Being pregnant…and thinking about death

Being pregnant…and thinking about death

Two things you won’t often read in the same sentence!

Being pregnant is, among other things, weird.  I wake up each morning to see what new and wonderful thing my body is up to today.  I feel a bit like a very interesting science experiment. You know, like you did at high school, when you put something into a petrie dish and every day you’d peer into it and see what it was up to. Sometimes not much, sometimes a small change, sometimes something freaky and unexpected that you’d want to share with the class.  That’s my body right now.

But naturally it isn’t just affecting my body.  Don’t even get me started on my emotions (I pretty much bawl my guts out through every movie. Who knew horror movies could be so very moving?).  But it also gets me thinking a lot about miscarriage, and the death of embryos, foetuses, and babies in general.

This is something lots of people expecting babies don’t like to think about and completely block out of their mind.  Or they can swing the other way and think about it a lot and in a very fearful manner, terrified that something might ‘go wrong’ for some reason.

But here is what some simple death awareness does  for me.  It reminds me not to take any day for granted.  It’s easy to be focusing forward, imagining a little baby to hold, and even a little toddler.  (I can’t think much further than that, my head might explode). But if you’re doing that – constantly thinking to the future – when are you actually going to enjoy the now?  These days of pregnancy are going so very fast, and I’m told they’ll just go quicker…and all that thinking ahead is time that I’m not simply being in the present.

Sure I’d very much like to have a healthy bubs who lives a long life, longer than the long life I might like to live. But that may not be what life has in store for either of us, and that’s ok.  And all that time counting on the future would be time I’m not enjoying the here and now…which is the only time I can be absolutely certain we have together.

Babies, of all ages (both pre and post-birth) die.  It happens.  If you factor in miscarriage then you probably know several people who have experienced this.  This may have happened in your own life.  It isn’t rare.  With this in mind, the other day out walking I asked myself a question: if I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this baby growing in my belly was only going to live say another 100 days….and I also knew that there wasn’t a thing I could do about it…then what would I be doing with that time?  Well, I certainly wouldn’t be spending my time imagining a future that was always uncertain but that I now knew wasn’t coming.  Instead I would enjoy each day.  Be present, be grateful, cherish this time we have together, knowing that it’s limited.

So this is what I do now. I try not to spend loads of time imagining the future – naturally I do need to do quite a lot of this, there is some serious planning that needs to happen! – but I try to achieve some balance and make sure each day that I take time being present, thinking about this little creature as it is right now.  I don’t know  how long we have together – maybe another 60 years, 30 years, 3 years, or 100 days.  So I want to do my best to make sure I enjoy each and every day of it.

This is the same with everyone you love.  You don’t know how much time you have with them. You may well want it to be a long time….but that doesn’t mean it will.  What if you only have 100 days?  What would you do different? So of course do your thinking and planning for the future….but don’t let that overtake the time you are present, grateful and loving for what and who you have right here, right now, today.

Much love,

Kristie

xx

Tagged as: bereavement, death, grief, pregnancy, pregnant