words.

​March 17th will forever take on new meaning for me. No green, no pinching, no tradition. Just cold, and sterile, and numb.
 
I remember lying in that hospital bed in pre-op, this date last year, looking around at the nurses moving back and forth, no one was wearing green. Maybe it wasn’t really March 17th. Maybe this all wasn’t really real.
 
I didn’t even tell people that I was going to be out from work. It was exactly two weeks from the first procedure: a failed attempt at “naturally” passing the pregnancy. When I returned to school the first time, there were no cards, no flowers, no hugs from my colleagues and friends. Well, I remember one hug from someone so unexpected that I will forever look at them through different eyes; forever grateful they took the risk to share a moment of sympathy. Five young ladies, my beloved yearbook editors, had little offerings of condolences, sprinkled with their own heart-felt acknowledgements of my loss. But, I didn’t cry. When you are numb, you can’t cry. Instead I carried on, allowing the pattern and comfort of hustle to propel me.
 
So March 17th was just another school day. Sharing my grief had only been met with deafening silence; a double dose would not have helped. So, not sharing became my armor and shield, a guaranteed way to protect myself from the disappointment of expectation. The disappointment of not being known and seen the way that I had hoped my beloved friends and colleagues would have seen me: broken, devastated, lost.

Read More