Grief's timetable

If there is one things I've learned in almost 14 years as a bereaved mother, it's that grief has its own timetable -- and mine may be quite different than yours (or yours, or yours, or yours).

Last Saturday, on impulse, I started going through my overflowing closets & armoire, weeding out some stuff to take to Goodwill. I was in a rare purging mood (normally I'm a bit of a packrat -- much to dh's despair), & I decided to strike while the iron was hot. : )

I paused when I opened one of the drawers where I keep my nightgowns. (It was almost hard to open, because it was so overstuffed.)

After Katie was stillborn, I snapped up anything & everything related to Classic Pooh (which was to have been the theme for her nursery). Classic Pooh was quite popular at the time (less so these days, it seems), and one place where I could indulge myself was the lingerie store. A couple of the lingerie chains were selling nightwear with Classic Pooh motifs, & I would buy them whenever I saw them, sometimes the same design in different colours. Over time, I amassed quite a collection.

I prefer nightgowns to PJs, and short to long. Some of the nightgowns were longsleeved, more for winter & fall; some shortsleeved or with spaghetti straps, for summer. Some were cotton T-shirt style; others cozy flannel.

I took great comfort in my Classic Pooh nighties, those first few years, their warmth enveloping me. I felt like it was a way of keeping Katie close to me.

I still wear some of them (I have a lot! & I rotate them, so they don't wear out as fast. I have other non-Pooh nightwear too).

But lately, some of them -- especially the longsleeved winter ones -- seem to be almost TOO cozy. Sweltering, even, in a way that they weren't 14 years ago. Global warming, maybe?? (Umm, yeah, that's it -- it couldn't possibly be -- cough, cough -- perimenopausal hormones, now, could it??)

Others just plain didn't fit any more. Some have shrunk. My shape has changed. I've grown out of them.

I felt a brief moment of sadness as I stroked the soft flannel one more time and fingered the Pooh motifs on them.

And then I folded them up and put them in the bag to take to Goodwill.

*** *** ***

(Just to be clear -- I still have enough Classic Pooh nightgowns to keep me cozy for many, many nights to come. And there are one or two of my favourites that I won't be parting with any time soon, even if they are getting pretty worn.)

(And also to be clear -- my maternity clothes are still in my closet. I still don't see myself giving those away anytime soon.)

A couple of noteworthy articles this weekend...

• Friday's Globe & Mail had a lovely personal essay by a bereaved father about a memorial balloon release in Edmonton: A balloon for Jonas
• Front-page article about a surrogacy arrangement in Saturday's Toronto Star (no comments -- yet...!): Friend's "unimaginable gift" fulfills couple's desire for a child

"Wanting to have a baby is not a crime"

In yesterday's Globe & Mail, award-winning health reporter & columnist Andre Picard published a column in which he called for the Assisted Human Reproduction Act of 1994 -- the law which governs ARTs in Canada -- to be scrapped. The federal government did recently scrap Assisted Human Reproductive Canada, the regulatory agency created by the act.

While the puns near the beginning of the article are truly cringeworthy, I wanted to stand up & cheer when I read this line, mid-article:

"Wanting to have a baby is not a crime."

And also at Picard's concluding paragraph:

"The government likes to paint itself as pro-family. It should be helping people build their families – all kinds of families – not putting up ridiculous legal hurdles. And it should be spending money on assisting women and men with fertility challenges, not criminalizing the desire for children."

Alas, I fear the current government (some members in particular, anyway), while talking a good line about getting government out of people's lives, would like nothing more than to follow the example of its right-wing compatriots south of the border and make anything to do with women's bodies, health care and reproductive freedom the exception to that general rule.

So we will see what happens next. But in the meantime, it's heartening to read Picard's words. (If not the comments that follow. Beware.)

Just call me Dinosaur :p

Dh & I recently got a notice from our cable television provider that they were "upgrading" our service, at no cost to us. (Coincidentally, this was right around the same time they sent us another notice announcing price increases for all their packages. Hmmmm....)

Since we moved into this house 22 years ago, we've always had a fairly basic cable package. All the basic channels plus a few others (CNN, A&E, Bravo, Comedy, TSN, etc.), but none of the premium movie channels or anything like that. Well, apparently, basic cable (like the rotary antenna that used to sit on top of my parents' house when I was a teenager) is going the way of the dodo bird. Everything is going digital -- and, as a result, to continue to receive service, we were told we needed to get a digital converter box. We could pick up as many as we needed from our service provider at one of their retail outlets, or have them couriered to us.

