A Hawk Walks Into a Bar and Becomes Infertile.

I was never the type of girl who dreamt of babies, white picket fences or a prince riding in on a white horse. I dreamt more of reckless abandon, traveling the world and being financially independent. And so, that was somewhat the life that I created for myself. 

Children, for the past decade, have been an enormous part of my life. God babies, nephews, friends’ children. I love them all intensely. Slowly, through the years a quiet biological clock began to tick here and there. It was often easily quieted with the next great adventure or love affair. And so it went. The ebb and flow.

And then I met my Him. We got pregnant early on in our relationship. Very early. I wasn’t elated. I was scared shitless. However, just as I began to settle into the idea of actually following through with perhaps being a mother, I miscarried. I didn’t wallow in sadness. I believed what was meant to be was meant to be. I ate D’Angelo’s on the way home from the hospital after my D&C. It was about a year or so later that I sort of grieved. In many ways I still do. Maybe not so much for ‘it’—more so of the chance, or even greater, my insolence surrounding ‘it’.

I had just turned 40. My Him and I were now married. Ever since the miscarriage my body hadn’t felt quite my own. Something shifted, something changed. We were never able to get pregnant again and I just knew something was ‘off’. So began the months of being a lab rat at a fertility clinic.

I won’t bore you with the details but it turned out that I was in early onset menopause and the likelihood of me ever conceiving hovered around the 1% mark. Not too promising. I was able to carry a child, just not conceive so they encouraged me to try egg donation. I have a stepdaughter who’s been in my life since she was a one-year-old. So, in essence I felt that I already had the egg donation covered. I already loved a soul that came to me through someone else. I guess selfishly, I wanted my own person. Doesn’t everyone, in one way or another?

Finding out that you are, for all intents and purposes, infertile is something that I find difficult to process or digest. In the beginning I, for the most part, walked up to strangers on the street shaking their hand yelling, “Hi, I can’t have kids.” I felt the need to sort of get that out of the way. I wore it as my scarlet letter. In the beginning, I think I cried every other minute, mid-sentence. And in between that I bounced into, “I am woman, hear me roar, no big thing chicken wing, I am mother to all….” Maniacal.

We always want what we can’t have. And now I wanted it more than ever. I didn’t want to be different. Why me? Crack whores could have children. Those who could not emotionally, physically or mentally support a child—but not me. What had I done to the Universe to deserve such a slight? The intensity of loss, as a woman, a human, was at times a weight that dragged my core. The child that I had lost became a statue, a saint, a beloved being of regret that symbolized my last chance, and I had blown it because I didn’t love it immediately. Because I had been afraid of all that ‘it’ had meant. There are things that I experienced emotionally that pen to paper will never adequately be able to articulate. The chaotic darkness of process that is never truly definable.

It’s been a year and a half now—Christ, longer. Due to logical requests, I no longer announce my infertility upon walking into a room. I think I’m past the worst of it now. I am slowly settling into acceptance. I still do silly things like take random pregnancy tests just because, and I pull out an ovulation test strip every once in a while just hoping for a surprise…but alas, there is never a surprise. Life is filled with so few surprises.

Lately I’ve been plagued with the question “Why am I here?” If I can’t have that, then what is it that I will leave as my legacy? What will be my epitaph? What is my purpose? What is my unconditional love? My work? My thing to mold and shape and be a foundation for? I get that I have many things and beings worthy of love in my life, but there is so much in me to give and it feels stifled by there not being enough places to give it.

I have had a blessed life—that’s for sure. I don’t deny or negate that. I will always bounce back. I will always be OK and I will always see the brighter side of the moon. However, I can’t help but feel this emptiness that is like a quiet smoky ember that burns ever so slightly in my chest, and if I breathe deep enough, it rumbles itself down to my belly where it smokes and wallows in its ashes.

In these moments, like now, like tonight, when I feel so isolated from my own life and terrified of what my future might not hold, all of those things that I tell myself that make life right escape me. And my throat gets tight and music streams around me and I want to smash things to tiny insignificant bits. But I won’t. And I don’t. And I keep it tight and blow slowly on the ember to keep the tiny red coal alive because I’ve been so used to carrying it with me now that I don’t really want it to go out because it, it is better than the alternative of nothing.

It’s not self-pitying or at least not meant to be. It’s just questioning. Perhaps I just wager a question to the Universe. You took this, so could I have something to replace it? Maybe I already do and I’m just not sure of it. Checkmate. Fucker.

I’ll end this torturous pointless ramble with one thing. I remember that day. When I knew something was wrong and the hawks came down and flew in circles around my courtyard. And I knew that it was done. You were gone. And I’m sorry I didn’t get to know you. But thanks for thinking for a bit I was worthy enough to be inside of. I won’t waver next time I meet you. Promise.

