Hindsight

I survived the eye exam today, but left feeling broken and waited to cry until I got back to the car.

I have come to understand that I will not find a doctor, that wants to be a healer.

I went to the EYE doctor for goodness sake and the constant teasing of my poor eyesight, the jokes about how I needed a German Shepard and that I have old eyes were just too much to bear by the end.

I ordered my new prescription and left with eyes the size of saucers.

I am sure that if I haven't had years of doctors telling me all the things that are wrong with my body, it might not have been such a big deal but I think it simply just reconfirms that I do not like doctors anymore.

I simply need to interact with them in order to keep myself healthy, despite them.

Toddle

Toddle: to walk with short toddering steps in the manner of a young child.

I took myself to a party supply store the other day in preparation for decorating my nephews birthday cake.

I asked shortly before his first birthday for the "contract" to make his birthday cake.

It was a massive accomplishment to get to that point, and I wanted to celebrate his first time around the sun.

When he was born we had been trying to get pregnant for a while and I tried to comfort myself with the idea that the little boy I had dreamed of was simply delivered to the family; but a different set of arms and home.
It worked for a little bit....but since has been another silent symbol of what has not come true for us.

Meanwhile, back at this party store......
I was mindlessly wandering thru aisles of colorful decorations, frosting tips and plastic platters. A woman and her two young-ish daugthers came in and asked for the "christening stuff" I heard her and her daughters find the items they were looking for and then start commenting about the baby shower items...all while I was deciding which color yellow was the "yewlow" my nephew wanted for his cake.
I made a mental note to myself to not go down the next aisle as it had the baby stuff on it and it didn't have anything I needed on it.
The lady and her daugthers proceeded to shop and where getting balloons filled when I began to see what other gems this shop had. I was daydreaming about parties and fun gatherings all while looking at these fun light decorations. I got some cellophane bags for the goodies and then I saw the Fiesta stuff...being a big Dia De Los Muertos fan I always take a look at what else is out there what could work on next years altar. Crepe paper flowers, I use to know how to make those as a kid....
turn around to see the other side of the aisle and ....BAM
Smack dab in front of me...cowboy stuff
I was so blown off guard...I was so prepared to not go down the baby shower aisle.
All those stick ponies and chaps and wanted posters...and straw hats and and and
I was totally spun , I felt the tears welling up in my eyes, I started to breathe really hard...I was actually looking for a place to hide!
I somehow, found the strength to turn around and stand in the corner of the store.
I got my head together and went to check out.

I was drunk, I was spun, I was so shaken, I was toddling...

Lily

My heart goes out today...

I read this morning that Lily Allen has had another miscarriage

and is currently in the hospital with a blood-poisoning condition, septicaemia.

I know she is a music personality, and that this is news that is being reported in the tabloids...

but she is still a woman trying to become a mother and facing devastating losses along her trip.

I am saying a little mediation for her and her sweetie.

Loss is loss, no matter who you are.

Long Long Long

It's been a long long long time,

How could I ever have lost you

When I loved you.

It took a long long long time

Now I'm so happy I found you

How I love you

So many tears I was searching,

So many tears I was wasting, oh. Oh--

Now I can see you, be you

How can I ever misplace you

How I want you

Oh I love you

You know that I need you.

Ooh I love you.

Beatles Song, White Album, Lyrics George Harrison

lovely

A lovely pair of glasses of wine and an evening with my hubby has taken my words away.

Have a wonderful Friday night.

I am having a great time.

Daydream

Mother and Daughter, Kathmandu Nepal

This morning while having a birthday breakfast for me brother, I got lost.

I slowly floated into a seduction.

I watched while my sister-in-law created a hairstyle out of my nieces tangled locks.

The slow brushing, the quiet contemplation of playing with the rubber bands.

The smell of her freshly cleaned hair and the warmth of the color.

My mother caught me, she wrapped her arm around me and gave me a kiss.