I wanted to pick it up personally, so that I could ask questions about the setup, if necessary. Of course, it took several weeks of nagging (& several reminders from the provider via snail & voice mail) before we actually got the job done, about two weekends ago. Brought home two boxes, pulled the TV stand out from the wall, went through the instructions, plugged everything in and... black screen. Nada. Went through everything again, same result.

Big sigh. Picked up the phone & called the service provider's number, as listed on the notification about the new changes. Went through automated menu hell. Several times. Could not for the life of me find an option that would put me in touch with a real live person who could answer my questions. Had to deal with dh's cursing in the background. (Dh is probably slightly more enthralled with the allure of new toys than I am -- but has little to no patience for trying to figure out how to set them up & make them work. Hence, that has become my department.)

Finally went upstairs, fished out my last bill from the provider & called the (different) number listed on that. Went through yet another long menu of options, but eventually did get a real live person on the line (without being on hold for too long).

"Try unplugging and replugging the cord," he suggested. I did. And it worked. Duh. I felt like an idiot, but at least we had TV again.

Except now we have to use two remote controls -- the one that came with the TV and the one that came with the new digital box. We have to turn the TV on & off with the TV remote, but can only change the channels with the digital box remote. (We also have remotes for the VCR, DVD player, and stereo.)

This past weekend, I wanted to tape a program on the VCR while we were out. Guess what -- since adding the new box into the mix -- even though I didn't touch the VCR wiring -- it doesn't work anymore. I figure one of the nephews will know what to do with it -- we just have to get them to come over (not as easy to do as it once was). Or I suppose I could call the service provider again -- but just thinking about dragging the TV stand away from the wall, going through menu hell (again), etc., made me tired. We were on our way out, I didn't have a lot of time to muck around.

I missed the program instead.

I haven't tried the DVD player yet. I expect it probably doesn't work anymore with the new setup either.

*** *** ***

Speaking of the DVD player -- dh & I were late adapters (are you surprised?). We finally got one about five years ago (just before Blu-Ray became the Next Big Thing, of course). Our VCR (bought in 1999, replacing the original that we bought in 1989) had served us perfectly well (& continues to do so) -- but fewer & fewer (& these days, next to none) of the movies & TV shows we wanted to purchase or watch came in VCR format. (Not that we watch a lot of movies on DVD -- we still like to go to the theatre.)

So, one day during a vacation week, we went to Best Buy and bought a DVD player. Brought it home. Dragged the TV set out from the wall. Read the instructions & figured out what plug went where. Turned it on. Nothing happened. Went over the instructions again -- & again. Could not for the life of me figure out what we were doing wrong.

Realized it was 4 p.m. "The nephews should be home from school -- give them a call," I told dh. Within five minutes, we had a working DVD player (one button on the TV remote that the instructions neglected to mention should be pressed made the difference).

Teenagers may be a pain in the butt -- but they do come in handy sometimes. ; )

*** *** ***

I still have my stereo with turntable & cassette deck (which my parents bought for me for Christmas 1981). We didn't get a stereo with a CD player until the mid/late 1990s, when it had become nearly impossible to buy the latest music from our favourite bands on cassette. (I have many of the same albums on vinyl, cassette AND CD. )(Not to mention movies on both VHS and DVD.)

I do not have an iPod. I may eventually have to cave & get one, since it is becoming harder & harder to find anything beyond either the very latest release or "greatest hits" package for any given artist at my local HMV, where the percentage of the store actually devoted to music has shrunk down to two aisles at the front with the latest releases and promotions and a teeny-tiny section at the back of the store. Fortunately, my sister (an early devotee of Napster) has a massive collection of mp3s & is willing to share. : )

*** *** ***

I was complaining about all the rigamorole involved with getting & setting up the new digital TV box when we got together with BIL & his family recently. "It's about time you joined the 21st century," BIL said scornfully.

BIL is the father of our two nephews, now ages 19 & 23 (the ones we called for DVD setup assistance), who both grew up surrounded by & comfortable with technological wizardry of all sorts. One of my favourite memories of our younger nephew from when he was a toddler is of watching him play the original Nintendo Duck Hunt game, gun pressed directly to the TV screen, soother in his mouth. ; )

BIL has a satellite dish with all the premium digital channels, flat-screen TV, Blu-Ray player, surround sound & enough video game systems & games to last three lifetimes (well, those are actually the nephews').

