Baby face.

Hello dear readers ......

I have been meaning to write this post for days, even a few weeks, but life has just all of a sudden got very very busy ( more explanation later ).
So .....
I really have made no secret in me wanting to have another child, the idea of having a baby with my amazing husband just make my heart literally jump. But the problem of impending old age is becoming part of the equation. Instead of us making the decision to try for a baby when we feel ready, it's now a case of try for a baby now before your body dictates that it's too late.

For a few years after my divorce, and even in the first few months of meeting Mark, I wanted a baby for all the wrong reasons. I wanted a baby to fill a mummy gap, I also wanted a baby to prove to my ex that I could still actually conceive ..... Therefore I was having good, amazing sex, with a man other than him !!!.
I admit that yes, these may have been very selfish thoughts, and I never even took into consideration Marks feeling on the matter.

But something changed as I watched my daughter and Marks relationship blossom, and she began to confide in him, hug him and send Father's Day cards to him. I realised that my husband  ( yes he did seem to want to marry despite my broken - ness )  was the most amazing man, taking on board a very broken me - and my very moody, sometimes mouthy teenage daughter. My reason for wanting a baby changed, because I wanted to see Mark with his baby, watching his baby grow, and seeing the look of absolute amazement and joy when we had a baby together.

So we decided, after a few debates and conversations, mainly about his disability and the fact that it can be inherited, to start trying for a baby.
Not to go into too much detail, but as you may have imagined this was not a task that we loathed or hated !!!!!.
Months have passed, even years have passed, and still we have no baby.
Circumstances over the last few months or so have been exceptionally difficult for both of us to cope with. My neurological stroke back in July has affected us more than we could ever express. Depression has hit us both very hard, and the fact that every month or so I realise again that I am not pregnant, doesn't help matters at all.
Our next step is to go for some fertility tests. Which in a normal couple, this would be stressful enough. But when you put together a neurotic wife, and a husband who has spina bifida, then fertility tests become a somewhat nightmare prospect.
We have openly talked about possible reasons for not getting pregnant, but often avoid the fact that maybe one of us, or even both of us have an issue that is preventing the very wanted baby Rankin to appear in my redundant womb.
The blame game often comes up in conversations, and even though we have promised that this would never ever be an issue for us, it's difficult to predict what might happen when or if we do have those fertility tests.

And so here we are, this is where we are at now. The busy period of buying a house, getting it ok for us to move in , and the preparing of the house that we have rented for four years, is stressful and exciting, but I suppose it's stopped the ' baby ' conversations for a while.
But it Definately hasn't stopped my yearning, my absolute agony sometimes, of wanting to be a mummy to Marks baby.

So for now, I wait patiently ( well on the outside ), tear wallpaper off the Walls in frustration ...... And pray for my cat to be pregnant, in the hope that maybe a little furry kitten will fill in the gap in my heart ....... For now.

I Want Doesn't Always Get

Patience just isn't my strongpoint .....when growing up I always had hobbies that didn't make me wait. I couldn't bear the thought of having to make something that took more than 10 minutes. (You knitters and gardeners out there, I admire your patience ). Having said that, I learned to play a brass instrument from the age of about 6, and in those early days when the practice was hard and the teaching was very boring, I suppose I did have to learn a certain degree of patience.

But on the whole when I was growing up, I was never a fan of waiting, and my Grandma would often have to remind me ..... Patience is a virtue, patience is a grace, if you practice patience, you wear a smiling face. Yes .... I probably was a pretty miserable child because I didn't practice patience very often.

This of course has carried on through to adulthood, waiting still causes me a great deal of stress. I was a complete nightmare when I was pregnant, nine months of torture ( this will be talked about in a later blog ). But even simple tasks like measuring correct ingredients for a cake mixture, then waiting for it to cook are all examples of tests of my patience. I want the cake now.

Yesturday I watched Charlie and the chocolate factory ( the better version of course with the late Gene Wilder in it ), and at one particular part of the film we are introduced to a horrendous child called Veruca Salt.  She sings a song (before her demise down a rotten egg Shute)
about wanting everything ...... NOW !

I would be lying if I told you that none of the words of that song echo true in my life. Although I don't think I have ever wanted a golden goose or ever said .....' Give it to me now '

Often I get myself in a panic because things don't happen straight away, or I am told by a doctor that my temporary paralysis will eventually correct itself, and I will be able to feel my arm and leg again !. Or I am told by a therapist that my depression will eventually pass, that I must try and be patient with myself, that I will feel better. I recall the numerous times that I have told my friends, or colleagues that are struggling, that now is not forever. But I can't take that fact on board for myself. Why are we so rubbish at taking our own advice I wonder ???.

When the dark black fog of depression  descends , then my most logical thinking goes out of the window. The now and the not yet, the then and the therefore all mingle into one complete mess....which results in me personally struggling to see any way forward. Even when I am reminded of all the good things around me ( my friends, family, work, church ), still I struggle to see past the darkness, it's just too all consuming. Many people ask people with depression to describe what it actually feels like. Well to me It's like someone comes up behind you and puts a black cloth over your head, or a scary emotion sucking dementor from Harry Potter comes swooping  into your life and just sucks out all the nice and all the good, and just leaves you feeling empty and cold.

At the moment though, the ' now is not forever ' is sticking in my mind a lot, and reminding me that I am in fact a living survivor. I have survived a depressive episodes before, and I am pretty certain that with the right help, and the right support, I will survive this depressive episode.

• I take comfort when I see stories of how others have survived, have overcome devastating adversities. ( and I cannot write that sentence without quoting from the amazing Manilow when he says ' I made it through the rain, and found myself respected, by the others who, got rained on too, and made it through )

• I watch the Paralympics  ( not at all because I find Jonny Peacock very attractive ), and just admire their sheer skill and abilities. I am just amazed and humbled when I see them achieve more than they have ever dreamed or imagined and they succeed making their disability into a living hope of achieving against all odds.

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• I've now probably rambled enough .... So I will close shortly, but before I do I love it when I read something and it just fits in with my own situation and thought pattern......

• Tibetan saying, “No matter what sort of difficulties, how painful the experience is, if we lose our hope, that’s our real disaster,” 

I can sometimes faintly hear a voice, and it gently says to me ...... Keep going, keep working through, and all will be well in the end. I promise.

I hope so ...... Soon.

Depression slayer in the making

So this is me. I am a mum, a wife, a Chrstian, a neurologiacal stroke victim and a battler of depression.

There, i've said it ( therapy over ! )

I recently suffered a neurological stroke which has left me with a weakness on the left hand side of my body. This in itself could give me plenty of material to write about on here, but I want most of all to vent my very personal journey with the black dog that is depression. There are a few people who have dared to admit that they have enountered this black dog at some time in their own lives, in the media, or know of someone who has.
 
But I have come to a stage in my life where I need a chance to talk, need an opportunity to tell my story, in order to help me deal with my depression..

I hope that maybe me being honest and open might just selfishly help me through the particular depressive episode that I am going through at the moment. But most of all, I would wish that the words that I write, although difficult for me to write and for people to read, might in some way help someone else ......

So this is me, depression slayer in the making !!!.