A healthy little Rainbow

**Note: This was written at the time of the appointment.

December 10, 2019

At twelve weeks and one day, this morning was the big morning - the scary, but necessary, NT test for our newest pregnancy we nicknamed Rainbow. In order to specifically avoid my oh-so favorite ultrasound physician, we scheduled our test in Hadera (when we could have simply walked to the Maccabi station two blocks from our house). Wishing I could take a valium or xanax before the trip, I practiced my breathing I learned from hypnobirthing (it comes in so handy so many times!) and we made the short drive north. I was very quiet.

It really is a lovely hospital and, that day, finally, the sky was filled with dark gray clouds threatening rain. In Israel, rain is considered a blessing and we pray for it during the winter months. I was so happy for the potential rain; November had been so dry and we were worried about the remainder of the season. I tried to think of it as a blessing for me, but I was still so nervous.

In our appointment, it was clear that this doctor had decent bedside manners. We chose not to tell him about our last time pregnant; it seemed easier. He asked all the necessary questions and I was very quiet, but I answered everything and hubby helped when I didn't catch something.

It's probably good he didn't have to take my blood pressure because I would have been immediately taken to the ER. Anyway, I lay down quietly and he began. I took a look at the images and they all looked pretty good to me. I saw a nose bone, not much fluid behind baby's neck, baby's tummy, etc. But who really knows? I'm no expert.

But he saw what I believed I saw - a healthy baby with an NT measurement of 1.7mm. A much smaller number than the last pregnancy, which was in the dangerous 9mm range.

He kept speaking quietly, calmly, telling my husband and I what was on the screen. Hands, legs, tummy, brain, lungs, heart, all looking good. A healthy little potential baby holding a balloon.

You know that feeling when you finally exhale and only then realize you were holding your breath? Yea, totally there.

We exited the ultrasound and I started crying from relief. Hubby put his arm around me and asked me gently if I wanted a coffee. Yes, please, I said. And we walked outside to discover that it was pouring rain and it was beautiful. Rivulets of water streamed down the sidewalks and cleansed the streets, everyone ran from place to place with their umbrellas or rushing with hoods or newspapers hastily thrown over their heads. The wind whipped and I pulled my jacket around me closer. We peered around, saw a random little coffee shop next door, and ran inside to what we discovered was Cafe Alice (which meant a lot personally since I have someone very close to me with that name).

By no means were we the only ones with the same idea, but Israelis are friendly. We ordered our two hot chocolates and shared a tiny table with another woman. Eventually, we moved to an open table at the back of the cafe where I could just breathe quietly, tear up, hold Ariel's hand, and wait for the rain to pass.

Did I know that I had been holding my breath? Praying for this result? Sure. But knowing it... feeling it... internalizing it are all different things.

As we walked up the hill to return to the car, we spotted it. A rainbow off in the distance.

We held hands the rest of the way to the car.

Perfect Soul, Imperfect Baby: Swirling Thoughts

Part V: Tuesday, August 13.

My Swirling Thoughts.

Each morning for the past week (yes, it's been a week) I've struggled to get out of bed. In my everyday life since last August when I got re-diagnosed, I have suffered from depression. To combat it, I take anti-depressants and until now, they have been a life-saver. I also happen to have a sleep disorder; for this, I take sleep medication nightly (except for the nights before the days I think I'm going to have a "procedure," which isn't really a procedure, but rather the termination of a life that, apparently, wasn't meant to be). 

This week, however, was a doozy and the depression really kicked it up a notch. My husband shared with me last week that he was concerned for me and my mental health. Yea, nodding, I could see that, but I'll be okay. I'll write and write and write some more. Maybe I'll paint. Maybe I'll do more photography. Maybe I'll vomit.

I go to work because why not, what else am I going to do. So I arrive and it appears, from the outside, that it's a regular morning at my regular desk with the regular Mediterranean Sea outside my window.

From the inside, it's all turmoil. My thoughts center around this sad, broken little life still growing inside me. I just want to get past this already (whatever "this" is), and I'm glad it will finally be tomorrow. At the same time, I'm dreading it. Kinda like a funeral, I guess. You know you need to attend and you know it's going to suck, but you also know you might, possibly, start to feel some closure after it happens (or at least you hope so).

I draft and share my very first article about it, sharing my baby and my story with the world. Before this moment, very few people knew and, suddenly, everyone knows. The wall cracks and crumbles before me.

Everyone comments on my bravery; they message me privately; they leave messages of love and light to break through the darkness surrounding me; they send me WhatsApps. 

Women from Michigan, Israel, other cities and countries come out of the woodwork to flood me with love and stories; women I know, women I don't know, women who publicly share their experiences, women who have never told anyone about their loss. I hear from other women who (and a husband whose wife) went through something similar. 

They offer to chat, to listen, to sit next to me, to attend the procedure with me. It's incredible, a little intimidating, and very humbling. It makes me cry that (unfortunately) I am not alone though my situation is slightly different than most, me with a still-alive baby.

Here's what's not fair about this, aside from everything.

• I'm still nauseated.
• I still have cravings.
• I still take my folic acid and prenatal vitamins.
• I still am scared to drink alcohol even though it's completely and logically moot at this point.
• I feel guilty and relieved that I'll probably physically feel better after this is done.

Lunch is relatively "normal" and I find it surreal that this is my "new normal." 

It's only after lunch, as I start to think again, when I start to feel awful and queasy about the whole thing, even though I know, intellectually, it's the right decision. And that's part of the problem. Your brain says one thing and your heart wants something else.

The problem is that I was given way too much time to think about this.

The problem is that this happened at all and I will likely never ever have an answer for any of it. 

