Day 22

In high school I wrote in my journal every night. I considered it one of my greatest accomplishments that I had such a detailed chronicle of my teenage years. When I went to college, my writing became more and more sporadic – probably because my days were much less structured. I still try to get a few notes in every few months, and especially to avoid only writing when things are hard. I don’t want it to seem like my life is altogether terrible.

Lately I’ve been doing a lot more writing, mainly so I can see how my feelings have developed over the past few weeks. Yesterday and today have been really hard for me, particularly at night, and rather than sobbing and wailing (the kids were asleep, so I stuck to silently sobbing), I wanted to put things into words.

But as soon as I wrote the date I thought, 16 days left. Just 16 days. What can I do in 16 days? How can I actually get ready for this? How will I convince myself to get in the car to drive to the hospital in 16 days, knowing I’ll go home that night without Tiny Baby? How do I function for the next two weeks? How will I manage afterwards when I’m barely keeping it together now?