Yesterday I was having one of those days where I was really feeling like throwing in the towel on the whole blog thing.  Why do I continue writing?  It takes up precious time and I oftentimes struggle with what to actually wrote.  I am not sure that many people are still reading other than the person who Googles and randomly stumbles upon one of my posts related to: "does CrossFit cause divorce?", "diastasis recti", or "do long cycles cause miscarriage?".  If I pulled my blog out of the blogisphere today, would anyone know or even care?

Since I started blogging, back in the spring of 2012, my content and tone have changed quite a bit.  I have gone from a very bitter and jaded "baby-less" person that blogged about miscarriage, temping, and pee-sticks to a mommy that blogs about her post-baby body self-esteem, running, and CrossFit issues.  The pre-baby and post-baby blogs are almost completely different audience types and, with the exception of people who have been following me for a while and have gone through similar circumstances, I am not sure how many new and regular readers I have.  What is the point of continuing?  For my own personal health and well-being?  If that was the case, couldn't I just write everything down in a private journal?  I seriously ask myself this all of the time.

Yesterday, I remembered to check my blog email box for the first time in several months.  Besides mounds of spam from people trying to get me to give them a shout out or let them "guest post", I had a few emails from a few different women who were writing to seek my advice regarding situations that they were in right now that I had once been in.  I was reminded of why I continue to keep my blog and the associated email box going.  For as many people that no longer follow me and read my posts, there continue to be a few people who come across my blog that find it helpful and comforting.  They have found themselves in an unfortunate position and the cosmic powers of Google have brought them to my tiny little space where they have been able to read about what I have gone through, relate either somewhat or completely, and apply things that I learned or tried to help them with their situations.  I seriously love that I am able to help even just one person a year because that is one less person who feels like they are dealing with a similar issue, alone.

One thing that a lot of these women that write to me have in common (and definitely how I once felt) is that they are alone in their situations and in their feelings about their situation.  They feel like the time is going so slowly and that they will never "be on the other side".  I am sure that there will always be extenuating circumstances that will make it medically impossible (for one reason or another) for someone who has miscarried many times, to have a child.  That said, out of all of the women who have ever taken the time to write to me personally, I cannot think of one that has followed up with me, that has not be able to eventually have a baby...somehow.  This makes me so happy.

I know that I currently don't have anyone's "permission" to anonymously post their story (and would NEVER do so unless I was given permission), but I would really love to share some stories of other ladies, who have been in similar shoes to my own, on my blog.  Maybe once a month or every other month or something like that.  I think that reading stories of others that have "been through it" helps those that are "still going through it" actually get through it.  Having some hope is half the battle and if I can provide hope to others by sharing positive stories, I am doing a world of good.

So, to my readers, if you have written to me before and still follow me, have never written but follow, or have stumbled upon my blog for the first time and have gone through a similar situation as me, please write to me (and either tell me your story or give me permission to anonymously use your story that we have already emailed about) and I will share in a dedicated post.  Your story is important and may help someone else who is struggling right now.  This isn't limited to just miscarriage, either, although that is the subject that I seem to get the most response and readers for.  I know I write about other topics such as body image (such as diastasis recti), nursing, and marriage issues, too, so feel free to write to me about that.   Share your struggles and things that you have tried that have helped you get through and continue on.  Please think about it.  I may be putting together a dedicated page on my blog to share the stories of others depending on the response that I get.  You could really help someone, too.  

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I feel like my blog is smack in the middle of an identity crisis, or maybe I am.  The reason that I started it was to chronicle my path through the scary jungle of repeated loss.  I was in a pretty dark place in April of 2012 and needed an outlet for my emotions, fears, and anxieties.  I wanted to connect with and potentially help others that were in similar spots.  I think this blog has served its purpose and then some, but right now I feel like I am in no man's land in both blog and in real life.

Over the past several months, my blog has switched from a loss blog, to a TTC after loss blog, to a pregnancy after loss blog, to a parenting after loss blog.  This has happened organically and frankly without my noticing until recently.  My blog has taken on a whole new identity and I am caught somewhere in the middle.

For so long trying to have a baby was the number one thing in my life.  It came above all else, including my husband and me.  My life revolved around temperature taking, analyzing cervical mucous, and ovulation and pregnancy testing.  Once I was pregnant it revolved around pregnancy symptoms, doctors appointments, ultrasounds, and gestational diabetes.  Now my life revolves around my son.  I guess that was just the organic evolution of things, but I do feel like a major part of my identity is gone and even though I don't have a ton of free time right now, I still feel like part of me has gone missing.

