall, and because of labour laws & union agreements, etc., not everybody will get tomorrow off, & there has been much grumbling about that. There has also been much musing in the press over what exactly one should do and eat on Family Day -- as the Toronto Star put it today, "How to invest an invented holiday with meaning."
And there's been a lot of rumination about the nature of families themselves, and the labelling of the holiday. As columnist Jim Coyle noted in an article in the Toronto Star this week:
"For a quarter-century or more, the idea of family values has been hijacked for political ends, trumpeted by a self-appointed moral majority, reeking of the kind of stifling, pious, hypocritical patriarchy that sent legions to therapists' couches. There was suspicion, in an age when families come in more shapes than that ice-cream chain has flavours, that what was being celebrated was an outdated Norman Rockwell image."
Beyond the political, of course, there is the personal. Even though dh & I like to think of ourselves as a "family of two," we are not a family, in the eyes of some people. Many people still consider "family" to be a (married, heterosexual) couple with the requisite two kids (preferably one of each gender). Anything that falls outside that definition... well....
Even those you might think would be most sensitive to our pain can sometimes be so wrapped up in their own struggles they don't realize the hurt they can cause. I can remember wincing as a client of our pregnancy loss support group, crying over her loss and her subsequent struggles to have another child, insisted that she & her husband were not a family, not a "real" family. To her, a family equalled husband, wife and baby, and anything less than that was lacking. Who was I to argue with her, particularly in that setting and in my role as facilitator and listener?
For anyone for whom family -- of origin, or creation -- has been a source of pain and not comfort -- for the thousands (millions?) of Ontarians who, like dh & me, have experienced the pain of infertility & pregnancy loss -- "Family Day" is invested with an entirely different meaning than the rosy picture the government has tried to create. I'm sure when Dalton got the bright idea for this holiday & encouraged families to "spend more time together," he wasn't thinking about dh & me standing in the pouring, freezing rain at the cemetery in front of our daughter's niche this afternoon.
I would have much preferred a name that smacked less of political pandering to the "family values" crowd & something tied more to our history and heritage. In 1996, Prime Minister Jean Chretien declared Feb. 15th as National Flag of Canada Day, or Flag Day, marking Canada's adoption of the red & white maple leaf flag in 1965 -- but he neglected to give us the day off to celebrate. Manitoba is calling this holiday "Riel Day." Even though Louis Riel is still a controversial figure in Canadian history, more than 120 years after he was hanged for treason, at least it's a nod to our history and something to get people talking about it.
But then, a rose by any other name... etc. etc. A holiday is a holiday, no matter how you label it. And Lord knows we need a break at this time of year, in this country. So if you are lucky enough to have a long weekend, whatever it's called, I hope you're enjoying it!
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Valentine's Day
Aurelia and Deathstar have both recently written frank posts about their marriages, & the difficulties involved in trying to hang on to your relationship through the rollercoaster ride that is infertility. I've been thinking about their words as we approach that day devoted to all things romantic (not to mention chocolate!!), Valentine's Day. And although my dh (a) is a private guy who doesn't like it when I write about him on the Internet & (b) reads this blog sometimes, I felt the day called for some musings about him, romance, loss & infertility.
My dh & I have been married 22+ years, together 26. We were probably apart longer than we were together before we got married -- he was from Toronto, I was from small-town western Canada. We met at university, but spent the next three years conducting a long-distance romance (on a student budget for telephone calls, postage & travel -- e-mail still being a good 10 years away!) as we finished our studies at different schools & then worked for a year while planning our wedding.
I thought that was probably as challenging as life would get for us, and that if our relationship could survive those long months of separation, it could survive anything. I'm sure neither of us ever dreamed that infertility & stillbirth would be part of the equation when we finally made those vows "for better or for worse."
