The Room

When we became pregnant last year, I waited until we were through our first trimester and then began to prep the baby’s room, which had been an office/catch-all room. When we lost the baby almost half way through the pregnancy, I shut the door to the room and tried my best to ignore it.

I am now 32 weeks along with another baby boy. A few weeks ago, I felt it was time to start on the nursery again. I was only getting slower and more tired, so waiting would probably mean I wouldn’t get it finished until after the baby came. I spent hours looking at ideas and settled on what I wanted. I planned, measured, and sampled different colors until I had everything perfect. Envisioning the room gave me hope and filled me with excitement.

When we were almost done with the biggest project, the accent wall, my husband called me in because something was off. I realized that, through an innocent misunderstanding, he had incorrectly put boards on the wall. A wave of disappointment came over me. I felt the tears rush my eyes and had to walk away.

Until that moment, I am not sure I realized how much the room meant to me. It was more than a room now. It was a new beginning. A fresh start. And I needed the room to be perfect.

So, the next day, one-by-one, I ripped the boards off the wall (12 in total) and pulled out each staple (some boards had 10 or more of them). By the end, I had a blister and a backache but I was ready to finish the room.

Luckily, my husband either sensed how important this was to me or he was afraid of my crazy hormones because he came home that afternoon and without me asking, we finished the accent wall. Next came another coat of paint, the curtains, and the fan. The major pieces are together and the room looks like a room ready to be filled with love and memories for a little boy.

After I lost my son, I thought the hardest day would be his due date in January 2019. I wasn’t pregnant again even though we were trying. (I got pregnant that month but the tests weren’t showing it yet.) And even though grief and sadness followed my every step that day, I surrounded myself with friends and fun and it was a great time.

But with the anniversary of my loss (September 11, if you can believe that) in my sites, I am reminded of the shock and uncontrollable despair I felt last year when a routine check up at 19 weeks and 5 days left me with the news that my son had stopped growing and his heart had stopped beating. I remember the guilt I had that my body had failed me and maybe I was too old. Maybe I deserved to lose my son because I tempted fate with my age.

As we approach the anniversary of the loss of our son and our due date with our new son, I am am torn between grief, excitement, and worry. I have those thoughts again. Here I am at 40 years old and pregnant with another son. A lot can go wrong in the next 8 weeks. Will my body fail me again?

But, as I walk past the open door to my son’s room, instead of being reminded of what could have been, it reminds me of what will be. I can hear the newborn cries and toddler giggles. And when my fears threaten to take over and bring me down the rabbit hole of everything that can go wrong in the next few weeks, looking at his room brings me back into a good place where I can breathe and enjoy these last few weeks of my last pregnancy.

I will never understand why I lost a seemingly healthy baby well into my second trimester. I can only trust there is a plan and that was part of it. And I will enjoy the belly kicks (or punches depending on his mood) and trust that the next few weeks will go as planned.