Thanks for listening.

Russian Roulette

"Open your eyes, look within.  Are you satisfied with the life you're living?" - Bob Marley

I stood in line tonight at the grocery.  As I idly scanned my Facebook feed from my phone while my groceries were being bagged, the elderly bagger named Louie nudged me and said, “We’ve been having a discussion tonight and I wanted to get your opinion on something.”  I looked up at him intently.  “Shoot.” I stated.  “If someone offered you a billion dollars to play Russian Roulette would you take it?  You’d only have a one in 6 chance of dying. 1 out of 6 bullets.”  Without hesitation I responded, “Not a chance in Hell Louie.  Not a chance in Hell.”  He winked. “Me either kid.  Me either.” And so we went on about our ritual.

For some reason, driving home the conversation stuck with me.  More so because I’m not sure if a few years ago I would’ve answered the question so quickly and with such unabashed confidence in knowing my retort.  A few years ago I was lucky to get through my days without wishing that this life would somehow just vaporize into thin air.  

Every step for many years felt as if I was running in cement.  Going nowhere fast and if something didn’t change I was going to be frozen there, a statue of myself ‘The Girl Who Couldn’t Get Away From Herself’ they would’ve called me.  Repeating the same patterns of behavior over and over again expecting different results.  Yes, the definition of insanity.  I was the poster girl.  I had everything externally, an insane career, piles of friends, jaunting around the world just because but on the inside…I was vacant.  A shadow.  Some sort of lost semblance of something that I was supposed to be but couldn’t find my way to. There had to be more.  I had to be more.  

And then one day, after something insignificant, out of nowhere I decided that I no longer needed to carry these weights.  I could be something different.  Something better.  As long as it took, I would pull myself out of this drowning of the self.  I would find light.  And so I did.

It wasn’t easy.  It required a concentrated effort to unravel myself from myself.  Every time I went to react, I chose to act instead.  I chose to consciously and purposely move instead of chaotically flounder.  What did I want the outcome to be was the penetrating thought with my every word, with my every movement.  If I wanted love, I had to project love.  If I wanted peace, I had to seek it.  If I wanted understanding, I had to understand.  If I wanted something to be beautiful, I had to first believe that I was, in whatever form.  If I wanted forgiveness, I had to forgive myself first and foremost.  

I dusted off the hope chest of myself and went through each shred of paper, photograph, poem, travel, lover, lesson and embraced them all….one by one.  I incorporated the pieces of me into a wholeness of the being that I was now.  I took the 14 year girl in me who had been stopped in her tracks with anguish and held her hand and let her know that she was ok.  I had this now and we were gonna be just fine.  I stared my 30 year old self in the face, hugged her really fucking hard and said, “You will get through this and be far greater than you could ever comprehend.”  And I let her rest.  

I decided to be a little bit more gentle with myself.  To drink less wine.  Absorb more air.  I decided to envision, visualize, believe.  I would whisper as I drove for miles in my car, in the middle of the night, “Wherever you are, the rest of my life, I love you, I’m grateful for you and I’m ready when you are…”  I allowed myself the ability to wait patiently, to flow with the current instead of fighting the tide.  I would get where I needed to go if I could just float.  Just be.

And slowly but surely, it came.  Because slowly but surely I was ready to see it, to embrace it.  To recognize it.

There are a thousand cliches of self help.  But in the end, it’s two words.  Help yourself.  Stop waiting for some lightening to crack from the sky of your being to jolt a change forward.  Be your own electricity.  Stop grunting and start being.  There is no elixir.  There is no magic moment. It’s one foot in front of the other, doing the next right thing.  Being the next right thing.  It’s about being a boomerang.  What you project out will be what comes back.  It’s about releasing yourself of instant gratification and having patience with the process. It’s about having a process.  

I still falter. I am human.  But I would so much rather this, the strangely beautifully confusing moments to be my story than the last moment being that I was stupid enough to lose out on the next chapter because I might be willing to play a stupid game of staring down the barrel of something I might not be able to come back from. 

This is beautiful.  This is life and this is enough.  I am enough.

Thanks for listening.

I Love You Still

Super honored to have a piece of my writing published via Elephant Journal xo

http://www.elephantjournal.com/2014/10/i-love-you-still/

Chapter Two

I sit in front of my computer.  I have my first appointment with Dr. Weirdo tonight.  What do I tell him?  Where do I start?

I’ll Google a few things.  That’s a start.

