Well, we’ve made it this far. Tomorrow morning is our first, all important scan. If all is well, our little frog is about the size of a large raspberry, or for the geeks, the One ring. I’ve been pretty constantly sick this pregnancy and have lost quite a bit of weight due to the nausea. Combined with the heat I’ve been pretty useless, although I am still surfacing bit by bit from the pit I’ve been in, getting flashes of insight that my sense of being lost, loathed, and exposed to ridicule are products of my own mind rather than the reality of my life and work. Bitterness gradually eases into grief and self care.

Rose and I spent this morning weeping in each others arms, planning for possible loss. What we’ll name them, what our fears are, who we might ask for help. Then we had a quiet day doing whatever we needed to to stop clawing the world apart. I read on my lovely new kobo ereader, napped, had a bath, and we played a board game with a friend in the evening.

The world is suspended. Rose and I have never had a first scan with good news. Tomorrow morning feels like going to the biggest lottery in the world – a huge dream come true or a whole world dashed. The stakes feel unbearably high. We laugh, do things together, cry, feel numb, retreat into silence, reach out, over and over again. All possible worlds lie before us. And our minds try to break down the odds, understand the future we need to prepare for. They whisper that all is well, they whisper that a good scan tomorrow is still no guarantee, that 8 month pregnancies can still end in loss, that 3 year olds drown, that Mums die in car accidents. That tragedy is always part of life. One way or another our hearts will be broken. We try to face mortality and bear the unbearable.

Our hearts are not up to the task. If our hopes burn, we’ll burn with them, and what walks from the ashes will be different to who we were before. I can’t predict anything with any certainty but that; every step on this road changes us both. So we try to be kind. This is what it is to be alive, humour, love, terror. The lights that guide us and the darkness that parts us. Hands reaching across the dark.