Damnit, it feels new again

I was plugging along pretty well there for about a week.  Yup, back to my old self.

I don't know what's got me today but I feel like I'm brand new to this grieving thing again.

I spent the day in the pottery studio, merrily ignoring my brain and just making big ole mugs and goblets.  Actually got quite a bit done.

But as soon as I'm in the house, I'm obsessive again and I'm crying.  And it's 2:30am, I've taken my sleeping pill hours ago and it never even made me drowsy.  I'm terrified to lay down because as soon as I stop obsessively web browsing, I'm going to cry again.

Maybe it's because I'm having brunch with extended family in the morning.  It will be the first time I see aunts/uncles/cousins/grandma since it happened.  Everyone knows so I'm probably going to get a lot of sad faces and "how are you?"  I have no idea how to respond to that.  "I'm in the middle of a complete and total nonfunctioning breakdown, but how are you?"  I'm not even sure just how fast the news spread through my family, but the gift basket from one branch arrived on my doorstep a day or two after it happened so I'm thinking pretty damned fast.

I feel like I'm going to be sitting there, keeping my head down, eating my breakfast and avoiding any talk about my life because my life sucks donkey balls right now and there's simply no getting around it.  It's hard to visit with Grandma when I have absolutely nothing positive to say right now.  And her hearing isn't all that great so anything I do manage to say I'm going to have to say it pretty loud in the restaurant.

I don't think shouting "I miss my dead babies and I wish I could have them back" across the restaurant is a really swell idea.

And I'm probably going to hear stories of other relatives who went through miscarriages and went on to have happy babies.  Swell.  It's kind of ok when I see others stories on message boards, but I'm not sure I really want the stories so close to home.

Someone else being in pain doesn't ease my pain at all so why would it be comforting to tell me about the pain someone I care about has endured?  Telling me about that switches my role from the one who needs to be comforted, to becoming the comforter of their pain.  I ain't got that in me right now.

A relative sent me a very nice card outlining her journey.  Actually, I'm not certain how she's related.  Kind of a cousin of a cousin of a cousin kind of thing.  I don't think I would recognize her walking down the street but I'm familiar with her name and what branch of the family that she's closest to. 

I received this with mixed emotions.  First and foremost, she hardly knows me at all and she took the time and emotional energy to reach out to me.  That's pretty damned swell of her.  And there was a comfort in knowing I'm not alone.  On the other hand, she went through several losses before she finally got her son.  I'm barely surviving my first loss of 2 babies, I can't imagine going though this half a dozen more times.  Holy shit, is that in my future???  Once it happens once, it's probably going to happen again???  NOT what I want to hear right now. 

When others tell their stories of multiple losses, I kind of feel like they are trying to one up me.  I think we all know that game that we play on a daily basis of oh your day sucked?  Well let me tell you how much mine sucked worse!  Is that what's happening when people tell you how many miscarriages they had to endure?

By the way, I don't interpret this particular person as doing that.  Her letter was really very nice and when I have the gumption to respond with more than "I'm sad" I'll write her back.

Damnit, I've started crying again.  I'll be curled up in the fetal position on the couch if anyone needs me.