Many times, I still wake up in the morning and am in complete awe of the fact that I have a baby.  I am now so deeply entrenched in all things baby.  I complain about baby related things...irregular sleeping patterns, breastfeeding issues, blowouts...  I relate to people with babies and children.  I pretty much only associate with people who have babies and children.  I am becoming one of those people that I despised when I was having trouble carrying a pregnancy and I am not feeling good about it.

I belong to a support group in FB of girls that all lost babies that were due in April, 2012.  One of those girls recently posted that she was feeling quite sad about the anniversary of the date when she found out two years ago that she was losing her baby.  It made me stop and pause because I could no longer remember the anniversary of the date that I found out about my impending pregnancy loss.  It upset me.  I used to keep close tabs on all of the dates of my losses and I feel like I have pushed them all to the back of my consciousness.  I don't think about those babies like I once used to.  I don't dream about them.  I don't cry about them.  I rarely even think about them because I am quite preoccupied with the one that made it.  It makes me want to cry as I am typing this.

Yesterday I decided to visit Fertility Friend, which has been a favorite site of mine for several years, and used to be a daily habit.  Since I haven't gotten my period yet and we are not planning on trying for another baby for quite some time, I realized that I really didn't fit in on any of the boards.  The TTC boards are for people who are actively trying to get pregnant or at the least tracking their cycles.  The Pregnancy boards are (obviously) for people who are pregnant or just gave birth.  My VIP membership runs out in 34 days.  My first thought was to renew it, but then I remembered that I really have no use for it right now.  That made me sad, too.  One day I'll probably go back to trying to have a baby and all that goes along with that, but right now, thankfully, I am in a different place and I don't need it.

In trying to move forward with my life, I decided that rather than close down the blog all together, that I am going to try a new and fresh look.  I know I have changed and my blog has changed, too.  I need to keep the blog in-sync with my life if I want to continue it. So stay tuned.  One day in the near future, you might not recognize the look of my little space on the Internet anymore.  Hopefully you'll still recognize me though.  I'm still the same girl as I was when I started the blog, I just have my precious baby now.

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Thanks for all of the comments/feedback.  After thinking it over, I decided that I am not going to stop blogging.  I am going to try to let myself be a little more open with my thoughts and my ideas.  I need this space for me.  It helps to get out my thoughts and I really love interacting with others who really get it.

I am still on the fence about commenting though.  I have a core group of ladies blogs that I comment on regularly.  They comment on mine.  I consider them friends...real friends, even though I have never met any of them in person.  I feel like I really do know them.  I feel comfortable commenting on their blogs.  I think that limiting my blog list and stopping "drive by" commenting, even where friend bloggers solicit support for their blogger friends or I feel like I really get what the person is experiencing, is the way to go.  I don't ever want my comments to be taken the wrong way and I never have had the intention of hurting another blogger and if they don't know me or really know where I have come from then I guess this is possible.  Hopefully this is the last I'll be writing about this because this space is supposed to be for blogging about loss and pregnancy after loss and not blogging about blogging!

This past weekend, my husband and I sent out holiday cards which I created through V.ista P.rint.  I have been creating yearly cards (and sometimes calendars) for friends and family.  My cards, up until this year, have consisted of my furbaby family.  It has always been my year-long goal of getting them together for a picture where they are all looking at the camera.  As you can see, last year I succeeded, naturally!

2009

2010

2011

Last year around the holidays was tough for us.  We had our second miscarriage in the middle of December.  Holiday cards flooded my mailbox with pictures of new babies and happy families.  It was a tough pill to swallow.  My mom came up to help me through it (this was my only natural miscarriage so I wasn't sure how hard it would be).  She was amazing through everything.  She made me tea and watched K.eeping up with the K.ardashian's with me.  She also helped me bake cookies, which is something that I love to do.  At Christmas, I make 13-15 different kinds on my own.  I bake for 3 days straight and then deliver (or mail) bags and boxes to my friends and family.  Since I wasn't feeling very festive last year, my mom helped me make about 6 different doughs before she left.  Somehow I managed the strength to get all 15 cookies mixed, baked, frosted, decorated, bagged, boxed, mailed, and delivered.  Not sure where that drive came from as I bled heavily.  Maybe it was a defense mechanism?

This year my husband and I decided that we had been withholding the news of this little guy for too long.  Even though we will never feel comfortable with things regarding this pregnancy, we decided to combine our yearly card (with furbabies, too) with a baby/gender announcement.  Let me tell you, as I created and ordered the cards, I was filled with fear.  I was filled with even more fear on Saturday and I addressed and stuffed the envelopes.  What if this doesn't work out?  What if something bad happens in the last 18 or so weeks?  To me, it seems like I have been trying to hide this pregnancy, even at 21 1/2 weeks.  Still worried that I might lose the baby.  The truth is, nothing is certain.  No one can guarantee me a baby in a few months.  I need to accept that.  I also need to accept the fact that I am visibly pregnant.  Pregnant enough where strangers tell me congrats and where my co-workers tell me I "look so big".  There is always a chance that something will go wrong.  Sending out a card isn't going to make the chance any higher (man miscarriage has made me so superstitious!).  It is what it is.  What will be will be.

