Doom and gloom

So, there's a colleague of mine who for paperwork reasons became aware that I was doing IVF. She was really sweet about it, warmly wishing me luck. A few months later, she turned up pregnant for the first time (how do I know it was her first time? Because she announced it immediately. Women who've had a miscarriage don't do that.). She's in her mid-40s.

It was not a great leap for me to conclude that she had had fertility treatments, quite possibly donor egg, and that it was a long road for her to get there. She was due in November.

The other night, lying awake I suddenly thought "What ever happened to Nice Colleague's baby?  I never heard anything about... oh, god." I checked her online registry and only a very few things had been purchased.

And I lay there for a while, thinking about the fact that I don't know her well enough to sally up and say "hey, dead baby or what?" and feeling awful that at the end of what was probably a long journey, things turned out badly. And hurting for her for what it must have been like socially, given that she told everyone and then some.

So the next day I went to my friend who knows her a bit better and said, "hey, what about Nice Colleague's baby?" My friend furrowed her brow and said "Ummm... Ella? No, that's not it. Katie."

And that was that. Katie is fine. She was just low-key about it, didn't announce the birth to the whole world I guess, maybe had another registry someplace else or had friends who liked to buy things off-registry. She's fine. They're both fine. She and her husband are new parents.

I was staggered with relief. And then I thought huh, maybe I should try not to jump directly from didn't see a birth announcement  to oh, dead baby.

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In other news, having an HSG next month to see if my pathetic periods are because my adhesions have returned, or because of who knows what. Please no adhesions. I would really rather not have to do all that again.

words are weak

There are no words to express the sorrow our community feels at the loss of Caemon.

T and I struggled to conceive together; she got pregnant a few weeks after I did. Caemon was born while we were still reeling from the shock of having Small Boy in our lives. T is a lively and eloquent blogger, and it has been a pleasure watching Caemon grow into a creative and precocious little boy, and watching his moms dote on every detail of his development. They reminded me of us, and of Small Boy, so very much.

This past August, Caemon was diagnosed with a rare form of childhood leukemia, JMML.  A bitter struggle followed with chemo, a bone marrow transplant, and relapse. He died on Tuesday.

It makes no sense. None of it makes sense. It doesn't make sense that I got to wake up this morning with my boy snuggled against my side, and J and T did not. It's not right, it's not fair, it doesn't make any sense at all. I am angry for them, and for all of us, and for Caemon, who didn't get a chance to do so many things.

I've had this post open for days. If it's so impossible for me to write, how do J and T even breathe?

What is there to do? Almost nothing. Send them money, send them love, and go back to trying to figure out how to carry the knowledge that we are all so close to the precipice.