For those of you who have followed my blog for a while, you'll know we started on our nursery crazy early. Probably as early as 12 weeks, or even earlier if I had to confess. We've had that room empty for a couple years prepping for this elusive baby during our long baby chase. But I realize now that working on it meant so much more than just getting the decor up or the furniture assembled. It was very symbolic for me. I felt like moving forward with it was a way of sending a message to my pregnant-after-loss brain stating this baby WILL get here, it's not IF she gets here. I was making a statement loud and clear. And besides, since we waited so long to have this baby, it didn't feel "early" to me anyway.
By pressing forward with the nursery and shoving fear aside I was telling infertility and the nagging loss brain to go eff itself. And it's felt really good.
So here I am today at 21 weeks (yay!) and it's about 99% finished. But I'm curious for the rest of you who have found success after infertility/loss, how has the timing of your nursery decorating been impacted by your infertility or loss thoughts? Do you feel like you should wait until the end of your pregnancy because of thoughts around infertility and/or loss? Or did/will you do it sooner? Did that not even weigh into the decisions at all? Did you forge ahead early because you felt entitled to after the long wait?
I was cautious. I waited till I was solidly in the second trimester before really pushing forward. I think I was 6 months when we bought the crib and painted the room. As a result it was only about 80% complete when he surprised us at 35 weeks. Now that we are preparing to try again I feel like I’ll jump right in out of fear of waiting too long again. I confess, I may have already bought an item for the new nursery….still I know there are no guarantees for a second child.
ReplyDeleteI think there's no right or wrong way. I am keeping everything crossed for you to have your second child. Thanks for commenting.
DeleteI had bleeding up to 10 weeks along so we waited until 20 weeks to decorate for that reason and we were going to decorate based on the baby's sex too.
ReplyDeleteThat makes sense, bleeding must have been very scary! Thanks for commenting.
DeleteI waited. I just couldn't do it. We had just started planning our registry and our nursery when we lost William at 15 weeks. When I was pregnant with Muppet, I was in my third trimester before I would even open the door, which had remained closed since the day I came home from the hospital after delivering our lost boy.
ReplyDeleteWe finished it on time and looking back, we should have started earlier, but I just couldn't get into it until I was out of the (scary to me) second trimester.
I can't even imagine how scary that must have been for you. Just awful, I am so sorry. I'm glad that muppet turned out to be your rainbow baby.
DeleteHi Liz,
ReplyDeleteMy story is a little different since we have yet to be successful, however, I feel I understand completely the symbolism of the nursery. For me, a big step was taking our boring guest room and making it a beautiful, decorated guest room while we wait for something to work. Not sure what I would do once we get that BFP, but more than likely would wait for the 2nd trimester, mostly because DH and I tend to move at a snail's pace anyway. So happy for you!
I'll keep my fingers crossed for you and I hope you find success. I hope that your nursery will end up being everything you dreamed of and more. *hug*
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