Guilt

When we did the infertility attack on our self-esteem I swore to myself that if I ever became lucky enough to get pregnant I'd not be one of those women that whined about how miserable she was. What was a little morning sickness in exchange for a child? After enduring hot flashes and diabiltating migranes brought on by Clomid, what was a little waddle? After taking needles to the stomach, what was a few well placed kicks? When I sat there - feeling barren - and listened to pregnant women complain about swollen appendages and sleepless nights I'd seethe. They are just so incredibly ungrateful, I'd think.
 
And throughout my first pregnancy I kept my word. I didn't whine. I didn't fuss. I didn't even consider myself in any great discomfort. (Although I did take occasion to mention how difficult it was to shave legs you couldn't actually see or reach.) Then again, I had no morning sickness. My weary fatigue of the 1st trimester was limited to earlier bedtimes. My baby sat high in my womb and the weight added (generoulsy I might add) around my entire body. I didn't notice it feeling any hotter than normal because frankly I find 90+ temps pretty damn hot no matter how many of us share this body space.
 
This time, however, is different. This time I feel like all I do is whine about how miserable I am. It started early on when I actually had all-freakin-day sickness -- when the mere thought of opening my eyes caused me to throw up whatever stomach acid and water from my sips of the cup near my bed I managed to sneak in during the night. I got to whine about that for 19 weeks. And now its picked up again. I realize I don't go long without complaining to someone how absolutely freakin' miserable I am and how looking at the calender and realizing I have two damn months left just puts me in a black cloud mood. This baby is low - yet still manages to stretch a limb out well enough to poke up up under the ribs if I'm not at least semi reclined. This child is completely out in front - so combine that with low you get wicked lower back pain all day long. This one makes me wake up at night with a throbbing ache in my hip that has me starting my days with a limb. By days end I waddle - at 32 weeks. I find the pokes and jabs of fetal movement disconcerting and quite honestly a wee bit freakish. I feel so incredibly foolish when I get down on the ground and struggle to get back up - something that sort of sucks rocks when you've got a 2 year old to play trucks with. So I whine a lot lately. I whine to anyone that will listen to me and then some. . . and then I feel guilt.
 
I read other people's blogs. Some of these people I know. Others I could crash into on the street and have no idea that she's the one that wrote that post that moved me so the day before. Some of these blogs are about struggles with infertility - and as I read them holding my achy back or pleading with my daughter to stop using me as a punching bag - I feel immense guilt. I sit here doing what I had sworn not to. . . and I read the words of women that would give anything to feel someone's foot in their lung. I see their words and I recognize that pain. That feeling of brokeness and uncompletness. The sense that you're body has failed you and its somehow all your fault...and yet here I sit - carrying the very thing I, like they now, once longed for. . .and I complain about it. It makes me feel incredibly guilty and ungrateful.
 
Logically I know this is an emotional, unreasonable response on my part - but that doens't make it go away. Its there. It'll be there. When my child is born I'll hug her tight and I'll put the discomforts of these 9 months behind me. I won't forget them. I won't ignore them and say "Hey, let's have a 3rd" but I won't let them rule me as they do now. I do wonder though, if the guilt will remain. . .