I was awoken into reality and my own messy locks.

wordless wednesday

Illustrated guide to parental obligations -- Utagawa Yoshitora, 1880



The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) maintains a collection of 400 health-themed woodblock prints from 19th-century Japan. The collection -- which includes drug advertisements, illustrated instructions for treating and preventing contagious diseases, and visual guides to the human body -- offers a unique look at Japanese medical knowledge in the late Edo and early Meiji periods

thanks to:
http://pinktentacle.com/2010/09/medical-woodblock-prints-from-19th-century-japan/

Cinderella

Cinderella, dressed in yellow

went upstairs to kiss a 'fella

made a mistake

and kissed a snake

how many doctors

did it take?

1 year later

1 year ago, while celebrating our 7th year wedding anniversary I had a miscarriage.

We spent the weekend, quiet and reflective and wounded.

When October 30th came around this year, I woke up and cried and apologized to my hubby.

I cooked food all day and then I filled my home with friends and family,

and quietly imagined what would have been.

Our Dia De Los Muertos altar is built and filled with family and a little reminder of our sweet little someone.

Words never seem to be enough

I am finding it hard to locate words.

When I was in the final stages of the show I was sitting and trying to imagine/meditate on what I wanted for this show...it was simply that, I wanted the show would be seen.

I fought off images of an empty gallery,

people getting the cards and then throwing them into the recycling can

or simply forgetting it.

In an effort to offset my insecurities...

I worked really hard to banish the image of being ignored or dismissed.

When I showed my final set of images to my art mentor, she looked at me and said

"You need to think bigger then you are doing. You need to see this traveling"

that set into motion the concept that this show was not simply to be shown once and then be stored in my garage, like a backpack or a box of sentimental clothes.

I wanted people to see the work and know what it feels like to loose something so deeply understood as yours. What it means to be infertile.

 This also set into motion a deep sense of panic to a fanatical level,

 I needed to work harder and longer and more intensely.

I wanted this to be my strongest body of work to date....I wanted to not let anyone down.

I spent many a night simply paralyzed with fear of making the "wrong choice" or making a mistake.

To date, nothing in my life has come easy and I have understood and accepted that from a very young age.

I have always had to work harder and longer.

Nothing is handed to me, and if it is, I will find myself without it soon enough.

I have other members of my family that the extreme opposite is the case and I understand that too.

So as I inched closer and closer to the show opening and this amazing journey began something

 very very foreign to me began to happen...things started to fall into place, people were offering to help me.

A journey I thought I would be taking alone fighting every step, making every choice, searching for every loose coin in the house to pay for labels or frames...some thing shifted.

It opened and the gallery filled up, everyday the gallery was open there were people there to see the show!

I was humbled and so thrilled.

I have met some amazing people, who have said some mind blowing things to me.

I heard that someone even came to the closed gallery after seeing a write up in the newspaper and banged on the door until someone opened it, just to see me show!

(like in a movie)

I have met some fellow bloggers and been starstruck by them!

Wowo ladies, you are my hero's!

I have opened my email and seen letters from people I don't know telling me deep dark secrets of loss.

I think that is what has got me so stunned.

I think I am suddenly lucky and it concerns me

End of days

Ladybird beetle eating aphids in the garden

I took my exhibit down.

I am pretty spun by this whole experience.

I was gone most of today, a dear friend said goodbye to her grandmother.

I fought tears, as her grandmother was one I had known for many years as well and cherished.

It made me remember all the wonderful and special things about my granmothers and how once they are gone you remember all the things you wanted to talk about and all the things you now have missing from your life.

I miss having grandparents.

These last few days of the exhibit have been amazing, in fact everyday the gallery was open there have been visitors! Amazing and wonderful indeed.

I do think that this was the most visited show the gallery had had.

Tonight, all alone, I packed up the images one by one, pulled the nails out of the drywall.

