I hear Voices

I hear voices in my head that nobody else hears. Well, actually just one. It is the voice that insists I must clean my plate even though I am getting full. It also tells me that people are judging me when they look at me and makes me apologize when something goes wrong whether it is my fault or not. And, it is the same voice that gets grouchy and pissy when I can't diet the way I want too and wants to throw in the towel and sit on the floor and pout instead.

This voice has been particularly loud with regards to my journey to finally taking a new baby home with me one day. In the four years I have been hoping to conceive, there were a lot of months of anxiously waiting and hoping AF wouldn't rear her ugly head, only to be bitterly disappointed when she came again with bags packed and ready to spend the week making me miserable. But after a while, The Voice stepped in and in an effort to protect me started whispering in my ear, "It isn't going to happen." and "Stop waiting and hoping." and when I would take a pregnancy test, instead of being happy and hopeful, The Voice would again pipe up with a warning mantra of, "Don't get your hopes up, this is test is going to be negative." The Voice would keep me from getting my hopes up. I kept trying for all those years, but I stopped being so tied up in it. I just began to feel like I was going through the motions, making a pointless attempt at a goal I was never going to reach. It made it less painful somehow, I no longer had a bitter disappointment every month, I just kind of gave up and kept going anyway.

Then I got pregnant with Little One. I can remember standing in the bathroom with that test in my hand and The Voice repeating once again it's mantra of "Don't get your hopes up, this is test is going to be negative." And when I took the test and it was positive, I was confused for a minute. I read the test instructions again, convinced I had done something wrong. It was like I was in a play and someone got their lines wrong. I couldn't quite convince myself that the test was positive. I took another test right away and it said the same thing. I kept the tests and every day, I would look at them in an attempt to quiet The Voice.

Because he was still there, in the back of my head, whispering, taunting, trying to protect me from the disappointment I was surely going to feel. I lived every day with the sound of The Voice in the back of my head saying that this wasn't real, this was all going to go away, there is no way I am ever going to get to take a baby home. So, I did what I could to convince myself, I talked to other pregnant moms, I took belly pics, I did scrapbooks, I talked to Little One, I rubbed my belly, trying desperately to quiet The Voice. To say that at last, my dream was going to come true, it was okay to be hopeful.

But then the bleeding started. There was no quieting The Voice then. No matter how many Ultrasounds told me that Little One was okay and growing, no matter how many doctors and friends said that bleeding was normal, no matter what anyone else said, The Voice just kept saying, "I told you so. This is all going to go away. This isn't really your dream to have." It all became too painful. I was terrified I was going to lose my baby, I was scared to hope, I was too scared to believe.

Then on June 4, 2007, it did indeed go away. My Little One was lost to me forever and The Voice won. I kept seeing my baby on the Ultrasound, feeling her in my hands, and feeling like there was something I did wrong. Maybe I didn't believe hard enough, love hard enough, eat the right things, take it easy enough. And all the while there was The Voice, repeating over and over, "I Told You. This isn't going to happen for you. Give up. Don't hope."

It has been a little while now and I no longer cry. I can look at a pregnant woman and not burst into tears, and I can appreciate the beauty of a newborn child without feeling the pain of my loss so desperately. And sometimes, I can even convince myself to believe that it will one day happen for me. I tell myself to go through the motions again. I make the room ready for one day. I hope and dream of one day. But secretly, in the deep, dark recesses of my mind, I still hear him. The Voice whispering incessantly, "It isn't going to happen. Stop waiting and hoping." And when I can't truly believe, I wear my smile like a mask and pretend that I still truly have hope in my heart of hearts.