Being on a break does not give you a break

No energy to tell you the frustrating news about Little H, the fact that our lawyer has almost no hope now (it's amazing how one little dentist appt takes biomom from unfit to parent of the year). I don't want to talk about it. Today I need to talk about even more dreams, the kind that you can't get away from, the kind that hurt that part of your heart that is supposed to feel only true happiness.

Saturday was the big party at the tattoo shop. R had to work, so it was my job to take pictures for the website. It was a long day, making sure I got shots of the bands, all the sponsors, the owner and artists having fun, etc. And then my little brother (CML) (who had been there most of the day) starts seriously looking into the design of his next tattoo. That tattoo will be his memorial for Goofball. As I walk past with the camera, on my way to get a few shots of the band jamming away, I see his go.ogle image search- gorilla. Goofball's collection of gorillas pops into my head, and I blink back a few tears and walk faster to get outside. The sun is glaring down and I'm instantly hot and wishing I was still standing in air conditioning, but afraid to step back inside for fear I would break down. An hour later, as I'm watching a group of college students get matching tattoos (and the girls in the group getting pierced), CML comes up to me with a few sheets of paper. "Which do you think is more like Goofball?" I have to look, I can't hide from it forever. One is a big silverback gorilla pounding his chest and roaring. That's not Goofball, he had no need to act aggressive. The other is standing on all 4 extremities, but with a serious look on his face, like he's protecting what he needs to, but not beyond the ability to comfort "his" children. That's Goofball, every bit of his personality, it says so much more to CML and I, because we know what that gorilla is thinking, we can see it in his eyes, and we miss it.

What does that have to do with the dream? Nothing really, there's no real link, until you get really deep into my brain. Somehow, Goofball is so linked to my desire for children that it felt like I lost more than him when he died. He was my link to hope that we'd overcome IF, he was the person I wanted to give a baby to, almost more than I wanted to give R a baby. So crying over Goofball suddenly feels like a precursor to my terrible dream. A dream that I could never imagine living through in real life, one that I am devistated that any of you have had to.

I don't remember how it started, but the beginning isn't important anyway. The part that keeps replaying over and over in my head, that kept me awake most of Saturday night, is the important part. I was in some sort of office building, not sure if it was a medical office or not. The dreaming me didn't realize that I was pregnant, but the me in my dream knew. I remember the feel of my stomach, how soft it was, a little bit squishy, a safe place for my little one to grow. And then the baby started talking to me (inside my head). I was so happy to have that small conversation, it felt like the purest connection two beings could ever have. And then my baby told me the news, that it was about to die and there was no way to stop it. The baby asked me to call R over and tell him, so that he would know. I started feeling the baby's heartbeat, right through my belly, I knew that he/she was putting everything left into making it beat so hard we could feel it, to give us the comfort of saying goodbye. And then it stopped and my baby whispered goodbye to me, and I moved R's hand away from my stomach because the heartbeat was gone. We were still standing in the hallway of an office building, quiet, knowing that we'd still never be parents.

And then, in my dream, I woke up and felt my belly. Felt that it was still big and squishy and holding a baby. And then I woke up for real, knowing that the dream -and the dream it was apparently inside of- was fake. That I've never made it past 5 1/2 weeks, never long enough to bloat, definitely never long enough to feel the baby or look pregnant, or even find a heartbeat. And even if I did, Goofball won't be there to share any of it. Go ahead subconcious, kick me while I'm down.