He can't understand why we still hang on to our 9-year-old Sony 32" set, and haven't bought a flat-screen LCD or plasma yet. Why? Because it's "only" 9 years old, works perfectly fine & I can't bring myself to do away with something that's still working perfectly well. Someone suggested we try to sell it -- or give it away. Apparently they are a dime a dozen these days -- everybody is trying to get rid of theirs, nobody wants to take them. (And if nobody wants our 9-year-old 32" Sony, I have little hope for the 15-year-old Panasonic 10" that sits on top of the armoire in our bedroom. Or the 25-year-old 19" Sony sitting in our basement -- the remote doesn't work very well anymore, and it takes a while to warm up these days, but the picture is still perfectly fine.)

It also drives BIL nuts that both dh & I have cellphones but rarely turn them on when we leave the house. Neither of us text messages, & we don't have data plans. I like the security of having a cellphone with me (have you tried finding a payphone these days?? & even if you can, do you have the appropriate change for it??) -- but I am not at all interested in hearing other people's conversations (although it doesn't seem I have much of a choice these days :p). I don't like having to dodge around people who are too busy staring at their screens to watch where they are going... and I find it more than slightly rude when I'm out for lunch or dinner with people who check their phones for messages every 10 minutes -- so I can't imagine subjecting others to the same behaviour.

I don't have a cellphone for work -- in my company, you only get one when you get promoted to a certain level, & I'm not there. I remember telling my boss the day she got her work BlackBerry, "I don't know whether to congratulate you or send you my condolences," lol.

*** **** ***

Maybe it's a function of aging. Perhaps I was not made for these times.

I grew up in a world where colour TV was a novelty, where you saw a TV show once, maybe twice in reruns, MAYBE years later, in syndication, and it was gone. You saw movies at the movie theatre, & then they were gone, maybe to turn up on TV years later.

We had one TV channel until I was about 14 & we moved closer to the city and to the U.S. border, where our housetop rotary antenna could pick up five channels, sometimes 6 or 7 depending on the weather.

Phones were tethered to the wall (although you could get longer cords -- my best friend's mom had the longest I think I have ever seen to this day), and there was no such thing as voice mail, answering machines, or call waiting.

You sent a (handwritten) letter in the mail and, weeks later, you might receive a reply. (The arrival of the mailman was a daily highlight.)

I had a transistor radio & I played my (vinyl) albums & 45s on my parents' big walnut console stereo. Sony Walkmans became all the rage around the time I was in university but I never had one. I love music, but I never developed the habit of taking it with me everywhere I went.

We read books. Lots & lots of books. We went to the library. We played board games, and cards. My cousins had a newfangled game that you played on the TV set, called Pong -- the harbinger of things to come.

*** *** ***

Here's one story that illustrates when I knew I was getting old -- and dealing with an entirely different generation:

Last summer, I went down to the food court for lunch with Young Coworker, age 25 (half my age, & young enough to be my daughter), and Summer Student (even younger). We all went to different places to get our lunch. I found Young Coworker relatively easily, and together, we grabbed a table.

Then we spotted Summer Student, looking around for us and not seeing us in the crowded food court. We waved, "Over here!" but she wasn't looking our way.

"I'll go get her," I said, getting up from my chair.

"I'll get her," said Young Coworker -- but she just SAT there, pecking away at her BlackBerry -- so I shrugged, got up, & headed over towards Summer Student -- who was suddenly looking at HER BlackBerry.

Then it dawned on me: Young Coworker was TEXTING her with our location.

Needless to say, I felt like an idiot. And incredibly old. (Silly me. Why get off your butt when you can text??)

*** *** ***

Sometimes I can't help but feel that my lack of technology (&, moreover, my lack of desire to keep up with the latest & greatest) is not just a function of my age & my roots in a different time and place, but also a function of my childlessness.

After all, kids these days seem to be born with a computer in their hands. They want the latest & greatest stuff -- and nag their parents until they get it for them. (Dh told me about an interview he saw with a young man, waiting in line outside the Eaton Centre Apple store for the new iPad 3. "I don't care if it's exactly the same as the iPad 2, I HAVE to have one!!" he exulted. Needless to say, that kind of thinking -- the need to have the latest & greatest, simply because it IS the latest & greatest, even if you don't REALLY need it -- is completely foreign to dh & me.)

