Reflections

The last few weeks have been super hectic as we've been getting ready for the baby, working through visa issues, and preparing for our move to Dubai.  In addition, I've been providing vacation coverage for two managers on our team, which ended up being a bit more involved than I originally expected. At the end of this past week, I handed all my extra coverage responsibilities back to their owners, AND I handed most of my normal responsibilities over to the person providing my maternity leave coverage.  All the laundry for the baby is done, the carseat is installed, the bassinet assembled, and now I just have some time to rest, wait, and reflect.

I reflect on what a wonderful husband I have.  G surprises me every day with how supportive and loving he is towards both our unborn child and me.  I knew that my ability to love would grow with the expansion of our family, what I didn't know was that my love for my husband would grow too. 

I reflect on my life before I met G. If I hadn't met G, and I was still single at 35, I planned to find a sperm donor and have a child on my own.  When my divorce was finalized, I started treatments to preserve my eggs as an insurance policy to myself for having children.  My dad is close to retirement, and we had a plan for him and my step mom to move to Houston to help me raise my child.  Having a child was important enough to me to do choose to do it alone, and while I am glad I didn't have to, I would still make the same choice.  I haven't even met my daughter yet, and I am so filled with awe and wonder of her.

I reflect on my life before my divorce.  I try to imagine pregnancy and a child with my first husband. I don't doubt that it would have been filled with love, and at the same time very different than my experience now.  We were married for over 8 years, together for a total of 13.  He was a huge part of my life.  Our marriage was incredibly tumultuous filled with brilliant highs and dark lows.  Early in our marriage, he wanted lots of children - at least 3, maybe 4 or 5. Over the next few years, he was diagnosed with severe anxiety, depression, debilitating migraines and eventually bipolar disorder and attention deficit hyperactive disorder. We thought we could defy the statistics -- 90% of marriages involving bipolar disorder fail.  I educated myself on mental health, we tried to find support groups, and in some ways, I began to lose myself. I became the worst version of myself and I continuously felt like a failure as a wife and partner.  The harder I tried, the more hyper-aware of his needs and mood swings I became, and the further I drove us apart. Amidst all this, the timing was never right for us to start a family - first he was finishing his PhD, then he accepted a job in a different city from where I lived, then he was unemployed in a deep depression, and at some point during our mental health journey together, he no longer wanted children.  We spent countless hours in counseling, and in the end, having a family was important enough to me to walk away. After filing for divorce, I started going to church again.  We had found a church we loved when we lived together in Minnesota, and after moving to Texas we drifted away from church in the same way that we drifted away from each other. It was hard for me to go back after such a long time away, and it took a long time before I could sit through a full mass without crying.  I learned that love isn't enough;marriage requires hard work and God, and I needed my next relationship to be faith centered.

I reflect on my life before my mother passed away.  I try to imagine the advice my mom would have given me while pregnant.  My mother and my first husband never really got along, and she and I grew apart because of that.  When she died a few months after my divorce was finalized I felt robbed of time to reconnect with my mom. We had made plans for her to visit me in Houston more often, something she was never able to do.  She wanted so much to be a grandmother.  I miss her every day, and I hope to see her stubbornness and her spirit in my daughter.

And my reflections usually come back to G. I don't have words for the gratitude that I feel towards him every day and I feel so blessed that he has come into my life.  Whether he was sent to me by my mother, my guardian angel, or God himself, I couldn't have imagined a more perfect partner for me. We often speak of wishing we could have met sooner, had more time together, and yet I know in my heart we met when we needed to meet.  We each had many things to learn in our first marriages before we were ready to be with each other.  I know the church's teachings on marriage and divorce, and while I wish my twenties hadn't ended in a failed marriage, it has shaped and molded me into stronger more patient partner for G.