Will I Ever Stop Wanting a Better Memory?

Maybe I am?

Maybe it’ll be different this time?

Maybe it’s worth one more chance?

Maybe we can do it all again?

Maybe it’s not as bad and draining as I envision it to be?

For a few days, I agonized. I wondered if there could be life in my womb again. Feeling scared was my knee-jerk reaction to this possibility, but what threw me off was the hint of excitement I felt deep down. It might have only lasted for a moment but that feeling makes its presence known and there was just no denying it.

Finally, I gave in to the tester to put an end to my agony. There was no chance in hell I was willing to wait weeks to see whether my period would come or if I should be digging through our attic to locate my Diaper Genie, so I decided to get answers as soon as possible. I took a deep breath, held it in, and ended up with both a sigh of relief, and slight disappointment which really surprised me.

I’m not pregnant. Only one line showed up. The unusual cramping I experienced for several nights were not implantation cramps after all.

Maybe it was just my aging and hormonal body going haywire? Maybe it was all in my head? Maybe the specter of hope I felt was my body’s recollection of Emily, my womb missing her after almost exactly five years?

In 2010, my husband and I decided it was time to give IVF another shot. Noah was three years old and I was ready to go through it again. By now, my body has had enough rest from all the hormones pumped through me; all the ultrasounds and blood draws that anyone going through assisted reproduction is all too familiar with. With the success we had with Noah, I was beyond optimistic that as long as this embryo took, everything would be alright.

By the end of our second round of IVF in 2010, we found out that one embryo took and we were declared four weeks and a few days pregnant! The celebration didn’t last long though because by the first week of December, just a week after celebrating Thanksgiving, I was told my baby was gone. She had stopped growing by seven weeks.

I still remember exactly what I was wearing on Thanksgiving Day during our annual family gathering. I still remember how everyone was telling me I had that undeniable pregnancy glow. I was happy and excited and enjoyed how everyone was hoping and betting that this time it will be a girl! Looking back now, I know that there was no real ‘glow’. During that party, underneath that Merlot-colored top I wore, and the festive mood that enveloped me, there was no longer any heart beating inside my womb. My baby was gone.

And I also still remember the initial puzzled look the nurse and ultrasound technician had on their faces as they tried to detect my baby’s heartbeat. All that quickly turned into sadness and a loss for words.

And how can I forget Noah’s words when I came home and stood by our door after that dreadful appointment, with my then three year old saying to me “Sorry you lost your baby, Mama.”

Through chromosomal analysis, I was told I had a daughter. She would be 4 1/2-years old by now had she survived. She could be in preschool. She could be playing with Noah’s Legos, fighting over them and then hugging it out. She could have helped decorate our Christmas tree. She could be trying to write her wish list for Santa.

I honestly thought I would be completely over it by now. But I had long suspected that one never really fully gets over the grief of losing a child, a death of one’s hopes most of all. I still hang my angel ornament every Christmas to remember my Emily. I still hang a red baby stocking for her, right beside Noah’s blue one just to honor her brief presence in my life. The wound has healed and no longer bleeds, and my heart has opened its doors to make peace with God. But healed wounds never meant complete freedom from the memory of the pain.

My short-lived imagination of the possibility of being pregnant again this year is not about me changing my mind about being a single child parent. I think it’s more about me wanting to replace an old scar with a better outcome. It’s about me easing out my sense of guilt and failure through the possibility of success. It’s not about wanting to replace Emily with another child but about my desire to change a painful narrative that has since defined me; that narrative that says my body doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to.

Maybe in time I’d be able to accept the full narrative and experience full forgiveness for myself?

Maybe in time the scar will no longer bring any memory of suffering with it but instead only a feeling of grace and Divine wisdom?

Maybe soon I can go through the holiday season without a sense of lack or the desire to imagine an alternate reality?

Maybe soon I will truly realize that life is not defined by the number of happy endings we get, but by the strength of our faith that no matter how the chapters in our lives turn out, everything is still bound to make sense in the end?

Joy is a writer, blogger, hopeless romantic and full-time over-analyzer who lives in Middle Tennessee with her husband and son. She was born and raised in the Philippines and was an academic who taught Sociology in that past life. She blogs at Catharsis where she indulges all her cerebral meanders as she navigates the world of parenting, mid-life angst and everything in between. You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter