Spirit, Strength and Peace
Dear God,
I haven’t asked much for myself over the past so many years. In fact … if I had to pinpoint a moment in time that I stopped requesting anything from You, it would be the same day I was so angry at You for not giving me the one thing in life that I prayed the hardest for. The one thing in my life that I wanted to experience the most.
I stopped asking at that point, not because I didn’t believe in You. Or that I didn’t think You loved me. I stopped asking because, quite honestly, I just wanted to stop feeling disappointed in myself all the time.
You see, I have always been told that You only give a person what You think he or she could handle. And seeing that I hadn’t been handling the whole infertility thing so well, I thought that perhaps that was the reason You felt I wasn’t ready or prepared or worthy of being a mother.
And that is why I stopped praying for myself.
God, I know that you know that I still pray to You. And that my requests are simple at best. I pray that You look over all my family and friends. I pray that You guide those most worthy of needing guidance to find spiritual happiness somewhere.
Because, even though I am not a very good practicing Catholic, I do believe that having faith in a higher being … whether You are called “God” or “Yahweh” or if You are even a multitude of deities … it is important in finding some sort of spiritual inner peace.
Right now, God … I’m looking for some of that inner peace. And specifically what I need at this moment is some strength.
I know You have provided me with many gifts, including the love and support of an incredible man. I also know You have graciously provided me with my “second chance” in life in a new city and a new home. I cannot tell you how incredibly grateful I am for the love and support of my husband and this opportunity to move to Chicago … because it’s amazing what a change in scenery can do to one’s soul.
The strength I need right now is to maintain my self-confidence. To know that I’m doing the best that I can do in the situation I am currently in. To ignore the thoughts in my head that tell me I’m “just not good enough.” To ignore my tendency to worry what others may think about what I’m doing. To be strong in the face of self-doubt.
Please God. I don’t ask for much. But if it wasn’t too much of a bother, I’m in much need of some inner strength …
The Zen of Yin and Yang
Anybody that has ever met me knows that I have two left feet.
Okay … so the Filipina in me can, at the very least, dance to a beat. But put me in a pair of heels (or heck, even flat shoes give me problems), and I can’t even walk a straight line without tripping.
I can even fall down while laying in bed. Seriously. Okay, so that part was really caused by Hubby turning over and taking all the blankets that I was lying on top of … but nonetheless, it was ME that fell on the floor.
The other day, as Hubby and I strolled the streets of the Magnificent Mile, I contemplated how throughout my life I’ve always been at one extreme or the other. I’ve thought about how I’ve either been extremely happy or in the throws of despair. Or I’ve either totally loved my job or completely hated it to the point of quitting. Or I’ve felt completely optimistic about IVF to being downright pessimistic about my infertility.
And then I tripped. (D*mn Crocs on uneven pavement …)
After being caught by Hubby and subsequently asked how my “trip” was … I thought about the irony of my last “fall.” Tripping when contemplating how unbalanced my life is.
So after I regained my footing, I began to contemplate whether my life has always been unbalanced. Much like I’ve always had two left feet. Had I always seen things so black and white? Did I always approach life in a yin and yang type of manner?
Hubby seems to think I do not. That I tend to see things in this manner only when there is some sort of major disruption in my life. Whether it’s IVF / Infertility or work-related issues … or even any “fun” situations like moving to Chicago or traveling to different places … it seems that I try to garner control of things by seeing them as “relative” yes or no situations. Right. Or wrong.
And looking back at any “interesting” moments in life, I realize that Hubby is absolutely right. The times in my life where I’ve had no control over any situation are the times that I felt most “unbalanced. Unfortunately, it’s also those type of situations that I always tend to focus on rather than the “uneventful” peaceful times in my life.
Why think about those lazy Sunday afternoons where Hubby and I sit at the local cafe and read, drink coffee and otherwise relax? Not when I can spend the time obsessing over whether or not I’m doing a good enough job in my new boss’s eyes. Why get excited over our recent move to the Windy City and all the new places we get to explore this summer when I can worry about whether I made the right decision to move? Why think about how d*mn unfair it is that other women can get pregnant at the drop of a hat when I can think about how much of an impact I may (or may not) have made on my nephew’s life?
So after that last literal trip, I decided that I should focus on the wonderful aspect of every day life. And that I shouldn’t take for granted something as simple as Hubby catching my arm as I trip over my two left feet. Because it’s those little things … those every day wonderful thoughtful things that provide the balance that I need in those otherwise chaotic, uncontrollable moments in life.
Letting Go …
This past Sunday morning at our Michigan home was a rough one.
I should preface this by saying that the raggedness of that morning had absolutely nothing to do with the baptism we attended later on that day. Because I was actually looking forward to spending time with these good friends; a couple that experienced the roller coaster of infertility first hand. I was looking forward to meeting their daughter for the first time.
Nor did it have to do with spending time with those other family friends’ kids who are waaay too adorable. Because, believe me … seeing how these kids grew so much over the past six months was just plain fun. (Personally, the story about our friend’s two year old son placing a Vic.toria’s Secret bag on his head and walking around calling himself Opti.mus Pri.me was my absolute favorite!)
Nope, what made the morning rough was what I stumbled upon while cleaning off the top of our dresser.
And the thing is … I should have known better because it was in the same exact place I left it when I last stumbled upon this item.
Hubby happened to be there this time when I found the picture of our two would-be babies. And he noticed the subtle flinch I made as I picked it up and set it aside … this time to pack it away so that it would be “filed” somewhere safe, so as not to be lost while in the midst of our “final” move to Chicago.
And when Hubby asked me if I was okay, I told him the truth. I was okay for the moment, but I was sure that it would affect me at a later date. It could be tonite … or it could be next week.
As it turned out, I would have to face my feelings about my failed IVF at that very moment. Because that was the moment that Hubby stood next to me, picked up the snapshot and said, “I’m going to throw it away.”
“No,” I immediately responded. “Don’t.” And when Hubby asked me why, I responded “Because that’s the only picture I have of them.”
Them, meaning my babies. My one instance at biological motherhood I would ever experience. The one time I could ever say that I had babies inside of me. So what if my babies didn’t “stick”? So what if I never got my second pink line? Or an HCG level that would ever equate to a positive pregnancy test? That picture was everything that could have been. That picture harvested all those unfulfilled possibilities.
And even though that one and only IVF cycle failed … that picture showed that Hubby & I were able to create something (or rather three * “somethings”… even though we didn’t have a snapshot of our third) from the two of us. It was a testament what lengths Hubby & I traveled in order to have children created from our own flesh and blood.
“It doesn’t matter,” Hubby said in response. “We’ll always know what they mean to us.”
And because I had no smart reply to that, Hubby continued. “It’s time to move on,” he told me. “We need to keep moving forward.”
“D*mn it,” I remember thinking to myself. “He’s right.” But rather than acknowledge it (after all, I am stubborn), I continued cleaning off the dresser.
That is, until Hubby snuck up behind me and put his arms around my waist. “It’s time,” he repeated.
“I know,” I finally said to him as he picked up the picture from where I last placed it on the dresser.
“So I can throw it away?,” Hubby asked.
“Yes,” I said. “But do it quickly before I change my mind.” And then as he took the picture and walked towards the trash can, I turned the other way.
“I can’t watch,” I told Hubby.
I listened to Hubby slowly walk away from me and pause by the bedroom door. Where the trash can was. And after a quick rustle of paper, the picture was gone.
*****
I blocked that moment out of my mind for the rest of the day; busy with two parties, the one baptism I mentioned above and the other a birthday party for my aunt. Both at buffet restaurants, may I add. (Still. So. Stuffed.) Then it was the long drive back to Chicago so I could work in the morning.
It wasn’t until Hubby & I dropped my cousin off (who bummed a ride with us to attend our Aunt’s party) that Hubby and I talked about our “babies” again. And how hard it still was for me to let them “go.”
That’s when Hubby turned to me and told me that it was hard for him too. Hard for him to throw away the picture. Harder for him to let go than he thought.
And as sad as that moment was for me, there was that little sliver of hope … that small glimmer of light at the end of a very long and dark tunnel. Because even though our car was packed with stuff we were moving from our old house to our new “home” in Chicago … the weight in my heart felt just a smidge lighter.
I guess this means I’m actually letting go.
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* Our third “something” was a lone blastocyte that was frozen. Hubby and I had hoped that more blastocytes would have survived the initial IVF procedure so that we would have the ability to try a “frozen cycle.”
Fake Plastic Trees
So I’ve been in the workforce for … well, what seems like forever. Seriously. I started babysitting at the age of 12 years old and spent many a summers watching over the younger neighborhood kids. Or the kids of my parents’ friends
And then at the age of 16, I got my first “official” job as a burger-slinger at the local fast food establishment. (Think of the recent “King-On” commercials on TV. Yeah, it was that restauraunt …) I had a manager who was the spittin’ image of Tim Curry and thought that all Asian girls looked like Conn.ie Chung. He also had a habit of sticking any non-Caucasian employee in the back either making the sandwiches or washing dishes. Amongst other nasty comments he made, the naive person in me took a few years to I recognize what a bigot this man was. So yeah, I lasted about 3 months on that job.
The next summer I managed to land a job at the local mall working at a music store. No, it wasn’t an independent record store … although I always wished I could have worked at one. Yes, it was one of those retail chain stores that sold mostly Top 40 crap. But the job had its perks, which included a decent discount, first dibs on any “alternative” stuff that managed to come into the store, and a crap load of freebies that the label reps would hand out any time they came into the store. Oh … and we also got a lot of “heads up” on tour dates and album releases before the general public new. Of course pre-internet … that was a pretty d*mn cool perk. It was definitely a fun job to have, and the people that I worked with and interacted with on a daily basis definitely made the mundane more interesting.
I managed to keep the music store job for the next three years; lasting through the summer after my first year in college. And, if you can believe it … I also managed to hold a second job at one of the department stores within the same mall. That one wasn’t as fun, as I managed to get stuck in the men’s clothing department. However, to this day I know exactly how to fold a man’s dress shirt back into the original packaging it may have come in. Ain’t it amazing how we retain the stupidest things?
I finally quit both retail jobs after my first year in Nursing school. And that’s because I managed to get my first job in a hospital as a Nursing Assistant. Which turned in to a Nurse Technician position another year later. Which eventually turned into my first post-college job. Of course, I moved over to the bigger “sister” hospital at that time. Which meant more interesting patients and definitely more Residents (“Doctors-In-Training” … not to be confused with Med School students). Those first couple years post-graduation in my first job had to be one of the most exciting times of my career. Lots of new things to learn, lots of interesting co-worker dynamics, etc.
After about two years, the “glamour” and excitement of working on “the floors” started to wear down on me. Things suddenly became routine. And since by then I was married, working the afternoon shift and every other weekend grated on me because, as a newlywed, I just wanted to spend time with my Hubby. It’s about that time when I started to feel the “burn out” of working on the floors. And looking back now, I have a feeling that the reason I was burning out was more because of the way our unit was being managed* and not by the people I worked with or the actual work I was responsible.
In any case, my “break” literally came when I injured my back on the job. How, may you ask, did that happen? Well, it’s not that a patient fell on me … rather it was me that fell on a patient. Yep. As a fellow RN and I were lifting a patient who slipped off of her chair onto the floor, this patient began to lose her balance. Now … in Nursing School, you’re taught to “ease” a patient that is falling down onto the floor. In otherwords, you don’t let go of the patient; you guide them slowly onto a chair or back down on the floor. Well … while I attempted to “ease” this patient onto the floor, my fellow RN decided to just let the patient go.
And down the patient went. With me right on top of her shortly afterwards. And … ouch, what was that sharp pain I felt in my lower back?
I happened to be off that weekend and when I couldn’t sleep comfortably for the next two days, I decided it was time to fill out paperwork. So after a couple of Employee Health appointments and an MRI to my lower back, I found out I had a herniated disk. And despite the months of physical therapy and cortisone shots (which, by the way, I think may have been one of the reasons for my IF issues … ), the pain to my back and it’s associated numbness and tingling down my left leg persisted. So that’s when I decided to have surgery to correct the herniated disk. (What can I say? I was only 25 at the time and I didn’t want to be in pain for the rest of my life!)
And that’s when I met my disability RN Case Manager for the first time. She’s the one who showed me that there were other areas of Nursing that I could get in to with my degree. So armed with that information, when I returned to work I was lucky enough to have a fellow RN who was doing Case Management for the hospital I worked for. She’s the one that got me my first position in Case Management and I haven’t turned back to floor nursing since.
So I guess you can say that I literally “fell” into Case Management. Ha!
Okay, so that long diatribe wasn’t what I was getting at when I first started this post. What I’m really getting at is that since I was a young’in I worked. And once I graduated from college and joined the career workforce, I’ve worked. Full time, mind you. The only time I ever took a break between jobs (besides when I went for my back surgery) was when I left the hospital to work for a health insurance company. And even then, it was less than a week. And when I left that job to come here to Chicago, I took absolutely no time off in between.
Oh sure, I’ve had time off during the year. I mean, we Full-Time folk do accrue vacation time that we are entitled to. And trust me, Hubby & I make it a point to take a vacation because that’s a priority for us in life. I mean really, it’s our time to recharge our batteries and refuel our energy so that we can delve headfirst into our careers with new purpose. We need that time because, unlike others that have different priorities than us, our childless (or child-free, still deciding) life consists of little more than our careers.
Okay, so I’m overexagerating here (or as Hubby says I’m “V.H.1 Storytelling”). I mean, I wouldn’t be writing / blogging and Hubby wouldn’t be sketching if I didn’t do anything more than wake up and go to work every day. But I think you readers may get the point.
It’s been just over five months since I moved to Chicago and started this new job, without taking more than 2 days off (strictly for the NYE holiday) inbetween. And before that, it’s been since July last year that Hubby & I have taken any sort of vacation together. Needless to say, I’m ripe for some time off.
H*ll. I don’t even care if it’s a Stay-cation. I don’t care if I don’t do more than read, write or blog for a week. I just want to have the time dedicated to ourselves. To be together. To fully relish in the big move that the two of us made together. To explore our new local surroundings. (Hmm … I guess you could call that a “Play-cation” then. Not to be confused with “placate” though … ) All without the pressure to keep working. To make deadlines. To set new goals. To maintain the current goals.
Seriously, I’d be happy to just be in bed with Hubby, imagining we’re back in Hawaii lying in a hammock on the beach at sunset. Perhaps we can bring in some fake plastic trees, too.
As it is, the next long weekend we have planned will be Memorial Day. (But then, is it a vacation if the rest of your company is off too?!) And the next one would be Independence Day … which is followed closely by my birthday that following Monday. And d*mn it … you know I’ll be taking that day off. I mean, I’ll at least have accrued one or two vacation days by then …
I mean if I can’t take time off to find a new career path or even take time off to take my imaginary kids to a fun vacation spot during their imaginary summer vacation … let alone to take a maternity leave for that imaginary pregnancy, too … I should be entitiled to have my own birthday off. Don’t you think?
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* I know that now, only because being in a leadership position … I know that a person never leaves a job because of the people or because of the actual work. Nope. In my experience, most people that go willingly on to “greener pastures” (or maybe not so “greener” …) leave because of who they report to.