A friend just told me that she is pregnant. It’s her second pregnancy; she lost her first last year at around the same time I did. It’s early days still and she says that every time she goes to the bathroom she checks for blood. She is so afraid it will happen again.
The best response I could muster to that was, ‘Oh, honey.’
Because OF COURSE she’s scared. Were I ever to find myself pregnant again, I am pretty sure I would be doing the same, feeling the same. But there is a very good chance that this one will go to term, and there is a very good chance that all the way through, she will hold the flame of hope in one hand and a rock of fear in the other.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how little we can control what we are sent. How it is easier to bend and flow to what life brings rather than rage against it, or, worse yet, punish ourselves because we believe that we have created our entire reality.
The most important thing, the most, is to keep hoping, even when the disappointments are coming thick and fast. If hope dies, bitterness oozes in to replace it.
Now, I gotta confess: sometimes I find it hard to keep hope alive. Sad things happen, bad things happen. That’s life. And when they do, how to be gentle with myself? How to show compassion for me? And not blame myself when I’m not at fault? I don’t know. When I am hurting, I often dip out of the flow of life. I find it much harder to experience the deaths, sadnesses, and disappointments as Life than I do the serendipity, the births, the love. I KNOW they are curves of the same circle. But it doesn’t always feel that way.
I do find my Happy Lists help. So does going to the beach, doing yoga, hanging out with good people. The connecty stuff, you know? The yuj.
It also helps, sometimes, to feel the fear and do it anyway, if you will forgive me quoting myself. That’s what my friend is doing with her pregnancy. She wants this, and the fear of what-if isn’t strong enough to hold her back from trying again. That, I guess, is how. Hope stronger than fear.
Jump. And if you fall, get up, dust your knees, strap your sprained ankles, and jump again. That’s what I am doing. I’ll let you know how it goes! And no, I am NOT referring to getting myself accidentally knocked up. For me, that wouldn’t be jumping, that would be stupid. I am aware of the distinction, people!
Moving from Stability: Understanding the Pelvis in Posture (Online workshop)
Light Up Your Life
I found this blog randomly, while surfing the net at work. You have no idea how much I needed to read this today. Thank you so much. : )
Hi Jamie. Thanks for stopping by! I’m so glad it helped a little x
I think that what is really about is hoping despite the fear. Fear is always present in some form or another, but it’s when we forget hope that things become desperate. Feeling the fear and doing it anyway is an awesome way to be hopeful. After reading the book by Susan Jeffers, I realized how stuck in my comfort zone I had been. And, I’ve found, that in order to be proactively hopeful you must look past any fear. I understand your friend’s fear, because the crush of disappointment in that situation is heartbreaking, but without the possibility of disappointment, there would not be a bundle of pure joy at the end of the journey. Best wishes.
I know what you mean. Sometimes I’m so full of love and hope and happiness I feel myself buzzing around, almost flying. And glowing too. But other times I notice nothing but the “have nots” – what I don’t have and think I should have or what I’d really, really, really like to have in my life. It’s such a flip/flop isn’t it? And I do that thing too, of taking myself away from the things that soothe me at the times I need it most. There’s been so much of the sadness and disappointments that sometimes I wonder if I can take any more, even just one little drop. And it seems like it is such a huge battle to be happy and stay happy.
So yes, the yoga and cycling and dancing and writing and hoping and people and music – all of that helps. And I love your happy lists, too. I think they’re such a great idea!
What can we do however if we give up? Very little, right? Hardly anything. And our world grows smaller and less comforting and the panic rises in our throat, making it harder to breathe.
So actually I think in the end, finding our happiness is the only way to keep living, despite it all. In the face of it all. Because of it all.
I send my very best wishes to your friend for the health and safety of her precious cargo