Looking forward

I'm climbing out of the pit. I'm trying to convince myself that, while I've made mistakes in my life (like, not trying to get pregnant 5 years earlier, and many various and sundry other things), that doesn't mean that the rest of my life should or will suck. I can move on from the mistakes and find joy in life. I can become a mother even if it doesn't involve a genetic link. I'm not a failure just because I'm too busy right now to get through the adoption class or because the orientation was depressing. I can find a way.

I've been dwelling a lot on historical figures. A review of a scented candle, of all things, brought me to a French royal mistress (linky) - a minor figure that I'd never even heard of. Anyhoo, she had six children, only two of whom survived childhood. Of the two, one died at the age of 16 in his first military campaign. The other married, but didn't have children and her husband died of smallpox 5 years into the marriage. So, not only did the woman go through the pain of so many children dying, she never got to make her genetic mark on the world because neither of her surviving children managed to have kids either. And that got me thinking about all the millions of people since the world began who didn't get to successfully reproduce, through accident or death or disease or whatever. Millions of people, if not billions. Why should I think that I deserve any different? OK, so nowadays we deal with more infertility and fewer children dying in childhood, but the end result is the same. And it's not like women haven't been barren through the ages, or ended up in convents or as old maids because there was no other option to them. If you think about it, it's monumentally lucky that our particular genetic combinations arrived on the planet at all, because it was through so many lucky and random circumstances that we have the genes that we do. So the future of humanity clearly doesn't depend on me carrying on my particular genes. I can still make a difference by raising a child with love and can pass on my beliefs, family histories, silly habits, and the like.

Having said that, it's only natural to want to have your "own" children. Children related by flesh and blood. Because that's all that humans have known for millenia. Either you have children or you are barren, and if you're a lucky barren person, you get to adopt. That was it. So it's no wonder that we have this inbuilt drive. It doesn't mean that I don't think that adopted (or DE or whatever) children aren't fated, aren't our own. I do truly believe that if and when I become a mother, that child will be my perfect child, meant to teach me lessons that I need to learn. [By perfect, you realize, I am not talking physically or behaviorally or mentally perfect, but the one that I am supposed to be with.] However, believing that still doesn't stop me mourning my dreams, mourning my idiot mistakes and choices, mourning the simple lack, the failure to achieve motherhood the way that I believe we are all driven to do. And mourning the 50lbs I let pile onto my arse along the way.

I have lots of good things to come in 2009. I will find a way to attend the adoption classes. I will get my home study done. I am going to go to acu school (in less than a week!). According to my horoscope, I have the best opportunity in a decade to meet my true love. I can lose weight if I put my mind to it. I will hopefully make some new friends at school. I may or may not become a mother this year, but I will become an honorary auntie to several of my infertility buddy's kids as 2009 will involve a veritable baby boom (yes, you may not realize this or even want me to be honorary auntie, but I am claiming your unborn children). There is so much to look forward to.

Happy New Year, one and all.