Everett’s due date was April Fool’s Day. It truly is ironic, seeing that he had some completely different plans, the joke’s on us! When we did the math at the doctor’s office, the nurse laughed as she calculated it in her mind and said, “of course this baby would be an April Fool’s baby!” I think she was referring to the dread that many infertiles experience when it comes to April Fool’s Day. There is always one (or more) person in the social media world who thinks it’s funny to joke about being pregnant. I don’t believe it’s ever done with bad intentions, but I am here to ask you to please don’t do it. It isn’t even a funny joke and it’s worn out by now. I know, we live in a world where no one likes to be offended, and many might think that this is a unique perspective. 1 in 4 women experience pregnancy loss and 1 in 8 couples experience infertility. Knowing those numbers, is it really such a rare frame of reference? The chances are that you are really hurting someone you care about. Is the bad joke really worth it? I digress.
The purpose of this post is that last year I sort of just let April 1st pass me by without any real thought of the significance of it. Maybe it was because we were in the thick of adjusting to life at home with a newborn, or maybe it was because he was never going to be born on April 1st. He was measuring so large that we kept moving his due date back, by the time he was born we were settled on the 3rd week in March. Because of this, I really never had a set due date in my mind, especially since I didn’t like the thought of an April Fool’s Day baby, mainly because I know it would sting my other infertile friends extra hard to have my baby that day. And maybe it was because I was already sick of hearing the jokes about it when I told people my due date; I didn’t want any of us to hear that the rest of our lives.
April 1st is hitting me a lot harder this year, I am realizing that he is just now supposed to be turning one, instead of almost 15 months old. His first birthday seems so long ago now. He has changed so much since then that I can’t even fathom everything this little being had to go through, and everything he is currently going through to try and catch up. A baby born at 30 weeks can’t regulate their own body temperature, they have to mentally realize and remember to breathe (it’s not innate in them yet), they could have brain hemorrhages or heart issues (luckily ours didn’t), they have digestion issues and are more susceptible to jaundice and other illnesses due to a weakened immune system. They are also more susceptible to SIDS. That’s a lot of stuff for a less than 4-pound baby to overcome.
Sometimes I couldn’t care less that he’s behind, and other days I freak out that I am not doing enough to get him to catch up. I am still trying to find the balance. So far, I have found that pushing him does no good, he has done everything in his own time, which ends up being right on time for all of us. Experts say it can take up to 3 years for him to catch up to his peers, and the thought of that makes me sad for him. I went to his class Valentine’s party and all the kids (even those significantly younger than him) were all playing around him and he was just sitting in the middle of the room watching everyone around him because he couldn’t crawl yet. I don’t know if he was sad about it, but I was holding back tears and feeling guilty for not being able to keep him in the womb longer. I don’t have anything to compare this to, but I do love how big of a deal his milestones are when he reaches them because I know how much more he has to overcome to get there. I am sure every mother feels the same bittersweetness of their baby growing up. I definitely cried (tears of both happiness and sadness) when he started army crawling around the house.
First Comes Love 