I pulled every label off the wall and lastly removed the show title from the marquee wall.

It was quiet and the air felt heavy.

I was saying goodbye again, I felt every image again.

Read my words and slowly and carefully placed them into their boxes.

As I picked up the guest book, I saw the names of some family members.

I was surprised to see that they came to see the show. 

Then a message on the home phone, they never call...

A tearful voice was on the other end, telling me how she felt about seeing my images and reading my words.

It has made the whole thing even more surreal.

I met a woman the other day that was starting a new business, an infertility "resource center" of sorts. She wants to specialize in hyponotherapy, she comes from a long history in reproductive centers. 

She asked me very pointed questions and wanted to know what I had tried.

I went thru my list of alternative methods and found myself shaking again.

I was feeling them all again; feeling the loss, the hope that was left by the side of the road, and the pain.

She asked for my thoughts on her ideas and desires for her "clinic"

I made suggestions about what she could change in her wording that might be more on the side of empathy.

I felt like I was talking to the enemy, the pusher, the dream pusher....

She said she had never thought outside the box of the reproductive center thinking, she could see another side now. I am wondering if she really did, or if she was trying to wrap her head around the idea that sometimes you don't get what you work so hard for, risk so much for and want so badly.

Maybe I planted a seed;  maybe she will see that although the other side of the fence really has

 grass, it is just not the kind of grass you wanted, even after watering, fertilizing, pulling all the weeds and spending weekends mowing it.

 Sometimes all you are left with are empty containers of products or dead spots.

I have visited an amazing amount of loss this month.

Amongst this all my period was late again, several days late.

I was pulled so easily thru the thick waters of seduction and dreams, into the delusion.

It was not the case, but I was left mad at myself for being enticed by something that will always evade me.

I think I am still mourning, everything 

Guilt

Infertility has left me with a mountain of guilt.

I spent several hours at the gallery today greeting visitors and watching as they would either come in and say nothing or spill deeply personal stories into my heart.

Today the most feared thing happened....let me back up a little.

When I was getting closer to the show opening I feared that I would be attacked verbally or that my show would be received in a negative light. I did a lot of preparation mentally to ready myself for just that

....I thought.

Today about an hour before the gallery was to close for the day a woman came in and started looking around. I greeted her as she walked into the gallery and said if she had questions about the show I would be happy to answer them. She seemed to be simply skimming the show and so I thought nothing much of her visit. Then as she turned to leave, she caught a glimpse of one of my miscarriage images and got her glasses out of her pocketbook.

From here she started to ask questions about what the image was of and then starting looking at all the images and began a half hour talk about how I was paying for things I had done in a past life.

She started in with asking very blunt questions:

Are you a stressed person?

Did you try relaxing?

Did you try therapy?

Did you have tests done?

How many pregnancy losses did I have?

What does my husband think of me?

Did I have a trauma as a child?

The she told me that she had two abortions and now has two wonderful children and grandchildren

Then back to my faults...

I should have past life regression done

I should have my history researched

I should have hypnotherapy

I need to take different vitamins

I really must have done something horrible in a past life

Have I done something bad in this life?

As she left, I realized I had put all my walls up...I had been attacked, I could hear myself saying "interesting" to her suggestions.

 Inside I was screaming and wanting to hide,

inside I was drowning in my guilt.

Inside I was lost.

I was shaken to the core....It has taken me several hours to extract myself from her words.

I felt so broken, so bad, so unsettled.

I came home and simply threw myself into my hubby's arms asking him to surround me,

wanting to feel protected and safe once again.

I don't feel brave

I don't feel strong

I simply feel like a really bad person

I can hear The Barreness laughing at me.

Shock and Awe

I feel like I am floating still....swaying between being awake or asleep, focused or unsure.

I am past my two big openings and I have several pages of kind words about the show.

The newspaper article came out in today's paper.

