and so it goes

as the days go by and the drugs and hormones of pregnancy wear off, I grow sad.

And I know this part of the process. I know this is a wave I must dive under. I must feel the tides push over me, forcing me down and washing over me with the gravity of the world, because if I don't give over to it, I will be swept under by surprise, against my will, and taken down to drown. I know this intuitively, and from experience.

I wish everyone else would let me be sad.

I know it is hard to watch people you love feel guilty or sad or regretful, especially when they should see what you see, how much they deserve to be happy, how silly they are being, all the reasons they shouldn't be sad, but it is not fair to ask people to be happy because their sadness makes you sad. It is not right to ask people to swallow their emotions and rationalize their feelings to make you feel more comfortable.

I need to be sad.

I need to mourn the loss of my birth story as I had it planned. I need to be allowed to feel like a failure, because I did fail. I failed to do what women are built to do. I failed to let my baby out of my body, for a second time. The circumstances are different, but this time I can't blame knowledge or understanding or education. I have only my own body to blame, another item on a mile long list of things to hate about my body.

I need to be allowed to vent this sadness to get past it so that I CAN invest my energy in being a better mom. I need to say it out loud and not be afraid that I am making other uncomfortable. I need to say...I hate myself for being so weak. I hate myself for not trying something else. I hate myself for giving in when maybe I was close. I hate myself for saddling my family with excess debt we cannot afford. I hate myself for all these reasons but mostly I hate that I am not the woman I want to be and I don't know what to do to be her. I hate that this is a problem I cannot solve. I hate that I am supposed to just accept that I am not who I want to be and I have to just suck it up.

I hate it.

It's not that millions of women have been fine after giving birth by C-section or that I think I have fucked up my kids by not pushing them through my vagina. It is that *I* couldn't do what *I* set out to do. It was my goal. It was my project. It was my body. It was my choice. and I failed.

I need to be sad about that for a while. Okay? I need to be sad.

She is perfect and I do feel I can begin to forgive myself for my birth with Benjamin, but now I have a whole new fish to fry.

I am not the picture of a mother or a woman I want to be for my children. I am not the role model I want to be. I am not the figure of strength and protection I want to be. I feel ill equipped to serve them the way they deserve to be served, and I don't know how to make it up to them or if I ever will.

I need to feel this.

I need to say this.

I need you to hear this.