22 April 2017

I am so fucking terrified. My husband and I conceived so easily. Yet we conceived a child that could not survive. We created life, and suffering. We have since discovered that he is made up of lemonade, beer, and shandies, and I just have beer and lemonade. His two shandies have the same amount of beer and lemonade as one of each, but when we got one lemonade and one shandy from him, we had too much lemonade.

When life hands you lemons??? Not sure that saying applies...

We could conceive a child with two lemonades and two beers, one from each of us, but it seems there's only a 50% chance of that... until we see the geneticist; who might explain that it's more complicated than that, and it's actually much higher, but we just beat the odds with our first pregnancy. Perhaps I'm being too pessimistic, we just have to wait to see the geneticist to learn those odds. Trouble is, I've never been one for betting too much.

The day I was born, on the 4th of the 4th, at 7am, weighing 7Ib; my dad went to the bookies and put £4 on number 4, and £7 on number 7. He lost. I've never been one for betting too much.

My mother informed me that when she heard that my husband's birthday was the anniversary of her father's death, she held a fear for us that I would have a miscarriage. I've always liked the numbers 4 and 7, despite their lack of luck. I place significance in the patterns of numbers, as, apparently, does my mother. I suppose she is a maths teacher...

My husband had suggested that if we have one successful round of IVF, we then potentially try to have another naturally. Somehow it will be easier to cope with a loss if we already have a child. What he doesn't understand is that it is not just a loss, it is physical pain, physical reminders, infections, more infections as side effects of the drugs used to treat the first ones, a body that is trying to get back to normal after 3 months of growing a human, or more, next time.

I'm terrified of creating life, and with it, another world of pain. I've never been one for betting too much, but I think I'm going to have to bet on IVF, unless the odds are much lower than I think. Much lower. Sometimes bets are better than nothing. Hope is better than fear.

I'm willing to work with bets, but I'm not yet sure if I'm prepared for the pain of the consequences...