It was very strange to see my words printed...very strange to realize that someone heard what I was saying. So much of this has been me talking here or in my head...or whispered to hubby at night while lying in bed.

I think I am in a little bit of shock.
I outed myself to my entire community

I stopped by the gallery early this morning to water the plants and check on the work.

I had dreams all night that the gallery owner had sold the walls that my work is on and forgotten that I had my work was still on it.

It was a night of feeling so unsure, so frightened, so unseen or unheard.

Turns out the owner of a local contemporary gallery came by before me this morning and pounded on the doors to see the show as he had read the article in today's paper.

He left his name in the guestbook with the words " Great Art/ Great use of the art process"

He took several cards and told the gallery owner that he knows other people that need to see this show.

I know I am in shock now, as I am not sure how to react to this or how I even feel about it.

Thick of it

I went and sat at the gallery today for a couple hours. In that time three people wandered in to see the show.

Two were college students and one a painter.

The college students wandered in, as the local photography teacher made an assignment of my show (kind of neat) and in doing so has gotten many of his students to the gallery. Both asked me questions, about the work and its meaning. I think they felt a little disconnected from the subject, and after asking questions, felt a better sense of what was going on. Both left kind comments in the guest book about how it helped them think differently.

The painter was moved to tears, she sobbed and said "you really convey loss", she told me she wanted to share something with me, but struggled to get words out....she finally let them tumble out of her

 " I lost my husband less then 6 months ago.

I am a painter and I have a show coming up and I am not sure I can get a show together"

She allowed me to hug her and offer condolences. I was broken hearted for her as well.

She asked how long it took to put this show together and we talked shop about making and gathering work.

She left after sharing many more personal stories with me and crying some more.

I was thankful that she trusted me enough to share her loss and thoughts, and hopefully I showed her that you can still create in the sea that loss creates.

letters....

" Four and Twenty Blackbirds"
Photopolymer etching

I am totally overwhelmed with little letters that are arriving in my inbox....

I am simply a pool of tears by the stories the I am trusted enough to witness.

I am so thankful to know such amazing women

My parents had their private view of the show this evening....both were moved to tears, my father fell silent and had a hard time looking into my eyes, but simply hugged me and told me he loved me. My mother wept openly and loudly, and kept saying I am so sorry. It took my husband off guard, and he became weepy too.

I feel very raw, very soft and slightly afraid.

I am gonna need some waterproof mascara tomorrow night.

All Quiet Tonight...

marquee wall

I spent the day hanging the show in the gallery....totally absorbed and distracted from the emotion.

It was a blessing, as now I am simply tired and numb...

like I need a long soak in the tub but it will never be hot enough, sweet enough or long enough.

I was assisted by a dear new friend whose husband has terminal cancer, she knew this show was emotional for me, but insisted on helping anyways...her heart monitor beeping every now and then.

It served as a reminder for me to simply breathe and be present.

She told me after it was all up that it was a lovely show.

It went quickly, like a wedding after months of preparations.

The I was simply left in the gallery with my work, still cloaked in the plastic covers to protect the plexi from smudges and dirt.

Another new friend arrived and helped me lay the letters on the marquee wall

and

that is when it seemed so much more real.

Now instead of having this in a safe cloistered place, I have neatly framed, hung and lit the moment.

I have displayed it in a room for people to look at and possibly judge, but what I really hope is that I might have also helped someone understand what it means to be infertile.

How it has ruined the party, left a stain on the floor and dented the car.

All evidence that it is there and you can now see it.

Ask questions if you want, I will only give you the truth.

I wanted to make more comments on IComIleave week, so sorry ladies

I confess

I think I made a terrible mistake tonight....I was out to dinner with hubby and was trying really hard to simply relax, as my lack of sleep this last week has left me running on empty.

I am thrilled to have the whole show ready for the gallery but the stress will escalate Sunday and all of next week...so tonight was a "break" a date and a little relaxing.