So this year we sent out cards and included our whole family and we are hoping and praying for the best in 2013.  :)

2012

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Yesterday wasn't the best day for me in blog land and it wasn't for another blogger I follow, either.  The blogger that I follow recently got her BFP after infertility, miscarriage, and IVF.  She has expressed over and over how thankful she is and how scared she is.  I totally relate to everything she says even though we have slightly different circumstances.  Getting a BFP after loss brings with it a whole different set of challenges.  It is hard to be excited about something that you have had before and lost in an instant.

That said, just because someone has experienced a loss (or 2 or 3...) and has dealt with IF and/or has had some form of ART doesn't mean that they shouldn't be able to be honest about their pregnancies when they do become pregnant.  Someone being honest and truthful about things (especially in the IF community) can often be misconstrued as being whiny or complaining when they "should just be happy they are pregnant and pretend everything is always roses".  Well, unfortunately this isn't always the case, as I have come to find out (my latest pregnancy malady is serious eczema of the left ear canal).  I am always very reticent in revealing some of my true thoughts on how I am feeling on my blog because I don't want them to be misinterpreted as me complaining and not being so incredibly overjoyed that my body was finally able to figure out how to grow a human being past 10 weeks gestation to hopefully give us the baby that we have wanted for so long in a few months.

Anyways, the blogger posted about her issues with her weight (something I actually posted on a few days ago).  I totally understood where she was coming from, but apparently others didn't. I don't know what was said exactly because I missed the follow-up post, but it made me sad to think that she was getting nasty comments for being honest.  There is nothing wrong with some comments of differing opinions, but there is no need to be rude and/or nasty.  Most of us IF/PL bloggers have been though enough and are just looking for some support and validation.  I don't know why some people feel the need to be mean. If you really don't like what the person is saying, then don't read any more.  Sheesh.

As for me, I had another issue with commenting on another blog.  I was offering support to someone who is going though yet another pregnancy loss.  Apparently my words were not good enough or something.  I am racking my brain trying to figure out what I said that might have offended.  I NEVER mentioned being pregnant or ANYTHING about pregnancy.  I only offered condolences like all the others because I have suffered through 3 losses myself in a short period of time.  I get it.  Or I thought I got it.  Anyways, for one reason or another my comment never got published.  I am not sure if it is because I am pregnant now or what and maybe the blogger knows that.  I guess that means that all of my earlier struggles don't matter.  The fact that I am pregnant now invalidates everything I went through apparently?  Maybe I am reading into things, but in this circumstance, I don't see how I could be doing that.  Maybe I need a lesson on proper commenting?  Maybe I should just stop commenting?  The whole thing just really bothered me for some reason.  I thought about it all night.  I ended up unfollowing the blog (my blog list is dwindling) because why read and give support where it isn't wanted?  I also questioned leaving comments on other blogs any more because I don't like this bad/guilty feeling of not knowing what I did wrong (still debating this one with myself and haven't decided what to do yet).  I still want to support those who are in the trenches, but maybe they don't appreciate my support or see it as sincere anymore.  Maybe they would rather I stay away?  That makes me sad, because I really do care.  :(

This is when I started having serious doubts about continuing to blog and follow/comment on other blogs.  I felt so much more connected when I was having trouble and experiencing loss then I do now. Even though a lot of the bloggers that I have been following are now pregnant, I still feel this way.  The bloggers who are now pregnant blog much less than before.  I am not sure why this is.  I guess I blog less, but mostly because I am worried about being too honest and offending people.  I sort of feel like once you are pregnant, no one really wants to hear about the pregnancy aspect of things.  Maybe this isn't true, I am not sure.  I also feel guilty for not having it as hard as some others have had it or continue to have it.  I only had to go through this shit for a year and change others have been going through this for years.  Sometimes it seems like it is a contest of who has it the worst.  I know that there will always be someone out there who has it worse than the next person.  That just sucks.  I know that when I was going through loss after loss, I felt the most comfort going through old posts of people who had experienced many losses and went on to have successful pregnancies.  I wanted to read all about their experiences.  They gave me so much hope.  