As a result, parents often wind up learning how to use this stuff too (although never quite as well as the kids). Many of my peers never texted a word until they got cellphones for their kids. They find the kids prefer texting to actual voice conversations, so they've had to learn to text in order to communicate with their offspring.

Now, I am not a complete dinosaur. I spend time every night on my laptop, after all. ; ) I e-mail, I blog, I post on message boards, I am on Facebook (I don't Twitter). I do research for my family tree on Ancestry.ca and have a Family Tree Maker program to store all of my stuff.

I Skype with my parents (they actually had Skype before I did!!) and with PND & The Princess. I have a Kobo e-reader (although I mostly use it when I'm on vacation & don't want to lug 20 extra pounds of books with me). I do have a cellphone, even if I don't use it very often.

But I just don't feel the urge to keep up with the latest & greatest. Most of the time, when I upgrade or adopt new technology, it's because I have to (as with the digital cable box).

Technology has enriched my life in many, many ways. But it sure has complicated it, too.

Sometimes I feel lucky that I'm free of the obligation to keep up with the latest & greatest, for my kids' sake if not for my own.

But sometimes, it's just another reminder of what's lacking in my life -- and old and how out of place & irrelevant I sometimes feel. :(

"If you like families so much, why don't you have children?"

I don't live in the province of Alberta. (Mrs. Spit may be more qualified to write this post, from that perspective.) I don't know much about the politics there or the current election campaign, except that both major parties, the Conservatives (currently in power) and the Wildrose Party, are led by women, meaning it is almost certain that the next premier will be a woman. But as a childless-not-by-choice woman, I was appalled to hear that a Conservative Party staff member issued a snarky tweet asking why, if Wildrose leader Danielle Smith, 41 years old, likes families so much (referring to certain policy promises), she has no children of her own." Smith responded with this statement:

“In the last day the question has been raised about why I don’t have children of my own. When David and I married in 2006 we intended to have children together. After a few years we sought help from the Calgary Regional Fertility Clinic. I appreciated the support and assistance of the caring staff as we went through tests and treatments, but in the end we were not successful. “I consider myself very fortunate to have a terrific stepson, Jonathan, David’s son from a previous marriage. I am also blessed to have grown up in a large family with four siblings who have given me the opportunity to be the auntie of 5 terrific nieces and nephews: Emily, Sam, Chloe, Seyenna and Logan. “Family is very important to me and I consider this to be a very personal matter. I will not be commenting on it further.”

Current premier & Conservative leader Alison Redford, 49 years old and the mother of a young daughter, issued a statement calling the tweet "entirely inappropriate... hurtful and does not reflect my values nor those of my campaign in any way." She also called Smith personally. The staffer who made the tweet has resigned. This is not the first time that childless (for whatever reason) female politicians have had to endure inappropriate comments related to their lack of children. In my own blog here, I've highlighted several cases, including U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, and, in Australia, Prime Minister Julia Gillard. Childless male politicians tend to get off easier -- although in Britain awhile back, William Hague responded to rumours that he was gay by issuing a statement that he & his wife had tried for years to have children and had suffered multiple miscarriages. I'm curious about the staffer who made the Tweet. Does SHE have children herself? One comment I read suggested she was young and childless, and that perhaps time and life experience would give her a different perspective. I hope so (but reading other comments, I'm not entirely hopeful). Do people who make these kinds of comments not stop to think about just WHY someone might not have children (not that it's really any of their business anyway)? If it's because of fertility issues, such questions are a painful reminder; if it's because the person does not want children, it can be highly annoying. Story about the incident in Huffington Post Canada Commetary by Hina P. Ansari: Being Childless: Why Don't Our Opinions Count?

Red-letter days

Yesterday, I noted in my last post, marked 14 years since the day I took a home pregnancy test. Aunt Flo was late, but she'd been late in the past & turned out to be only teasing me, in the 2+ years we'd been ttc.

So I was not prepared for the sight of two bright blue lines almost immediately popping into view. Off we went on a rollercoaster ride that, in some ways, has never quite ended. Today is 14 years since I went to have my blood drawn at my family dr's office; tomorrow is 14 years since I went to payphone, hands trembling as I dropped the quarters in the slot, and heard the nurse telling me, "The news is good!"