Codependency (or codependence, co-narcissism or inverted narcissism) is unhealthy love and a tendency to behave in overly passive or excessively caretaking ways that harm one's relationships and quality of life. It also often involves placing a lower priority on one's own needs, while being excessively preoccupied with the needs of others.^[1] Codependency can occur in any type of relationship, including family, work, friendship, and also romantic, peer or community relationships.^[1] Codependency may also be characterized by denial, low self-esteem, excessive compliance, or control patterns.^[1] Narcissists are considered to be natural magnets for the codependent.

Shit.  I was done at unhealthy love.  Shit.  I think of him.  Shhhhh.  I say to myself.  Calm, Tarah, calm. 

How will I tell him where it started?  Where did it start?  I drift off into a daydream staring out into the sunlight.

I rush for the elevator.  My hair, wet and sticking to my head.  I jump in, he’s there.  Just he and I.  Fuck.  “Morning Ms. Cammett,” he says quietly, calmly with an inquisitive stare, looking me up and down.  “Morning,” I say to the Iceman housing the corner office. 

He’s tall.  He’s wide.  He’s 6’4” of confusion.  Mystery.  He isn’t modern. He is dated but still powerful in his tone.  He wears Ralph Lauren shirts firmly pressed and has Fred Flintstone hair but there is something about him that makes me tingle with familiarity.  I don’t know him but I feel an aching energy that connects me to him.  As if perhaps, I’ve known him for a thousand lifetimes before. He makes me itchy. 

I stare in silence as the elevator brings us up, trying to think of something witty to say.  We’re close to our floor and there it is, “Tarah, that problem that you talked about, well, I’d like to help you with it….” he says, OHMYFUCKINGGOD.  I swallow a stone.  Milliseconds become hours.  He heard.

The evening before we had all gone out for drinks after work.  People were in town.  It was a reason to drink.  He came.  The Iceman.  I had too many drinks and I was rambling on to a coworker about my dilapidated marriage, over before it began.  But more importantly, I was rambling on and on about the fact that I hadn’t had sex in over six months and I was horny as hell.  He was there.  Observing.  Listening.  He always does that. 

Holy shit.  That’s what he’s referring to.  He?  Me?  I mean, he’s like older and powerful and I’m just me?  Did he really just say that?  He did.  I guess he can, cause he’s him and all powerful and shit and I’m so confused.  I’m staring straight ahead.  I can’t make eye contact.  Palms sweating.  Parts tingling.  The elevator doors open, without a thought, without one look, I take one step out, still staring straight ahead and unconsciously say, “Just name the time and place.”  And walk away.  I feel his smirk burning through my back. 

“What’s up gorgeous?” flits through the air and I’m instantly snapped back from my memory.  A sideways grin happens across my face.  “You say that to all the girls,” I snap back looking up at his sandy blonde hair, dancing blue eyes and mischievous grin.  “Nooooooo….” He retorts, leaning over my desk with an okay-so-I-totally-do look on his face.  I love this boy.  My Quinn.  Over the couple of years we’ve worked together he’s become such a close friend.  Always saving me from myself, reminding me that I’m still young and that there’s still hope.  He’s the only one here that knows.  He’s my lifeline. 

“Come to the city tonight.  Get trashed with me and the water polo boys.”  I roll my eyes at him.  He’s always trying to get me away from ‘him’.  “I can’t – I have a ‘thing’,” thinking about Dr. Weirdo and making quotations in the air.  “You always have a ‘thing’,” he snaps back mimicking me.  I mouth the words, Therapy while using my thumb and index finger to form a gun shooting at my temple.  Good he mouths back.  He knows how much I need it.  “How about this weekend then?  Come and crash for the weekend.  We’ll see some music, I’ll find you a hottie, be your wingman.  C’mon!”  He’s pretty hard to resist.  He always makes life seem so easy.  He’s always trying to show me a different way.  “I think I’m running away this weekend.  I need my ocean."  He nods approvingly.  He prefers me to be far away from ‘him’.  He sighs with resignation.  “Fine.   Lunch then?  Diner at noon?”  “Yes.” 

I love our time at the diner.  It’s my only escape from that place from the torture.

We order the same thing every time.  I scoff down a cup of chicken noodle soup and a grilled cheese; he gets breakfast and chocolate milk.  He’s such a boy.  It’s the most I eat these days so I let myself indulge.  I look at him.  “You look like shit,” I grumble.  He grins.  “It’s the stripper.  She stopped by after work, which was 4AM.  I haven’t had much sleep.”  Ugh.  I hate the Stripper.  He’s so smart.  So witty.  So deserving of someone with a brain cell and not bubbles popping out of their mouth when they speak.  But he’s recently divorced and this is his coming out party so I give him a minimal eye roll, stare and pray internally this pattern won’t last forever as interesting as it makes for lunch fodder.  “Have you seen him?” I whisper looking down at my plate.  “No.”  I shrink.  Where the fuck is he?  “Has he reached out to you?” he asks.  “No.” I shrink again.  Quinn gives me that, he's-an-asshole-but-you-already-know-that look.  I look away.