This morning when I checked my gmail, I found an email from someone who had experienced 3 losses in a short period of time (very similar to mine) and had just gotten a positive pregnancy test.  She was obviously very scared, but hopeful at the same time.  She found my blog and has been reading for a while.  Reading her touching email made me realize that no for every person out there who isn't interested in my story or thinks I didn't have it hard enough or something, there is someone out there who I might be helping and who really is interested.  I have connected (through email) with several ladies who have been through very similar situations as me.  I now email some of them regularly.  I check in with them and vice-versa.  We share worries and fears along with the good news.  Even though some of these ladies are on the other side of the world, I feel so connected to them now.

The email from the woman made me remember why I started this blog and why I continue to write.  This is why I blog.

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Back in April, when I started my blog, I didn't know that there was a whole community of other bloggers out there with similar issues to the ones that I was having.  I started the blog because I searched and searched for others like me and couldn't find anyone at first.  I thought that blogging would be a way for me to write about the issues that I was having and hope that I might help someone in the future who stumbled across it.

One of my friends forwarded me the Stirrup Queen's blog URL and I was immediately intrigued when I saw that there were many others out there that were in situations that were almost identical to my own.   Multiple miscarriages with no apparent cause??  I immediately signed my blog up in the main listing and then started searching for other blogs.  I started following a few blogs that interested me and that I could relate to.  Gradually people started commenting on my blog and I got a few followers.  I signed up for the LFCA and made even more bloggie friends.  Through ICLW I have met even more amazing ladies with some amazing yet heartbreaking stories.

Over the past few months, I have gotten to be much closer with bloggers from all over the world. It has been incredible that this little blog, which just started out as a collection of my thoughts for the random user, has made allowed me to make some really great friends.  I am so grateful to Mel @ Stirrup Queen's for bringing so many fabulous women together.  

Thus far most of my experiences in the blog world have been nothing but positive and enriching.  That was until last week.  Something happened to me in the blogisphere that kind of upset me.  Maybe it is my pregnancy emotions or maybe I am just more sensitive after opening up so much.  I am sure that you are all rolling your eyes by now (and will probably laugh when you read on), but I am being honest and I have never blogged about blogging before so hear me out if you will.

I heard of another blogger who was going through similar recurrent miscarriages like I have gone through.  She was worried that her current pregnancy might end up in another miscarriage.  This is a fear that I have felt many times before and that I STILL feel.  I thought I'd got over and offer some support because I felt like I could really relate to the person.  There were already quite a few comments, but I left one anyways.  I was trying to be optimistic, which in hindsight might have been a bad idea since most of the other commenters forecasted gloom and doom in a supportive fashion.  Anyways, I left the comment.  A few days later I went back to check the blog and I saw that the author had about twice as many comments as when I left my comment and that she had (literally) posted a response to every comment, thanking everyone for their support and advice, EXCEPT for mine.  I get that not every comment warrants a response, but I was really the only comment that didn't deserve one?  For some reason I felt really hurt by this at that particular point in time.

In this rather vulnerable moment, I started thinking about all of the blogs that I have been following regularly.  There are more blogs that I regularly comment on who comment on mine too and ladies that I support who also support me as well.  I have spoken about some of this before, but I recognize that some girls who might have followed me and supported/commented more regularly when I was TTC that either stopped or do so on a much less frequent basis because they are in a bad place.  I get it.  Hearing about any pregnancy while you are currently in the trenches is tough to deal with, IF/loss or no IF/loss.  I am not necessarily talking about this situation (although I will have to admit that sometimes it stings when people that you support(ed) all the time don't support you back anymore, but I guess that is just the way the infertility/loss cookie crumbles).  I am talking more about the blogs that I have followed and commented on who's authors have never once commented on my blog.

I get that you can't follow every blog out there and you can't always comment on every comment that you get, but if a person comments on my blog more than once, I usually start casually following them and commenting occasionally and then sometimes I end up following them regularly if I make a connection.  I realized last week that there have been ladies that I have been following, commenting/supporting for months that have never (or maybe once) commented on my blog.  I started asking myself why I was continuing to follow them and offer them advice, when then have never once done the same for me?  Some of those blogs have gone post-less for weeks.  I decided then and there that it was time to start unfollowing those blogs and only keep the ones in my reader where I truly have a connection with the author.  I think at this point I owe it to myself to stop investing my time and energy into people who either don't know or care about my existence or what I am going through.

I also tried to remind myself of the reason why I started the blog in the first place.  The blog was for me to write down my feelings to share with others that were going through similar situations.  I think I got really caught up in the whole idea of followers/commenters and lost sight of the real reasons that I started the blog.

Now I am curious if I am the only one who had ever felt this way or had a similar experience or realization regarding blogging?  Am I just taking things too seriously?  Do I need to grow some thicker skin?  Has anyone else ever cleaned out their blog following list under similar circumstances?  I would love to get some honest opinions here.  Feel free to call me out too, because there is a strong chance that I am just being to sensitive.

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