Half an hour

I got to watch my daughter's heart beat for half an hour today.

And as I did, I fought back tears in that dark room.  Part of that was the joy of seeing her alive and well, knowing that the flips I feel are so much more than stomach flutters.  And part of that was anxiety, fear, and anger, at so many things.

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I haven't been sleeping well lately.  I fall asleep just fine, exhausted at the end of every day.  But then I wake up, usually because I need to use the bathroom (pregnant lady problems), sometimes because of an overly-loving cat, sometimes because of an annoying CGM alarm.  And then I can't go back to sleep as my mind kicks on with worry, anxiety, stress, frustration, and anger that I can't fall back asleep.

And so I lay there.  I try to at least get some REST rather than forcing myself out of bed, until finally I can't take it anymore.

Last night was one of those nights.  I slept peacefully from 10 pm to 3:30 am, and then no more.  I finally got out of bed just after six to get ready.  Nick was able to drop me off at the Children's Hospital on his way to work so that I could get a fetal echo done of our baby girl.  After our anatomy scan last week, all looked good with her heart, but this is standard procedure for a high-risk pregnancy.  Nick had to drop me off a little over an hour before the appointment, but I would have had to leave the house at the same time if I were taking the train, and this way I got to stay out of the 10 degree weather.

I waited for 40 minutes past my appointment time, so a grand total of an hour and forty-five minutes of waiting.  I was frustrated and bordering on angry because of this wait.  You see, I'm in the middle of writing my dissertation.  It's due very soon.  I'm very behind.  I am a bundle of stress and nerves because of this.  So I really didn't appreciate the extra lengthy wait, which cut significantly into my work time.

It didn't help when the sonographer asked me if my diabetes was "controlled."  I so badly wanted to make her say what she meant by that, to ask how she would like that measured, to show my frustration at that blanket term.  Instead I said, "Umm, yes?"  Then we started the ultrasound.  I got almost no interaction from my sonographer because someone from the machine manufacturer was their tweaking all of the settings with her.  I got a couple of sentences over the course of the half hour while they discussed resolution and zoom settings.

As I laid there, I tried to calm down.  I was angry because of the wait, the lack of sleep, the anxiety about my dissertation, the stress of not knowing what's going on with my career next year (nutshell: I'm graduating, I applied for many, many jobs and postdocs and so far all rejections...), and my recent frustrations with having diabetes.

Palate cleanser: Longwood Gardens, January 2014

The ups and downs of diabetes (literal and figurative) have been taking their toll on me lately.  I'm so tired of the lows, the unexplained highs, the desire to put certain things in my mouth fighting with wanting to keep my baby as safe as possible, the night alarms, the finger pricks that won't stop bleeding, the marks on my body from pump and CGM sites, and on and on and on.

And as I laid there, watching my baby's heart beat, I felt guilty.  Guilty despite knowing that I'm doing my best to keep her safe.  Trying to feel grateful that it means I get to see her so frequently in ultrasound.  But guilty that I might be hurting her, that my best efforts might not be enough, that we know so little about our future and its stability.

I tried to let it go, to tell myself that everything is fine so far and will be fine.  That I'm more than halfway through this and that she will be here before I know it.  That my dissertation will get finished.  That eventually we will know what's happening next year.  That maybe I'll sleep better tonight.

I got to watch her heart beat for half an hour today.  Thump, thump, thump, so fast and strong.  And everything looks great.  No visible problems.  I'll see her again in a few weeks for another anatomy scan, and a few weeks after that.  And in the meantime, I'll be doing my best to keep doing my best.  Counting carbs, dosing insulin, testing my blood sugar, writing page after page, trying to accept that I can't change any of these things.  I can only try my best to cope, and keep thinking about that beautiful little heart.