This is the longest he’s gone.  I haven’t seen him, I haven’t heard from him, he’s avoided the office.  My stomach wrenches and I fight every urge to run to the bathroom and vomit.  I can’t unravel myself.  It’s all around me.  

I glance at the waiter and do the universal check please look.  Lunch is over.  

Sundays

I think have become the most tedious bit. Today, I'm still hiding under the covers. It's cloudy and dark and well, I'm tired and don't see much reason to crawl out into the world.

Becky said to me once when we were discussing being single vs. being in a relationship (Becky is married) - she said, "I am envious of your Friday nights, and you are envious of my Sunday nights." I think it sums most of it up right there.

I recognize that I made a very difficult choice recently and that it will take awhile for all of the bits and pieces to sift and sort themselves out. I know that throughout this 'phase' of being I need to be gentle and kind to myself and others. Breathe my way through it. I recognize the art of letting go. I would like to think that I have spent the majority of my life perfecting it.

Although there is pride in choosing yourself, your strength and solitude and being alone until it's truly 'right' - it still aches and pinches in the oddest of moments. More so when you really just want someone to curl up next to you, pull you in and breathe quietly beside you so that your mind can rest.

Today however, I want to wallow a bit. I want to lay in bed, stare at my ceiling. Think about long Sunday walks, late breakfasts, sharing the New York Times, cooking Sunday dinners. All of the happy normalcy's that make up a Sunday. Today I feel like missing that. It's not to say that at some point I won't pull myself out of bed, perhaps shower and go join the Italian Feast that some of my friends are conjuring up...I will because I will be bored with my own thoughts and that's what you do. You pull yourself up.

For the next hour or two however, I will lay here. Just like this and miss things.

The Release.

I am broken. You can’t fix something unless it breaks. I am broken.

In many ways, I guess most of me broke over 5 years ago. I do believe that people can break you. I am not sure that I used to believe that. I always told myself that it was always about the ‘self’ and that others could never really hurt you – only the ‘self’ could. That’s not true. People can break you. When you give them all of your being and let them see you, raw and real and when you open their hand and give them your soul to carry and they shatter that gift, they can break you. And so it was...many years ago, someone broke me.

I moved home 3 years ago to fix what had been broken. I never fixed it. I wrapped it up in a lot of tape, stapled the bits that were falling off, tucked it away whispering to it only in the quiet of myself. But it was there. Over time, it has weathered and the tape began to fall off…it all unraveled and it began to speak. Loudly. So much so that it could no longer exist in the cavern of my spirit that I was trying to hold it. It screamed so loudly that I could no longer hear anything else…and it fell outside of me…and it shattered into a million little pieces all around me. And I had to look at it. I had to admit to myself that it was in fact really there. Piece by piece. Every little piece a memory that I have had to release. Piece by piece a shard of glass opening wounds that had never healed. Wounds bleeding tears around me like rivers.

I knew it was coming. This process that I had avoided and masked would one day knock on my door and not leave until I opened the door and answered to it. I know that the only way to get through something is to walk in it – across to the other side. I know that there is another side. I also know that it’s going to take awhile to heal this. These wounds from these shattered pieces of glass called my life – called my love.

Right now I am the girl wrapped in a blanket of such deep, inexpressible sadness. You can see it in my eyes. Strangers can see it in me. I feel these stares of such sympathy and empathy from others. I am the girl with tears in my eyes as I walk through the grocery store. I am the girl who vibrates this energy of loss. This is not to say that I don’t go about all of the day to days – that I don’t still laugh. I am just broken and there is a lot – a lot of fixing to do. To finally do so that I can have the life that I was meant to have, that I will have. I stopped fighting and started listening – as I was always supposed to do and the sounds brought me to this place. The release, - so that there could be a new beginning.

It’s ok for me to admit this – to talk about it. Because it’s real and its life and I am human. This is part of my purpose. Part of the story of the souls' journey to enlightenment and clarity. I am good. I have karma behind me, others don’t and that will be their journey to sort and rectify. This is about me now. Finding peace. Anointing myself. Healing my wounds, cleaning out the salt.

Time. I just need time and it will be alright. There is no forgiveness because I can’t offer that. It’s not my purpose. That will be the decision of beings far greater than me – when it will be time to forgive is someone else’s reckoning. I know that now. I know many things now.

There is no one to whisper me to sleep. There is no one to heal these wounds – only me. As it should be. As it has to be. And so it shall be.

We all have our paths. This is mine.