As we were leaving I saw a woman who I know thru other people and her hubby. She smiled and started a conversation, "are you ready for the show?" I said I was closer and happy to have it open this next week. She said that they were coming to the show as they are personally familiar with infertility too. I said " I had heard, us infertiles seem to know one another" at this I saw the look of confusion and a little shock, then they were told that their table was ready...it was awkward and we said good night quickly and left.

I felt horrible...I have spent the last two days talking almost nonstop to people from news papers and online magazines about my infertility and I guess my sense of social graces has dropped. I need to honor her and realize that she doesn't talk about her infertility or refer to herself in the same way.

We raced home and sent an apology to her:

"Dear sweet lady whom I just barely know,

I realized as we were walking away from our short and very sweet conversation that I might have hurt your feelings...I am sorry.

I should have said "I am sorry that we are in the same crappy sorority". I am sorry that you and your hubby have also not gotten the results you had hoped for.

I have been speaking a lot about my own struggles with infertility,

that I guess some of my filters have dropped and I did not mean to make you or your hubby feel uncomfortable or angry.

Please forgive my misstep in words or actions,

I do hope that you still come to see the show, as hopefully my work will speak better then I did for myself.

The Barreness"

I have made a promise to myself that I will be

far far far better at being present and conscience in my words.

I hope she can forgive me...

Thanks friend

I saw these thanks to "This is more Personal"

they are so bittersweet...although they are funny, they are so right on.

Thinly Coated

My Grandmothers Hands

I am feeling so very raw.

Like I have the thinnest protection and yet I am walking thru a knife shop.

I am proud of my work, I do think it really speaks to the pain and loss both emotionally and physically that infertility makes.

As I look again at the work as I tuck it into their frames and mats...I am moved again.

Frightened and moved.

I simply feel like I need to be touched...that sense that you are not alone,

the quiet comfort, that someone else is there.

I am missing my grandmothers dearly and keep calling to them.

In moments of panic I find myself looking at pictures of them to soothe me.

My grandmothers are both gone from this world.

One a little over 4years, the other just shy of 2 years.

I had very different relationships with each, but both were close ones.

I was terrified when I told them about our childless future.

One simply wept...openly and deeply.

Then never mentioned it again, but asked once if I was still in pain.

The other wanted to make it all better,

she hugged me and sent me a card with money in it

suggesting I go buy myself something bright to wear.

I want to share this show with them...but I can't.

I have already decided to wear something to the show opening that reminds me of them,

a quiet personal reminder that they would be there if they could.

At least that is what I am telling myself

Awakened

I am feeling tired...stressed and tired, but there is still a lot of work ahead of me over the next week or so.

I feel asleep on the couch again watching cartoon, I watch cartoons in order to free my mind before bed and not think of the news or my body or anything.

My night was filled with dreams of testing, medical tests...reliving some and creating new ones.

Running from an ultrasound machine and looking for a bathroom, thru long corridors of mazed rooms. All while finding people I haven't seen since high school and trying to be polite but still needing to pee and all the while knowing that I only had five minutes to get back to the ultrasound room to finish the exam.

While naming my work yesterday, I dove back into the meaning of the piece; the inspiration, the element that drove me to make it. I know that a lot of my dream is about that.

My therapist use to joke that I had the thinest veil between worlds. I am thankful for that...but sometimes it just doesn't give me a break from myself.

I was feeling quite overwhelmed with emotions yesterday, but had no outlets for them. For some reason I wanted to carry them in my hands like a fluffy baby bird, peeking every once in a while at them from between my fingers. Never really opening my hands and letting it see the big sky. I never cried yesterday...but I feel a long soak coming around the corner.

I have awakened all the emotions, fears, troubles and pains from this road.

I know how deep into the woods that road goes.

The Barreness is standing at the entrance, she has candy and stiff drinks to tempt me.

I think I might make a signpost for myself, as I know how seductive that path is...

I do not want to get lost again.