I've always liked to think that losing Katie brought us closer together, that we survived because we held on tight to each other. And, several years later, when faced with the decision, I knew that we could make a go of childless/free living -- because we'd had a pretty good 16 years of doing it already. I figured that, as long as we had each other, we'd be all right. (Ironically, the first song we danced to at our wedding was "You & I" by Crystal Gayle & Eddie Rabbitt... with the repeated words, "We'll be all right... Just you & I." )
For the most part, I still believe that. And for many, many years, we've been the couple that everyone else rolled their eyes at -- the inseparable lovebirds who held hands & sometimes got caught sneaking a kiss at a family gathering (while everybody else was chasing after their kids, lol).
But it hasn't been all sunshine & roses, the last several years in particular. At 47 & 51, I suppose we're both prime candidates for midlife crises, and we both exhibit some of the classic signs. While loss & infertility has brought us closer together in some ways, I can see that it's also taken its toll on us both. Part of the problem is our very different ways of coping with the things that frustrate us. I seldom get truly angry, & when I do, I cry. I tend to bottle things up & pour out my feelings to my support network of friends, both real & in cyberspace. Dh tends to explode verbally when he's angry or frustrated, & I often have a hard time dealing with that. Think repressed Scandinavian (me) & emotional Italian (him). (Stereotypical, but in many ways, true.) I will be honest and say there have been days when he's been in a bad mood & I've thought, "Is THIS all I have to look forward to?? Is it always going to be this way??"
I've read that people who have children often focus so much on the kids that they neglect the relationship -- only realizing it, perhaps, when they become empty nesters & refocus on each other again after many years. For those of us who don't have children & have been empty nesters all along, the relationship is all we've got to focus on -- so perhaps we expect too much and depend on each other too much and obsess too much about it. Somewhere, there must be a happy balance between the two models.
It's not easy. But then, who said marriage would be? And we're still hanging in there. Because at the end of the day, we still love each other madly, even when we're driving each other nuts. Because he's still the one who makes my heart go flip-flop when I see him walking across the concourse of our office tower at the end of a long, hard day at work. And because no matter what else happens, we will always be Katie's mommy & daddy. He would have been -- he is -- a wonderful daddy.
My dh & I have been married 22+ years, together 26. We were probably apart longer than we were together before we got married -- he was from Toronto, I was from small-town western Canada. We met at university, but spent the next three years conducting a long-distance romance (on a student budget for telephone calls, postage & travel -- e-mail still being a good 10 years away!) as we finished our studies at different schools & then worked for a year while planning our wedding.
I thought that was probably as challenging as life would get for us, and that if our relationship could survive those long months of separation, it could survive anything. I'm sure neither of us ever dreamed that infertility & stillbirth would be part of the equation when we finally made those vows "for better or for worse."
I've always liked to think that losing Katie brought us closer together, that we survived because we held on tight to each other. And, several years later, when faced with the decision, I knew that we could make a go of childless/free living -- because we'd had a pretty good 16 years of doing it already. I figured that, as long as we had each other, we'd be all right. (Ironically, the first song we danced to at our wedding was "You & I" by Crystal Gayle & Eddie Rabbitt... with the repeated words, "We'll be all right... Just you & I." )
For the most part, I still believe that. And for many, many years, we've been the couple that everyone else rolled their eyes at -- the inseparable lovebirds who held hands & sometimes got caught sneaking a kiss at a family gathering (while everybody else was chasing after their kids, lol).
But it hasn't been all sunshine & roses, the last several years in particular. At 47 & 51, I suppose we're both prime candidates for midlife crises, and we both exhibit some of the classic signs. While loss & infertility has brought us closer together in some ways, I can see that it's also taken its toll on us both. Part of the problem is our very different ways of coping with the things that frustrate us. I seldom get truly angry, & when I do, I cry. I tend to bottle things up & pour out my feelings to my support network of friends, both real & in cyberspace. Dh tends to explode verbally when he's angry or frustrated, & I often have a hard time dealing with that. Think repressed Scandinavian (me) & emotional Italian (him). (Stereotypical, but in many ways, true.) I will be honest and say there have been days when he's been in a bad mood & I've thought, "Is THIS all I have to look forward to?? Is it always going to be this way??"
