I had a "moment"

Amid what was otherwise a very productive and warm fuzzy feeling inducing weekend I had one of those moments that come out of nowhere when you think that you've gotten to the point where your skin has thickened and you can confidently say that you're okay.

It happened at church on Sunday morning. We had just heard the adult choir sing some beautiful renditions of Christmas carols, everyone was in the holiday spirit and I was feeling very happy and safe from the sadness. The church that we attend  always does videos to introduce different sermon series and this week the sermon was going to be on the nativity. Once the video started I felt the moment coming and I wanted to be anywhere but in that seat in that church at that moment.

It started with a picture of Mary holding her assumably pregnant stomach. As it progressed with her finding out she was pregnant, etc. etc. I could just feel the emotional breakdown coming on. Then the screen switched to a picture of an ultrasound where there was a perfect baby swimming around and all was quiet except for the loud thump of that baby's perfect heartbeat. And the tears started. Luckily I've perfected the art of silent crying and the lights were down so that people could see the video. The tears just streamed down my face and I couldn't stop them. I felt completely overwhelmed. Josh had his arm around me and I think he noticed that my leg that was crossed started bouncing (my telltale sign that I'm trying with everything that I have to hold myself together) because he squeezed a little tighter.

In that moment when I heard that heartbeat on the video I was taken back to the first ultrasound that I'd ever experienced.....my ultrasound this past July. My doctor ordered it to check on the baby once I started bleeding. I went into that ultrasound feeling completely defeated but I had just a tiny speck of hope. Like it was yesterday I remember seeing that screen as I watched it that day....willing the technician to find a heartbeat. And not hearing a sound or seeing a flicker of movement, no matter how hard I concentrated. 

I didn't realize until Sunday how much that ultrasound traumatized me. I'm absolutely terrified that we'll always have disappointing ultrasounds, that we'll never be able to see a swimming baby or hear a strong heartbeat. Even thinking about it now makes me absolutely sick to my stomach.

I hadn't had a breakdown like that in awhile and it definitely reminded me that my skin isn't as tough as I thought it was. But I'm not giving up, I'm moving on with this process even though the fear is overwhelming so I've also been reminded that I'm stronger than I thought.