It's funny the power these "anniversaries" can hold on our memories and our emotions. For years & years after Katie was stillborn, I used to circle the 5th & the 7th every month in my calendar in red ink -- August 5, 1998, being the date I learned her heart was no longer beating; August 7 being the date I delivered her, the "official" date that's on all the paperwork and on her niche marker at the cemetery. I would also write in the box for that date "8 mo" or "9 mo" -- and then, as time passed, "1 yr, 5 mo," "5 yrs, 3 mo" and so on.

I did that for YEARS. Without rummaging through all my saved datebooks, I'm betting I did it for well over 5 years & probably more like 10.

Eventually, I came to realize I wasn't really noticing the dates anymore. And even when I did take note of them, circled & written in my datebook, more often than not, I felt... nothing. I would pause, remember ("oh yeah...")... think a bit about my baby girl... and go on with my day.

I did feel a pang of guilt when, filling out a new calendar for the year, I finally made the conscious decision not to circle & note the 5th & the 7th of the month anymore.

But there are still certain dates that are forever engraved on my heart (& still noted in red in my calendar), including:

• Feb. 8th: first day of my last menstrual period, pre-conception in 1998.
• March 24th: positive hpt (1998).
• July 18th: the date of my first post to an iVillage message board for childless-not-by-choice women (which, sadly, no longer exists) in 2001 -- which I view as the start of my journey to acceptance of childless/free living.
• Aug. 5th & 7th (as described above).
• Nov. 14th: the first of many due dates I was given (1998).

Do some dates still have a certain power over you, even years later?

Chicken :p

My division at work had a "town hall" meeting this afternoon, preceeded by a "networking" session.

The guest speakers at the town hall were representatives from our company's philanthropic program -- and prior to the meeting, we received an e-mail, which contained this line (edited):

"As a warm up to the presentation, take advantage of the networking session and talk about a recent volunteer experience, or a charity that you support, with your colleagues. "

So!! -- Who wants to hear about MY 10 years of volunteering -- with a pregnancy loss support group for bereaved parents -- or just how I wound up doing that??

Those closest to me at work, who were there at the time, knew about the group, of course. There may still be a few around who, if prodded, might remember. But as time went on & people left, fewer and fewer knew the full story behind my vague excuses about "other commitments" when everyone else would go for after-work drinks on Thursdays (party night downtown).

I can remember, once, early on, screwing up my courage to approach my coworkers for pledges for a fundraiser I was participating in to benefit the group. (Lord knows I've chipped in for umpteen Jump Rope for Hearts, danceathons, Relays for Life, etc., for THEIR kids.)

"You're STILL doing that?" one woman said to me with a quizzical look.

It was barely nine months after my daughter's stillbirth. Ummm, yes, we're STILL doing "that." Wonder what she would say if she knew we were STILL doing it, 9 years later too. ; )

Dh encouraged me to go to the networking session this afternoon, to speak up about our work, to be proud of what we did.

I AM proud of what we did in the group. I AM proud of my daughter. I would love nothing more than to be able to speak freely about her, about the amazing courage and strength of the dozens of parents dh & I met over those 10 years.

But.

It's hard. Still. Almost 14 years later. Knowing the likely reaction. Watching the dawning horror in people's eyes.

Volunteering with children, or for breast cancer or at a child's school, or at an animal shelter, or even a women's shelter, is viewed with approval. People want to know more about it.

Dead babies and grieving parents, on the other hand, just aren't as readily acceptable as topics of polite conversation (nevermind in the workplace). Still. It's something that people don't want to hear more about. (If they don't hear about it, they can pretend that it doesn't happen.)(Even if -- odds being what they are -- a sizeable chunk of the people in that room either could have used the group's services at some point in their past, or will need them in the future.)

So... I'm sorry to say -- I chickened out. :( I just couldn't do it. (What probably sealed the deal was being privy to New Grandma Coworker's daily call to her new-mom daughter to get the daily baby report.) I hid in my cubicle as others drifted off to the networking session -- and then joined them just before the actual meeting started a half hour later.

I didn't dwell on the fact that, exactly 14 years ago today, I took a home pregnancy test -- and watched in amazement as two blue lines immediately popped into view. But that was probably a reason too.