Dutch Lock Down Day Seventy One

[What Do You See?]

Photo by Mathilda Khoo on Unsplash

This year’s birthday was … way better than expected.

But this was one of the years that I totally lowered those expectations.

Anything was possible.

And that made all the difference.

I think.

But first the news:

I used to celebrate my birthday for the entire month of May. And then a close friend died and her funeral was near enough or on my birthday that it became something to be shunned. A month of mourning.

The same thing happened to New Year’s Eve for the same reason.

Photo by Irene Dávila on Unsplash

It often comes down to perception.

For the first pregnancy, I read up on quite a few possibilities before giving birth. Read a ton of books and read entirely too many opinion pieces on the internet. Which, frankly, I’m not sure I’d recommend. But. Going into the actual giving birth bit, I had a very open mind. Anything could happen. I had done everything I could. The doctors were there. I trusted the hospital, the health care system, and the staff. I could die. My child could die. But it was also possible that absolutely nothing could go wrong.

Anything was possible.

It was a fairly smooth delivery all things considered.

For the second pregnancy, I tried not to read as much. And that was okay. But going into the actual giving birth bit, I ASSUMED that it would be pretty similar to the first time. No big deal.

I was so wrong.

It was quite traumatic.

Maybe more than it needed to be – because of expectations.

But part of those expectations arrived because I had previously given birth and every birth everywhere is exactly the same #AMIRITE

This birthday, this year, has never happened before. I’ve never had a birthday during a pandemic. I had no expectations.

Anything was possible.

And it was good.


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