One Small Step for a Women (But Probably Not One Giant Leap for Mankind)

  Posted on January 9, 2015 By

 58 Comments

Most of us in the infertility world have the room. The room in our homes that was set aside for a nursery. The room that holds so much meaning in our hearts, and yet is so empty. The room that is a constant reminder what is so desperately wanted, and yet so far away.

I have that room. It’s a cute room. We painted it when we moved into the house. It’s a pretty cute little room just waiting to be used.

I’ve been deathly afraid of that room for quite some time now.

I keep the door shut and I NEVER dare to open the door, let alone walk inside.

But now that everyone is getting excited about our adoption plans, I am being asked things like

What colour is the nursery going to be?

When do you plan to start buying furniture for the nursery?

When will you start buying baby clothing?

When will you have a baby shower since you don’t know when the placement will occur?

The first time I heard any of these questions I was at a loss for words. (Yes, even this girl can be speechless). It has been almost 2 years since I’ve stepped in that room for more than 30 seconds. After all our losses, how can I begin to start decorating and assuming we will actually ever get a child? Panic started to set it. At one point I even said to Mr. MPB, I’m just not ready yet. Maybe once we are done the paper work and are officially waiting, but right now I’m just not ready.

Well, it turns out people keep asking these questions and similar variants. It turns out everyone else is ready! Heck, apparently one of our Aunts is already shopping and another one is already knitting.

So, I’ve decided to step up. While I’m not about to go for a stroll around ToysRUs just for fun, if people do start buying or making gifts for our baby, I will start putting them in the nursery. I’m not about to decline beautiful, well-meaning heartfelt gifts for our child, just because I’m scared that something could go wrong. Our child deserves to be showered in love, and I’m not about to stand in the way of love!

And so, upon making this decision, I took a very big step the other day. When I was putting away our Christmas decorations, I saw a box. A giant box that I have been hiding for the last 4 years or so. This box was the only real thing I have EVER purchased for our future child(ren). This box, contained one item – a beautiful Eames inspired rocking chair. I had been eying it for a long time, and the store went out of business, so I couldn’t resist at the closing out sale. I told Mr. MPB that it was a baby gift for a friend and used the story for years each time he’d ask about the giant box in the basement. (I had absolutely no intention of ever giving up this chair and he knew it).

But you see, I bought the chair a few years before we decided to actively start trying. The chair was bought innocently and naively. And thus, the chair became a symbol of everything that was going horribly wrong. The chair became a painful reminder of our lost babies and our lost dreams. The chair found itself left in its box and tucked far, far away in the darkest corner of our basement as to ensure I wouldn’t have to see it and face a physical reminder of everything.

On many occasions I threatened to give away the chair, because I know some of our friends would have appreciated it and I couldn’t bare the sight of the box. I couldn’t bare the reminder. Each time, Mr. MPB pleaded with me not to, not yet.

So, this last weekend, I took one giant step. I pulled out the box from the storage room. My Christmas decorations needed the space which in my pragmatic mind meant the box had to be moved. My hands slid onto the cardboard as if I were touching a fragile piece of glass – ever so slowly and ever so softly. I had done it, I had touched the box! Victory!? Nope, I needed to go further. I brought the box out of the storage room, and upstairs out of the basement. I found a knife and started to dig in. Mr. MPB noticed what I was up to and came to watch and help (and maybe to help pick up the pieces when I broke down). It turns out there was no breakdown. Upon opening the box for the first time, I discovered it is not the light blue colour I had ordered.  But with a twist of fate perfectly compliments the green of the nursery.  So now the big box has made its way to the recycling depot, and the light green chair is unwrapped and resting peacefully in our future child’s room.

20150109 - One Small Step

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 Category: Adoption, Recurrent Pregnancy Loss      Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

58 Comments on “One Small Step for a Women (But Probably Not One Giant Leap for Mankind)”

  4. What a beautiful description of such a tender event. I was in our crawl space yesterday, putting away Christmas stuff, and came across an unlabeled box. It happened to me baby girl clothing saved and given to us from my BIL and SIL. I had a good cry, and tucked it away further. Good on you for bringing out your victory chair, and placing it exactly where it should be.

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    • Oh, I totally understand stumbling upon something and then tucking it away – I did that for over 5 years with the giant box that held the chair. It’s funny, our home should be a safe space, yet there are still unexpected triggers.
      I hope with time you will pull out those little baby girl clothes and be able to use them (unless you have a boy, then maybe not). 🙂

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    • Thank you so much! It is just one giant step, presumably there will be more to come, like the day I actually buy something with intention for our child. Not yet, but one day. 🙂

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  6. I totally get the association of baby stuff and “everything gone wrong”. We’ve got a closet that hides a few token big items we purchased immediately when we started trying to conceive. My husband (and his relentless hope) has refused to let me give them away. I know how taking that chair out was a huge step for you. I just love the colour mix up! It’s intentions are refreshed. It is meant to serve a different purpose.