I've read that people who have children often focus so much on the kids that they neglect the relationship -- only realizing it, perhaps, when they become empty nesters & refocus on each other again after many years. For those of us who don't have children & have been empty nesters all along, the relationship is all we've got to focus on -- so perhaps we expect too much and depend on each other too much and obsess too much about it. Somewhere, there must be a happy balance between the two models.
It's not easy. But then, who said marriage would be? And we're still hanging in there. Because at the end of the day, we still love each other madly, even when we're driving each other nuts. Because he's still the one who makes my heart go flip-flop when I see him walking across the concourse of our office tower at the end of a long, hard day at work. And because no matter what else happens, we will always be Katie's mommy & daddy. He would have been -- he is -- a wonderful daddy.
Monday, February 11, 2008
One of the ones that got away
Mel's recent post on "the friend who got away," and my own recent post about the early days of my pregnancy made me think about dh's cousin (who was an usher at our wedding), his wife, & their two daughters. They live in the same subdivision we do -- they moved here first, shortly after their wedding, & we used to come out to visit them from the city, where we lived in a midtown apartment for the first five years of our marriage. The wife told us about a house that was for sale on their street, and while we didn't wind up buying that one, our house-hunting began in earnest & we eventually did wind up as neighbours, a couple of streets over. Dh's family lived with this cousin's family for the first several years after they came to Canada, and they grew up only a few blocks away from each other. How wonderful it would be, we thought, for our own children to do the same!
The first of their two girls was born in 1991 & the second in 1993. We visited each other often, we socialized & went places together. We exchanged house keys & picked up the mail for each other when we went on vacation. The girls came to our house for trick-or-treats on Halloween, and we occasionally babysat for them. We treated them like nieces, and although I adore(d) our own two nephews, I revelled in being able to buy pink & play Barbie dolls & board games, which I could relate to much more than the wrestling and violent video games our nephews preferred.
The wife was a daycare worker before she got married, and a stay-at-home mom afterward, who only just went back to school this year, now that both girls are in high school. She's one of those people who adores babies & is always swooping in & picking them up & cooing rapturously over them. Like everyone else in the family, they were ecstatic when we got pregnant. The day after our news spread, we arrived home from work to find a big balloon bouquet tied to the railing -- we knew just who it was from! The youngest daughter drew a picture for us that is one of my favourite pregnancy keepsakes: it shows me & dh (complete with glasses) -- & a tiny baby visible inside my tummy, labelled "BABY." lol
The wife offered to lend me her bassinet, & host my baby shower. "I just can't WAIT to have a new baby in the neighbourhood!" she exulted. "I'll be over every day to help you out!" I considered asking her if she would like to take care of the baby when I returned to work (for pay, of course) or, if not, to at least help me pick a good daycare provider.
When we found out that Katie was stillborn, they were just preparing to travel to be with the wife's sister, who was due to give birth any day to her first baby -- a boy, who arrived on Aug. 8. The wife came right over when I called her on the morning of Aug. 6, the day in between when we found out & when I was scheduled for induction. She sat with us for awhile, and offered to call all the relatives on that side of the family before they left to let them know what had happened.
When they got back home several weeks later, they came over to visit, bringing us a card & a little angel figurine. About two weekends later, we went to a waterpark with them & a few other family members. "You ARE going to try again?" she asked me. Another time, doing dishes together in her kitchen, she asked me what my baby had looked like -- one of the few people who ever asked questions about our experience.
My parents returned home, & dh returned to work... and I was left by myself at home. It was mid-October before I returned to work -- I was off for a total of 10 weeks. I would go for days on end without seeing another adult besides dh. Part of me enjoyed the solitude -- time to read and surf the Internet and absorb what had happened to me -- but sometimes I think I might have enjoyed some company -- a sympathetic ear over a cup of tea. I knew that the wife was busy getting her girls off to school and Brownies and so on... & they went back to visit her new nephew, and had several weddings to attend... but....