Hydrops fetalis happens. It's rare, but it happens. Only a tiny percentage of hydrops babies are miracle babies and mine, with its chromosomal abnormalities, defects in the umbilical cord, and possible and potential other bodily defects, is simply not one of them that had a chance.

But maybe that's a good thing. 

In a warped way, this could have been worse. The baby could have been given a tiny chance on which I would have had to wager. And, in all likelihood, the baby would have died somewhere between twenty-two weeks and birth, if we were lucky. When all this started, I joined a hydrops support group and I cannot tell you how many pictures I have seen of parents tearfully saying 'goodbye' to their little babies. Ironically, each picture made me feel better about the choice we were making.

Despite all this, the other thought endures. If I had to have a malformed fetus (the worst pairing of words in existence), why couldn't my body just manage to have a "regular" miscarriage? 

Why do I have to make this awful decision and sit with it for almost a week before being able to follow through?

How did this little fetus even get to this point of development... sheer stubbornness??

None of this is fair. Not even remotely.

Feminism and the Sexodus

I've had the feminist conversation with many people over a course of years, and most people, if not all, assume that I am a feminist... perhaps it's because, from the outside, I seem to be the epitome of that ideal: strong, independent, career-driven, with my law degree and my own firm only two years after graduating from Wayne State Law School. I am now 36 years old, married the love of my life two years ago, and have a gorgeous little boy who celebrates his first birthday next month. I have the best of both worlds, just as feminists claim we can all have.

But that almost didn't happen and it doesn't happen for many of us.

Avi Woolf is correct in his article, The Jewish Sexodus, when he says that "the war on masculinity as such throughout popular culture and society ... has reached the point that many men have decided love and marriage just ain't worth it."

For years now, it is expected of women that, after college, we should put our energy into our careers. Men are of little importance and low priority since we assume that they will wait for us. But why should they when all we do is bash them (take a close look at the commercials on television or read any anti-male jokes) or worse yet, communicate in subtle or not-so-subtle ways that we do not need them. We have sperm banks, nannies, and can be single Super-moms. It's little wonder men resort to porn, video games, and/or concentrate on their own careers.

Men and women are leading parallel lives, sadly separate from each other. By the time women realize that we are in our thirties, instead of having a loving husband and rambunctious kids (those who want them), we are alone with our other amazing, lonely girlfriends in our great jobs.

Since the rise of feminism decades ago, the insistence that women deserve "equality," and that men are pathetic, emotionless, grunting creatures who we only need for their sperm, the age at which women are getting married has risen and we have even now reached the point where our gene pool and future are losing out on some of these great women (and the men who would have married them) altogether.

Each week I worry about my girlfriends who are my age (and sometimes older) who are as-of-yet unmarried. They are truly remarkable women. Smart, extremely talented, outgoing, hardworking, friendly, funny, and pretty. They are catches - all of them. But where are the men? Where are their matches? They are dating and marrying younger women, who want stability and a husband. And how can you argue with the men's choices of a younger wife? It gives the men more time with their wife, more time to have children, and they don't have to fight so hard with an already established, unforgiving, possibly sour or disappointed thirty-something who expects more than reality can provide.

"A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle." This quote by Irina Dunn is commonly used and garners laughs among women. Generally, women do feel as though we are superior to men (due to emotional strength, empathic abilities, the seemingly innate ability to multitask, and the fact that we can give birth), but we forget that most men are generally physically stronger, more logical, and better at problem solving.

Dunn's quote fixates on our feelings of confidence and inflates our ego such that, despite the quote being untrue, our feelings are manipulated so that the delicate balance between men and women is undermined. Feminism (and the related bashing of men) ends up the tool that creates an over-inflated sense of self-worth in women and pushes away men.

Don't misunderstand me. I am a feminist (by the old standard). I know what and where I am today is a result of other women's diligence in fighting for rights and equality (one of whom was a great-great aunt, the first female law student at an ivy league school).

Hear this. Women are equal to men in importance. We are entitled to our careers, to equal pay for equal work. We are deserving of respect for our ideas, hard work, and diligence. If we choose to stay at home and raise our children and keep house, we should receive huge respect for that as well. If we choose to marry, or not, have kids or not, that is OUR CHOICE. But one cannot argue or ignore the lost idea before feminism ruined all of this -

Men and women are not equal; we are DIFFERENT.

Were we to accept our differences, glory in them, appreciate and embrace our yin and yang, and, more importantly, internalize that women NEED men, then perhaps women wouldn't focus 110% of our time and energy into our careers. Women want so badly to be equal to men, but men are able to handle a job and dating/marriage. Why can't we? What is so wrong with wanting to find your partner in your twenties instead of being selfish and self-absorbed for that decade and more?

Nothing.... but that was the truth that feminism beat out of us.

The essence and original ideas of feminism, that of equal pay, respect, and honoring a woman's choice, were commendable. The problem is that those ideals didn't remain true. They expanded into the belief that women are better (by stepping on the backs of men) and even mocked the very definition of itself when women who chose to stay at home to raise their children were berated as being an anathema to the "cause."

Fortunately, my story has a happy ending (thus far). I got lucky in finding my husband, even if I had to import him from another country. But getting married at the ripe old age of 34 also gives me little time to have the number of children that I would like. As such, I will have to (briefly) set aside the career I worked on so diligently just to focus on family. I would have been better off getting married younger so that I could dedicate my time more efficiently. Had I done that, I also would have had a partner to help me meet my goals, and perhaps I would have achieved even more. We will never know. But we can accomplish this for the next generation of women and men....

The first step is getting rid of this bastardization of feminism, the holier-than-thou attitude for women, and the war against men.



For more interesting reads on feminism, alpha females, and the war on men (I'll add them as I find them):
Should Non-Feminist Men Just Drop Dead?
The Alpha Female
Marriage Gap