5 minutes
Nearly everything I do is for my family. As I type I have two 18 month babies crawling all over me, and fighting for my attention. This may take some time.
I have lost quite a bit of my identity and in its place is an unhappy some times desperate woman. I try to put on a happy face for my babies, I am calm with them, I play with them, read to them etc. But I am afraid as they get older they will see through my facade. As soon as they go to bed, I melt into lethargy, this is not fair to my husband who has been working all day and who wants to spend time with his babies and then his wife, but I feel I can not keep up the routine past nightfall. The crows that fly past my window just before sunset are my marker that the day will soon end and I am in fear that as the days grow longer my days will get longer too.
Something has to change, and it needs to be me. I can not do much change the parameters of my relationships, some things are just facts. My husbands life is very well documented, even my babies lives as short as they have been thus far are documented. My Husband is a Ph D students working on a genetic disease that is fatal. He is looking for a cure, not only for the multitudes of people who have it but for himself and his brother. For that reason in order to have children without the inherent 50/50 risk of developing this disease we chose to do IVF. They are the first successful children in canada born through this process, to be mutant gene free and will not develop this disease later in life as their father will. They are now part of the medical curriculum at UBC!
Once they were conceived I became a womb. I hung on to some of my identity at first, I still went to school, I was in my last year at Emily Carr getting my BFA. I focussed on ceramics, but as many know, it can been physically demanding and as my pregnancy progressed and my babies were developing (I got the call it was twins as I was loading a gas kiln outside in the cold) I got slower, more tired, grumpy and stressed. It got to be too much, at 20 weeks I started having symptoms of pre-term labour and ended up in hospital on bed rest . Fetuses that small are rarely viable, so my new home for nearly three months was The Ever Green ward at Woman's Hospital. Though my instructors passed me and I graduated, I did not complete the year. I never finished my final project for the graduation show, I didn't walk down and get my diploma handed to me, there were no parties, toasts and cheers. The event went by with out a sound and suddenly four years of my life were over. My sister in-law and I went to my studio to clean it out, she had to lift , box and move while I pointed from a wheelchair (this was one of the first days I had been allowed to leave the hospital).
In medieval times some women were closed off into their rooms with drapes to hide the sun and stifle air flow. This is what I likened my experience to. I wasn't allowed to walk, I could only go outside with permission in a wheelchair, I had a window but it did not open, I watched winter turn to spring and to the early stages of summer. At 32 weeks I came out of my confinement only to spend a month longer going to my babies at the intensive care unit. My husband and I were so lucky, they were small. Billie the girl was 4.5 lbs and Elijah was 3.5 lbs but there were healthy. All that was left was to grow and get stronger.
I don't think you would know that they were preemies to look at them now. Everyday of their lives I am a constant, but as I get larger to them I get small to me. So my resolution is three fold.
1) I want to be the best artist I can be and then get better. Starting Jan 9th I am going back to School to complete my last class that I abandoned mid stride. I have also promised my self to practice art everyday even if it is just jotting down an idea or a simple sketch.
2)To become healthy again- I plan on doing some exercise at least 5 times a week, even if it 30 mins of yoga or taking my babies outside for a walk ( a twin stroller loaded down is very heavy).
3) To be the best mother I can be. If I can accomplish the first two then the third will go with out saying. Notice I did not say to be the the best wife I can be- I believe my husband is a big boy and he can take care of himself for now.
How will I know I am going in the right direction? I think it will be in my face.