I took her over some plums from my tree one afternoon (unlike me, it was bearing copious amounts of fruit that year). In mid-September, she invited me over to have lunch & spend the day. And we had dinner there on (Canadian) Thanksgiving in October, just before I returned to work.
And that's how many times I saw them. Which is not to say we were being totally ignored. But I couldn't help but remember her words about "coming over every day to help with the baby," & wonder what happened. I didn't doubt that she would have been over -- if not every day, most certainly more often than half a dozen times in 10 weeks.
Gradually -- very gradually -- we began to drift apart. The girls got older & busier. We'd drop by their place on a Friday or Saturday night, like old times, only to find them on their way out, or not at home at all. We'd call & leave messages that were never returned. Once in awhile, dh's brother would tell us they had gotten together & taken their kids somewhere that we hadn't been invited to.
Eventually, after several years, we gave up trying to make casual contact. These days, we generally see them at the same weddings & funerals & showers & birthday parties that we see all the other relatives at. Once in awhile we might run into them at the local supermarket, and we chide each other for not calling or coming over. Our next door neighbours pick up our mail now when we go on vacation. I imagine they have a similar arrangement, because they haven't asked us to pick up theirs in eons. I honestly can't remember the last time they came to our house, even on an errand.
I just can't help but wonder how different things might have been, had Katie been born. I don't think there was anything malicious on their part, although sometimes it seems to me as though they lost total interest in us once it became evident that we weren't going to have any more children. I can understand they probably felt uncomfortable being around us -- a common experience for parents who have lost a child. Or maybe what happened between us was just the usual drifting apart that eventually seems to happen between people with & without children. Who knows? Maybe we'll never know. But it makes me sad. Another loss on top of the many others we've had over the last 10 years.
The first of their two girls was born in 1991 & the second in 1993. We visited each other often, we socialized & went places together. We exchanged house keys & picked up the mail for each other when we went on vacation. The girls came to our house for trick-or-treats on Halloween, and we occasionally babysat for them. We treated them like nieces, and although I adore(d) our own two nephews, I revelled in being able to buy pink & play Barbie dolls & board games, which I could relate to much more than the wrestling and violent video games our nephews preferred.
The wife was a daycare worker before she got married, and a stay-at-home mom afterward, who only just went back to school this year, now that both girls are in high school. She's one of those people who adores babies & is always swooping in & picking them up & cooing rapturously over them. Like everyone else in the family, they were ecstatic when we got pregnant. The day after our news spread, we arrived home from work to find a big balloon bouquet tied to the railing -- we knew just who it was from! The youngest daughter drew a picture for us that is one of my favourite pregnancy keepsakes: it shows me & dh (complete with glasses) -- & a tiny baby visible inside my tummy, labelled "BABY." lol
The wife offered to lend me her bassinet, & host my baby shower. "I just can't WAIT to have a new baby in the neighbourhood!" she exulted. "I'll be over every day to help you out!" I considered asking her if she would like to take care of the baby when I returned to work (for pay, of course) or, if not, to at least help me pick a good daycare provider.
When we found out that Katie was stillborn, they were just preparing to travel to be with the wife's sister, who was due to give birth any day to her first baby -- a boy, who arrived on Aug. 8. The wife came right over when I called her on the morning of Aug. 6, the day in between when we found out & when I was scheduled for induction. She sat with us for awhile, and offered to call all the relatives on that side of the family before they left to let them know what had happened.
When they got back home several weeks later, they came over to visit, bringing us a card & a little angel figurine. About two weekends later, we went to a waterpark with them & a few other family members. "You ARE going to try again?" she asked me. Another time, doing dishes together in her kitchen, she asked me what my baby had looked like -- one of the few people who ever asked questions about our experience.
