All my friends are having babies and we got left behind......

[Mindful-Muma-to-be]

While experiencing infertility there are many milestones, how long you have been trying, anniversaries of angel babies, Christmas for all of us is hard I'm sure. For me our summer holiday in Dorset wins a prize for stiring up my maternal instinct, hundreds of kids everywhere you look, a deep longing to bring my own to these beaches. Each year we also meet up with my schoolmates while we are down there and I just spent the weekend with one who has a 3 -year-old and one who is pregnant now and who is due two months before I would have been if I had not miscarried.

I feel so lucky that I have learnt techniques such as mindfulness and emotional freedom technique (EFT) as they give me the strength to be able to enjoy spending time with my friends and their bumps and babies even though it still stings.

Writing helps me to express how I feel and since this topic is a current discussion on the Mindful Muma-to-be online support group (I volunteer for the Infertility Network UK and run a support group in London as well as on facebook - a secret group) I thought I would share a poem:

All my friends are having babies and we got left behind

All my friends are having babies and we got left behind

The ache of infertility takes little to remind

Reading bedtime stories to a three-year-old am I

Doing all the voices even though I want to cry

Sat tucked up in the nursery, with a cradle to my side

Every fibre in my body telling me to run and hide.

For these children belong to others not myself

Should I put myself in these positions, is it good for my health?

My baby didn't make it, one of the one in four that ends in tears

How long will we be waiting, it's already been three years?

The longing that I feel inside threatens to break my heart

I want to be a mum so bad, I want to play this part.

The voices in my mind they begin to taunt

Why then not us? They shout, they scream, they haunt

In my chest I feel the wave of panic start to grow

Years and years of trying and nothing yet to show

The unfairness and questioning begin their endless dance

But something inside quietly whispers “Let it go there is a chance”.

I have a choice right now you see

Believe my thoughts or gently....set them free

My breath becomes my faithful friend

Deep and smooth, breathe in and out to mend

The future hasn't happened yet and Mystic Meg I'm not

Take pleasure in the moment and be grateful for my lot.

“No” cries my tiny friend “you're reading it all wrong that word is moon!”

I apologise and smile, my time will come and who knows it may be soon.

I have no choice of when and how

But a mum I will be.....somehow

Many options lay ahead

My kids might come a different route instead

Deep inside I know a mum I'm meant to be

Patience is a virtue and acceptance is the key

Accept each moment as it is for what it wants to be

And that I find is the secret to being free

(and if breathing isn't working then try some EFT!)

Over to you

I adore spending time with my friends children and the pleasure I receive is far greater than the pain. How do you cope with always being 'auntie' and never mum?

Feel free to check out my blog and join us on the Facebook group mindfulmumatobe.co.uk

[suki84]

just read this, love it! x