Change

Oh, what a difference a week makes! Earlier in the week, on Wednesday, my principal called an emergency staff meeting. Budget cuts are costing us teachers next year. Luckily our building will even out, with the people with temporary contracts who were already leaving. But the way our numbers play out, one of us would have to teach half day kindergarten and then half day 2nd or 3rd grade. Long story short, I took the job. I think it'll be good for me, a change in scenery. Maybe precious, fresh kindergarteners will renew my love for teaching and remind me how rewarding it can be! And in the back of my mind I was thinking, it would be a pretty easy position for a sub to walk into, should the need arise for a maternity leave...

Flash Forward 2 days. Took a pregnancy test Friday night on a whim. (Not really a whim. I'd had a couple of dizzy spells earlier in the week like those I had when I was carrying Jesse. Billy's had weird cravings and we'd joked a lot that I must be pregnant for him to be having cravings, so the idea was planted.) Two lines indicate pregnant. There's one strong line and a second, very faint. I decide I'll take another in the morning. Again, one strong line, the second a little darker this time. Pretty sure I'm pregnant. We went to a wedding today, and then to a bbq with family afterwards. On the way to the bbq, we bought another package of pregnancy tests, the kind with the WORDS pregnant or not pregnant. We'd decided that if it came back positive, we'd tell the whole family tonight. Clearly waiting to tell anyone about my pregnancy with Jesse until we were "out of the woods" (past 12 weeks) didn't do a lick of good. So, we're doing it different this time. I peed on the stick in my cousin's bathroom and it popped pregnant. So we told the family and we're back in the game.

I'm excited. I feel more optimistic this time than I did with Jesse. I had never had the strong urge to buy anything for him, so I hadn't bought a thing yet when he was born sleeping. Last week I was at Kohl's and saw some wall decals for a nursery and had a STRONG desire to buy it. We don't even have a nursery! I didn't, but in the back of my mind I wondered if that was a sign. So it is with cautious optimism that I announce my second pregnancy. We should be due right around Thanksgiving, 2010. That'll be something to be thankful for!

Yet in the back of my mind, there are nagging thoughts. Am I being disloyal, betraying Jesse because I am excited about a new baby? When Jesse should have still been in my womb, should I be happy that there is a new life begun there? Is there a statute of limitations of sorts, on grief for a child lost? Should we have waited until after his due date? How will I handle the stress of this pregnancy? What if the worst happens again; how will I forgive myself?

And then I push those thoughts aside. We deserve this. We've been through our share of hardship and grief. I believe that Jesse understands that we miss him terribly, and that another child isn't a replacement for him. I think the tide is changing for us, and this is good...