Little Voice

If I'm honest, it was only a matter of time before I became a blogger ... even before Emma died I had developed a bit of a "forum" obsession. It started when I was expecting our second child - I joined a "Due Date Club" - somewhere to moan and groan and celebrate. It was so much fun ... and a seed was planted. Then our daughter was born and things got busier and I stopped visiting.

Fast forward a year or two. I had the great idea that we should add to our family and DH has agreed - eventually! I joined a Trying To Conceive forum. My husband just doesn't get overly excited about periods, cycles, temperatures (hard to imagine, I know) so it was good to have a like minded community to share with. When our third pregnancy ended at just 6 weeks, it was a simple matter to rejoin the forum for TTC after a loss ... and here's pretty much where a simple hobby began to tip over into mania. By the time I was 20 weeks pregnant with Emma, I was a member of 2 Due Date Clubs and a Pregnancy After Loss one too. In my defense, I would like to say that I did see my husband occasionally through the pregnancy.

...and then, it all went hideously and catastrophically wrong ... I went back to the boards to post sad goodbyes to women who had become virtual friends, women who were now mostly cherishing little newborns in babymoon land. I had to find weeping icons instead of champagne corks popping. The trouble with forums is that they are all about words and, for a while, there were no words to explain how being tipped head first into hell feels ... but they were all I had. Initially my husband and I didn't have anyone else IRL to talk to about this so it was back to the forums; loss ones now ... and, from the bottom of my heart, I bless the internet for existing. Posting on MDC Birth Loss and the SANDS forum has been my sanity these crazy months. When I felt alone, I could see (heartbreakingly) that I wasn't.

From there, it was a simple of matter of clicking on someone's signature and finding myself in the blogasphere (blogosphere? blogisphere?). I have wept for women I will never meet and mourned their birthed and buried children, even as I grieve my own. Reading their words made me want to join in - so here I am, dipping my toe in the water to see how it feels. I have to confess I'm nervous. I want to tell my story but I don't want to bore anyone. I want to speak of my daughter but I want to cherish her and hug her close. I want my voice to mingle with the ones already telling this painful story but I don't want to simply be a mimic. I just want to be me. Time will tell if I can manage this.

If you've made it this far ... welcome.