My parents returned home, & dh returned to work... and I was left by myself at home. It was mid-October before I returned to work -- I was off for a total of 10 weeks. I would go for days on end without seeing another adult besides dh. Part of me enjoyed the solitude -- time to read and surf the Internet and absorb what had happened to me -- but sometimes I think I might have enjoyed some company -- a sympathetic ear over a cup of tea. I knew that the wife was busy getting her girls off to school and Brownies and so on... & they went back to visit her new nephew, and had several weddings to attend... but....
I took her over some plums from my tree one afternoon (unlike me, it was bearing copious amounts of fruit that year). In mid-September, she invited me over to have lunch & spend the day. And we had dinner there on (Canadian) Thanksgiving in October, just before I returned to work.
And that's how many times I saw them. Which is not to say we were being totally ignored. But I couldn't help but remember her words about "coming over every day to help with the baby," & wonder what happened. I didn't doubt that she would have been over -- if not every day, most certainly more often than half a dozen times in 10 weeks.
Gradually -- very gradually -- we began to drift apart. The girls got older & busier. We'd drop by their place on a Friday or Saturday night, like old times, only to find them on their way out, or not at home at all. We'd call & leave messages that were never returned. Once in awhile, dh's brother would tell us they had gotten together & taken their kids somewhere that we hadn't been invited to.
Eventually, after several years, we gave up trying to make casual contact. These days, we generally see them at the same weddings & funerals & showers & birthday parties that we see all the other relatives at. Once in awhile we might run into them at the local supermarket, and we chide each other for not calling or coming over. Our next door neighbours pick up our mail now when we go on vacation. I imagine they have a similar arrangement, because they haven't asked us to pick up theirs in eons. I honestly can't remember the last time they came to our house, even on an errand.
I just can't help but wonder how different things might have been, had Katie been born. I don't think there was anything malicious on their part, although sometimes it seems to me as though they lost total interest in us once it became evident that we weren't going to have any more children. I can understand they probably felt uncomfortable being around us -- a common experience for parents who have lost a child. Or maybe what happened between us was just the usual drifting apart that eventually seems to happen between people with & without children. Who knows? Maybe we'll never know. But it makes me sad. Another loss on top of the many others we've had over the last 10 years.
Friday, February 8, 2008
February 8, 1998: And so it began...
...and so the "anniversary" cycle begins again, for the tenth time. Today is the day it all started 10 years ago (even though I had no idea at the time). Sunday, February 8, 1998, was my LMP date -- the first day of my last period before I got pregnant. The date that I recited at just about every doctor's appointment & ultrasound (& there were many...).
Again I've been looking through my datebook/diary for the week. I've gotten into the habit over the years of jotting down not just appointments and birthdays that are going to happen, but what actually did happen, and thank goodness. I've always thought I had a good memory, but there are so many details I have not remembered.
By Feb. 8th, my humungous cold sore was finally starting to heal. The Winter Olympics were underway in Nagano, Japan, and I got up at 6 a.m. (!!) to watch live coverage of the pairs short program in figure skating (the sport I follow passionately).
And my period started.
My jottings tell me that I was feeling crampy and took a two-hour nap that afternoon -- something I rarely do. We had brunch and went to the local mall, Costco & Chapters megabookstore where, as I noted, I slipped on the ice in the parking lot & fell on my butt with a thud. I do remember that (ow) -- I later liked to joke that the jolt to my system must have made the difference by shaking an egg loose from my tenacious ovaries.
What I hadn't remembered, until I looked at my datebook just now, was what a miserable period that was, even when compared to the heavy one that preceded it, 33 days earlier. I went into the office Monday morning, Feb. 9th, but I felt so crampy & nauseous & generally ill (not to mention stiff & sore from my fall)(the note in my book says "BLAH!"), I basically turned around & took the next available train home again. I didn't bother to wait for a bus but took a taxi home from the train station. I must have been feeling pretty lousy, because I stayed home the next day too, and both days, I took two-hour naps. I only get 8 sick days a year (three of which can be used as "personal obligation days") so I must have been feeling pretty crappy to use up two sick days right off the bat so early in the year.
