So much can change in a year (Forgive me for rambling)

Last year on this day (Stella's due date). I was living in Arizona. Far from all my friends and family (except for Charles and Chip) and felt so isolated and alone. I spent the whole day in bed crying. I had so hoped to be pregnant again by her due date, but it just wasn't happening. I had started wondering if I'd ever be pregnant again. Last year today I was in the utter pit of dispair.

Now here I am 365 days later.We are living back in North Carolina. I will be spending the day in bed again but for all different reasons, because I am pregnant and on bedrest. By tomorrow night or Monday sometime I will be holding my new daughter. We will have come full circle. Any tears cried this weekend will be tears of joy. I still feel Stella's loss, but this year we are so full of joy surrounding Skyla's arrival, that it really helps me come to terms with her loss. We will always mourn Stella, but we can't change what happened. We can only welcome Skyla into this world and be grateful that we got a second chance at bringing a new life into this world.

The weird thing is we have decided that Skyla will be our last child. I have today and tomorrow (and maybe some of Monday) to be pregnant .. and I will never be pregnant again. This is an odd thing for me because for the last 4 years of our lives things have revolved around getting pregnant, being pregnant, having a son, being post partum, deciding to get pregnant again, getting pregnant, miscarrying, trying for a year to get pregnant, hoping to stay pregnant, and now getting prepared for delivery again.

In most ways I am relieved. Never getting pregnant again means never having to deal with the possibility of miscarrying another child, never having to deal with that fear and devistation that came with my miscarriage. It also means not having to deal with the hard pregnancies that I have. Each time they keep getting worse and I am terrified to go through another pregnancy again after how rough Skyla's has been.

On the other hand never getting pregnant again means never again feeling those first kicks, never again knowing the joy of carrying a tiny miracle inside me again. Never wondering again whether the baby will come out looking like me or Charles or some relative back 2 generations ago. It's a bittersweet conclusion we came to, but it feels like the right decision.

I feel like though at this point I will have a healthy little boy, and a healthy baby girl (assuming everything goes perfectly with delivery .. I can't even consider the alternative right now) and I will have survived 2 high risk pregnancies, how can I ask for more?

Most of the time when you come to a point where your whole life changes you don't realize it ahead of time. The amazing thing about having a child is, you know ahead of time your life will never be the same, but you don't know exactly how everything will change. It's exciting and freightening at the same time.