A Different Christmas*

Last year on Christmas day, my best friend of a long ass time [20 years or so?] called me to wish me a Merry Christmas. We talk every major holiday & always pass the phone around to family, so I was expecting that at some point that day, I would hear from her. When she called, we had guests over, so I snuck into our bedroom so I could actually hear her & talk without the comments from the peanut gallery [aka, my darling husband].

What I wasn't expecting was for her to tell me that she was pregnant. Just a month before, she had been out here to visit & go to a Dave Matthews Band concert with me up in Virginia, when we had the "talk" that her and her husband were thinking about starting to try. It was a realistic conversation in that she wasn't expecting it to happen right way, she knew that it would likely take some time, and that she had learned a lot from the miscarriage I had a couple years back. It was a good talk. So when the words "I'm pregnant" came out, followed by "we weren't really trying that hard" and "I didn't expect to happen" the first time came out, it took everything I had to make my way through the conversation without crying. Luckily she was still in the car on her way to her parents house, so when we were done talking, I could hang up.

And when I hung up, the tears started flowing.

I called my mom proclaiming that I was a horrible friend. She was, and HAS BEEN, a solid rock in my life since the day we met in the 6th grade. But I cried my eyes out for a good two days, and definitely drank a lot of wine as I tried to get myself through the rest of the holiday. I wanted to be happy for her, but it was a long, long time before I could bring myself to accept how easy her getting pregnant had been. Because it wasn't me. It wasn't us.

This Christmas is obviously quite different for us. At 7 months pregnant, we are counting down the weeks until our little one arrives. There is a much different sentiment to our holiday and we are both happy to be counting down these last 11 weeks.

But we are also counting our blessings.

This Christmas, more than anything, I am grateful for what was given to us this year. I know how rough the holidays are for those in the infertile community, and I know how rough it can be to be around other pregnant people. The announcements and the photos still get to me, even being where I am, and I know that is something that might never go away. I speak from personal experience when I say that this weekend can shove it. People can be cruel and insensitive, no matter how good intentioned they are.

But even though 2011 was extremely rough for us, between family accidents, deaths & dealing with some other major issues, we were blessed with this one good thing. And I hope, more than any of you know, more than some of my friends know, that 2012 gives all of you exactly what you want. I hate seeing my friends, real or otherwise, in pain. I hope that this next year brings everyone exactly what they are wishing and hoping for. That treatments & medications work. That I have many more pregnant friends in my life. That this time, next year, you all are reflecting back and having a different kind of Christmas. My fingers are crossed.

Merry Christmas to all of you & your families. Bring on 2012.