That Thursday night, we babysat dh's cousin's two little girls, who were almost 7 & 4 at the time, while their parents attended a parent-teacher interview. They live only a few blocks away from us, and we used to be so much closer... (I feel a future blog post coming on!).
Friday was a Friday the 13th. Was this an omen?
Again I've been looking through my datebook/diary for the week. I've gotten into the habit over the years of jotting down not just appointments and birthdays that are going to happen, but what actually did happen, and thank goodness. I've always thought I had a good memory, but there are so many details I have not remembered.
By Feb. 8th, my humungous cold sore was finally starting to heal. The Winter Olympics were underway in Nagano, Japan, and I got up at 6 a.m. (!!) to watch live coverage of the pairs short program in figure skating (the sport I follow passionately).
And my period started.
My jottings tell me that I was feeling crampy and took a two-hour nap that afternoon -- something I rarely do. We had brunch and went to the local mall, Costco & Chapters megabookstore where, as I noted, I slipped on the ice in the parking lot & fell on my butt with a thud. I do remember that (ow) -- I later liked to joke that the jolt to my system must have made the difference by shaking an egg loose from my tenacious ovaries.
What I hadn't remembered, until I looked at my datebook just now, was what a miserable period that was, even when compared to the heavy one that preceded it, 33 days earlier. I went into the office Monday morning, Feb. 9th, but I felt so crampy & nauseous & generally ill (not to mention stiff & sore from my fall)(the note in my book says "BLAH!"), I basically turned around & took the next available train home again. I didn't bother to wait for a bus but took a taxi home from the train station. I must have been feeling pretty lousy, because I stayed home the next day too, and both days, I took two-hour naps. I only get 8 sick days a year (three of which can be used as "personal obligation days") so I must have been feeling pretty crappy to use up two sick days right off the bat so early in the year.
That Thursday night, we babysat dh's cousin's two little girls, who were almost 7 & 4 at the time, while their parents attended a parent-teacher interview. They live only a few blocks away from us, and we used to be so much closer... (I feel a future blog post coming on!).
Friday was a Friday the 13th. Was this an omen?
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Fashion file
I ducked into a few stores on my lunch hour, and all the spring clothes are coming in.
First of all -- whose bright idea was/is it to start filling the stores with capri pants when there are still 3-foot snowdrifts in my driveway??
Second: has anyone else noticed how, during the last year or so, the fashion for women has been tops & dresses with empire waists & the like? Now is it just me, or does this reflect (a) our society's obsession with stick-thin young girls and/or (b) pregnant women? You most certainly have to be very skinny to wear these styles & look good -- or at least, not look like you're pregnant -- unless you actually are pregnant, & then they show off your cute little belly very nicely.
They most certainly do not look good on 47-year-old, definitely not skinny but definitely not pregnant me. :(
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Fairytales, happy endings, loss & childless living
Writing and thinking about meaningful songs made me think of a recent song, although it's not really related to loss or infertility (in an obvious way, anyway... I suppose you can interpret just about anything the way you want it to...!).
I don't really like rap or hiphop at all (showing my age here), & Fergie & the Black-Eyed Peas are really not my style. But I do find myself humming one of Fergie's recent songs these days -- "Big Girls Don't Cry" (not to be confused by the song of the same name by Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons, which is more within my frame of reference...!") It has a beautiful melody & a lovely, wistful quality to it, and there's a line in it that goes: "Fairy tales don't always have a happy ending, do they?"
Maybe not. My fairy tale/dream come true pregnancy with Katie certainly didn't have a happy ending. To say dh & I are living happily ever after our loss & infertility is stretching it. But I can't say that we're living UNhappily either -- not all the time. Maybe fairy tales sometimes just end differently than you'd expect -- without the conventional expected happy ending.
