Letting Go and Holding Back

 There is a chirpy woman I follow on Twitter and sometimes check in on her blog too.  She started out all over the whole trying to conceive thing and now that she has she is ALL OVER the prepping for baby stuff.

She has had contests for gender guessing, she has had every sort of give away on her blog and has asked every single question a soon to be parent might ask on all things baby.

It has been fun to chip in with my own ideas and suggestions, though sometimes it gets a tad overwhelming. 

I get that this is her blogging persona.  I get that this is what she is doing to be 'out there' in the blogosphere.  

I also get the excitement part.

I remember what it was like when I was expecting the first time.  Where basically you spend nine months in a state of barely contained fear swinging to excitement and back again.

I remember reading every single book on the subject.  Watching every single baby show.  Visiting every single parenting forum.

I remember how you wanted to shout it all to the world.

Then I lost Scott.

When I was again pregnant with Tara I then understood TOTALLY what every woman who has either had problems conceiving,  miscarried, or lost a baby felt about pregnancy.   That  fear and anxiety totally overwhelms the excitement.

Now when I see her happily buying up every cute baby outfit she can find or registering for every single conceivable baby accessory,  part of me cringes.

Part of me want to shout out to her 'STOP!'  I want to warn her to not be TOO caught up in it all.....JUST IN CASE!

But how could I?  How can my one terrible experience spoil her joyful time?   How can my nightmare spoil her dream?

I don't want to spoil it all for her. But I do feel the urge to protect her.   But I can't protect her from the 'whatifs.'  I am sure she has all those same fears.  She doesn't need to hear horrid stories of loss and pain from someone else when she is no doubt like most moms to be keeping those type of thoughts firmly in the back of her mind.

But every time she tweets about new purchases, a dark part of me thinks.....'oh how horrid if something now happened to that baby.'   I keep seeing her surrounded by baby stuff and no baby.  I can't help myself. 

What a horrible horrible thing for me to think...I know.

With Tara we were a bundle of nerves.  Even though truly it was a once in a blue moon never will happen again tragedy that killed Scott, we worried through the whole pregnancy.   As excited as we all were, we held back...we waited...we waited to buy stuff...to even think about it all.

Strangely enough..we had done the same thing with Scott.  We had been very busy during the pregnancy and I had marked in my own mind when I wanted to EMBRACE the whole deal and to really start planning and buying stuff.   We lost him JUST before all that started.

Extraordinary events in your life do make you think about how 'it' all works...

So for now,  I will keep quiet.  I will keep my tremors of trepidation to myself.  I will enjoy her joy and excitement and hope that everything works out just as it should.

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Original Canada Moms Blog post, Kerry also writes about her life and her kids at Crunchy Carpets. She also posts at the community site for women bloggers on the west coast,  Wet Coast Women.