Timing

To those of you who comment on this blog, I wanted to put in yet another note of thanks for your words of wisdom and encouragement. It is great to hear from you all.

Someone asked what I meant by "Guess what time it is" in the previous post, assuming I was talking about time of the month. I meant time of day. It was midafternoon when I last wrote, and the afternoon blues were upon me as I complained that the prospect of work and school left me flat.

I am grateful to report that this is shifting: Lately, I am happily, albeit frantically, engaged in my work, my writing, my art-making, and in applying to graduate school. Morning, evening, and (knock wood) in the afternoon. All day long, actually. I forgot to eat lunch yesterday, in fact, I was so engrossed.

Speaking of time of the month, however, yesterday, I hit what, for me these days is the most poignant and fleeting time of the month. I'm talking EWCM here, people. For those of you not versed and deeply immersed in the TTC (trying to conceive) lexicon, I mean egg white cervical mucus, that clear, gooey stuff that lubes the passage of sperm through the mighty maw of the cervix just in time for conception. It's the telltale clue, the biological egg-timer, as it were, dinging up another ripe egg.

When I was a teenager, I had copious amounts of the stuff for a day or two every month. (No wonder, I read recently that we're most fertile between the ages of seventeen and twenty-four.) Nowadays, I'm lucky to see any at all. In fact, last time I noticed EWCM, J~ took the morning off and we conceived my latest ill-fated pregnancy.

But yesterday, mid-morning, I discovered my body had produced a great gob of the stuff. I checked my chart: it was the eleventh day of my cycle. Right on target. But J~ was already long gone and I was so deep into my work I didn't think about it long. By the time he came home and I had torn myself from the computer screen, the day was over. I was starving and stiff and in dire need of a workout. (Didn't I mention I forgot to eat lunch? I forgot to take any breaks at all yesterday.)

We talked about it. We noted the passing moment, the shift in my focus away from parenthood and toward a broader definition of my life's work and purpose. I asked him if he felt sad. He admitted that he did, but just a little. "Not a deep pit-of-the-stomach sadness," he said.

I nodded, agreeing, understanding. It is sad to think I may never be a mother. But also, when I can embrace it (usually after my requisite afternoon grieving period, which can be very intense) the thought is also tremendously freeing: I may never be a mother.

My fantasy these days is that I'll get pregnant by some miracle of health and timing. It'll happen at just the right moment, if there ever is such a thing, when J~ is more available to help, when I am more established and satisfied in my work. Perhaps that moment is a month away. Perhaps it doesn't exist. But in the meantime, life goes on.