Have you ever read the children's book "The Paper Bag Princess" by Robert Munsch? It starts out very much like a traditional fairy tale, with Princess Elizabeth slated to marry her Prince Ronald. A fiery dragon destroys Elizabeth's castle, kidnaps Ronald, & burns her dress, forcing her to innovate and wear a paper bag. Elizabeth sets out to find the dragon & rescue Ronald -- who is less than appreciative when she finally finds him, and criticizes her dishevelled appearance. She tells him he's "a bum." The last line of the book is: "They didn't get married after all," and the final illustration shows Elizabeth skipping off happily ever after into the sunset by herself. Needless to say, the feminist in me absolutely loved this twist on the traditional fairy tale (I have given this book as a present to countless little girls).
Munsch is also the author of "Love You Forever" -- a book which adults apparently either love or hate (some find the image of a mother sneaking into her grown-up son's house at night to rock him a tad creepy). Personally, it never fails to bring me to tears. You see, what many people don't know is that Munsch wrote the book as a tribute to his two stillborn babies -- the Sam & Gilly the book is dedicated to. (I learned this in a wonderful segment about him on CBC Television's "Life & Times" series -- sort of a Canadian version of A&E's Biography.) The lullaby the mother sings in the book is one he made up for them, and he sings it when he tells the story on the program, and in live performances.
Dh & I saw him perform "Love You Forever" (and several of his other stories) at the annual Word on the Street literacy festival in Toronto several years ago (a few years after Katie was stillborn). The children in the audience were giggling. Dh & I were blowing our noses & wiping our eyes. I felt a little silly until I looked around & realized most of the adults in the audience were doing the same thing. Not sure whether their reasons were the same as ours, but it's obviously a story that strikes a chord.
I don't really like rap or hiphop at all (showing my age here), & Fergie & the Black-Eyed Peas are really not my style. But I do find myself humming one of Fergie's recent songs these days -- "Big Girls Don't Cry" (not to be confused by the song of the same name by Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons, which is more within my frame of reference...!") It has a beautiful melody & a lovely, wistful quality to it, and there's a line in it that goes: "Fairy tales don't always have a happy ending, do they?"
Maybe not. My fairy tale/dream come true pregnancy with Katie certainly didn't have a happy ending. To say dh & I are living happily ever after our loss & infertility is stretching it. But I can't say that we're living UNhappily either -- not all the time. Maybe fairy tales sometimes just end differently than you'd expect -- without the conventional expected happy ending.
Have you ever read the children's book "The Paper Bag Princess" by Robert Munsch? It starts out very much like a traditional fairy tale, with Princess Elizabeth slated to marry her Prince Ronald. A fiery dragon destroys Elizabeth's castle, kidnaps Ronald, & burns her dress, forcing her to innovate and wear a paper bag. Elizabeth sets out to find the dragon & rescue Ronald -- who is less than appreciative when she finally finds him, and criticizes her dishevelled appearance. She tells him he's "a bum." The last line of the book is: "They didn't get married after all," and the final illustration shows Elizabeth skipping off happily ever after into the sunset by herself. Needless to say, the feminist in me absolutely loved this twist on the traditional fairy tale (I have given this book as a present to countless little girls).
Munsch is also the author of "Love You Forever" -- a book which adults apparently either love or hate (some find the image of a mother sneaking into her grown-up son's house at night to rock him a tad creepy). Personally, it never fails to bring me to tears. You see, what many people don't know is that Munsch wrote the book as a tribute to his two stillborn babies -- the Sam & Gilly the book is dedicated to. (I learned this in a wonderful segment about him on CBC Television's "Life & Times" series -- sort of a Canadian version of A&E's Biography.) The lullaby the mother sings in the book is one he made up for them, and he sings it when he tells the story on the program, and in live performances.
Dh & I saw him perform "Love You Forever" (and several of his other stories) at the annual Word on the Street literacy festival in Toronto several years ago (a few years after Katie was stillborn). The children in the audience were giggling. Dh & I were blowing our noses & wiping our eyes. I felt a little silly until I looked around & realized most of the adults in the audience were doing the same thing. Not sure whether their reasons were the same as ours, but it's obviously a story that strikes a chord.
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