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    • Thanks so much for understanding. It sounds like Mr. MPB and your husband are similar with their hope! It’s a great that we have them to keep us going. 🙂
      And yes, after keeping that box hidden away for over 5 years, it was a huge step for me. And the colour mix up is pretty random, but we both thought it was pretty cute when we opened it up. 🙂

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  8. I totally get this. Before I ever met J, there was a silent auction and a 5k I had done. One of the items was a beautiful handmade oak cradle made by one of the Dr.’s at our local hospital. No one had bid on it so I for whatever reason, I did. That cradle sat in my house and then moved to J’s house with me. At one point, I did try to sell it because I felt like it was jinxing us. In the end, one of the legs ended up cracking and breaking off when I was sliding it from one room to another. We still have the actual cradle part and may turn it into a planter or something this summer. So happy your chair made it into your nursery!

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  9. YES! I love this. First, that chair is absolutely adorable! I love it! Second, this is such a precious moment and a huge victory! I smiled all the way through this whole post. LOVE it!!

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  11. Oh my God! You have the Joker colours in your future child’s room! The Miracle Toddler would go bananas!

    Back to your post. First, love love love the chair. Especially the colour. The colour is perfect. Your courage in doing this is perfect.

    Second, there will be a child in that room, rocked in that chair. In my core I know this. It was time to enter the room and place that chair. Well done.

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    • So we have two future kids rooms, this one has been sitting empty and the other one is a guest room. Mr. MPB and I each picked the color for one room. The green room was Mr. MPB’s choice – we now lovingly refer to as the skittles room (the day we painted it I told Mr. MPB it looks like the lemon and lime skittles threw up on the wall). I had no idea it was the Joke colours.
      And secondly, thank you so much for your encouragement and the picture you paint of the future – I so hope you are right. 🙂

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  13. Awe! I’m so happy for you!

    Our nursery quilt was purchased long before we started trying, and we never ended up using it (but used its design as our nursery theme). Turns out, a quilt isn’t that useful for a tiny baby. What a waste of emotions all those years we we’re trying and avoiding that stupid quilt!

    The chair looks great!

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  14. Wow!! This is a big deal!! 🙂

    Great news that you’ve done this, i agree that this is a huge step forward and im really happy for you! Its funny how an object can have such a massive impact, im sure all of us reading this can totally relate to this, its brilliant news 🙂 xx

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  16. Yay for small steps! Proud of you! We have that room in our house too. It’s been fairly empty since we moved in. B wanted to move the cat litter box in there since “it isn’t being used” and I threw a fit…said I didn’t want litter on the floor where a baby would be crawling around. He thought I was being irrational, I said I didn’t care. I won. 🙂

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  19. What courage you had to display that chair. Wonderful looking chair, by the way. We have a vintage looking rocking chair that my sister-in-law used for her babies (who are teenagers now) so I don’t think we’ll spend money on something this trendy.

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    • It definitely was a moment of courage, now I just hope I can hold onto that courage and it doesn’t find itself hidden again in a few months.
      I’m sure your vintage chair is beautiful. 🙂

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  22. Congratulations!!! Yes, we have “a room” and, over one year into the adoption process after 4 miscarriages, it does not resemble a nursery in one way…except the plastic safeties we were required to put over the electrical sockets for our home study. 🙂 You are inspiring me – but I am too scared still!

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    • I think so many of us have that room. It haunted me for so long (and still does most days), but I’ve decided to keep trying to be a little less afraid of it. Maybe we can inspire each other as we slowly transform each of our own rooms. 🙂

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      • Yes! I have never talked about the room with anyone before so it is novel to share that thought! I actually have gotten to the point where I can go there and sit and think…but sometimes it is more of a crying, emotional place than a “Hey, this is just another bedroom.” I will let you know when I start! I think when we get a child referral I will be much more eager. (probably this summer or next fall)

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      • Not many people understand the significance that the room holds in our lives. Most people think I’m crazy that I have a wonderfully painted room sitting nearly empty.
        I think it’s amazing that you can go into the bedroom – I cannot get. I keep the door closed, and I walk past it multiple times a day and almost just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Like you, one day, probably when we are much further into the adoption I’ll start actually filling the room with baby stuff.

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      • I know when I start to fill it, I will think of you! When I first wrote about My son’s death, I mentioned the room because it held such a significance for my husband and me…but it means a lot to hear you write about it and know we aren’t alone!

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