MAMA MOON

I am six weeks pregnant.

I am six weeks pregnant and I don't know, can't know, whether I will ever get to meet this baby. I have lost three pregnancies. Each miscarriage seems to numb a part of my heart and with each one, it feels like the odds get stacked higher against me. I'm too cautious now to jump for joy at the sight of the plus sign on my pregnancy test. Now, I just stare at plastic stick in my hand and breathe.

I try to distract myself at first,  to ignore the fact that I'm pregnant. If I don't think about the baby, it won't hurt to lose it, I reason. But that never works. The thoughts find their way in. I calculate due dates, imagine another beautiful home birth, make mental lists of names that I like. My mind plays tug of war between denial and hope. I feel myself spinning off center-- falling out into a world of "what ifs," and losing touch with what is. I am six weeks pregnant. 

I stop and breathe. I take deep, full breaths to push out the fear. 

I throw myself into my art and into mothering the beautiful child I have here on Earth.  

I try to stay in the present. 

And at night, when I've made it through another day of fighting back anxiety and doubt, I look out the window at the moon. Each night, when she appears just a little bit larger in the sky, I know that I've made it one more day on this uncertain path. Whatever happens, I'm one day closer.

I watch the moon grow, little by little, until she is full and round and glowing. I whisper to her, asking her to hold the tiny life inside me in her light. 

Maybe this time my belly will grow big and round like the full moon. 

These two prints can be found at Studio Spirit & Sol.