I'm going to have to keep repeating this to myself for the next 7 months.

My neighbor was very kind, she & I are not exactly friends yet but since we both have toddlers we see each other in the yard, and we occasionally chat. She went ahead and let me know that she is 8 weeks pregnant so that I'll know now before she starts showing.

I'm still a mother. I'm still a neighbor. I'm not contagious. Just being around her is not going to make her lose her baby. I'm not contagious.

Oh yes, she was extremely kind to let me know, especially being so very newly pregnant, I really appreciate that.

It's just hard to start being "in" life again. Speedbumps for my pinto, I guess.

I know the feeling, Katherine.(Hi, I'm Michelle, by the way - new to this site). I lost my baby this past March to Trisomy 18 and in early May my cousin's wife announced her pregnancy.

Even though Trisomy 18 is genetic, it is not inherited. Yet, I still feel like my experience and my presence puts a black cloud over her pregnancy. At a family wedding last week you could cut the tension with a knife (more so even the tension of other family members).

As for your situation, I want to offer you strength - most of all as you have to spend the next months watching someone else's pregnancy unfold right next door.

Well, she's starting to show now. My son and her daughter still run and play with each other, my son picks the surprise lilies and hands them round "to all da prelly lalies in da garden" and it's not too bad, we sit on the benches next to Aeryn's garden which is actually beginning to look like one.

There's some hesitation when I ask how she's doing, and I have kept myself from doing anything crazy like going out and buying loads of the pregnancy tea which it turns out probably did keep my son alive (did you know nettles are a natural anticoagulant?) for her or, all things good forbid it, asking to rub her tummy (never in my life have I felt that urge before, craziness knows no bounds it seems) yet, and all I can do is keep hoping and praying that everything will go well for her without making her too nervous.

Katherine, your post is bringing me to the verge of tears. I so understand.

We're on a different planet than the rest of the world, it seems, doesn't it? Or at least a different plane of reality. We co-exist. We smile and nod. We try our best to maintain these friendships with others and be involved in "life" again. But so many times for me, I feel like it's such a farce.

Thank you for posting what you did. I feel so many times that I'm seen as a contagion.

It's been ok. She's due in February. Unconsciously, anytime she's near me, her hands are on her stomach, holding that unborn child constantly when I'm around. Whether it's because the thought of "what if" is frightening or the thought of "what if" means she wants to cherish things, it just is. It bothers me and at the same time it doesn't.

It's going to be hard to look across the garden and see either of the sights I see for February. Either I'll see a happy family of four with grandparents, or I'll see a family that's had to start a horrible journey. The fact that I can see the second scenario in my head at all tells you that I'm having a hard time now. I didn't think this time of year would be as hard for me as it is becoming, but the "you should have laid your grief aside by now" crowd keeps gaining voices.

I'm fairly sure what I'll see come February or so is a cranky toddler, a tired mom, a beaming dad bouncing a newborn, and grandparents running around alternating between their current little princess and their new one. That's going to be hard, but it's what I'd rather see, it's the "supposed to happen" that we all expected.

She delivered fine though a little late, a beaming dad told me "we're tired but fine." I'm glad. I still feel a horror of being near pregnant women though, today out at lunch the cashier was in that second trimester looking perky and happy, like a goddess of spring fecundity...I know it's stupid but it's still like I want to keep as far away as possible. Hearing about my neighbor's new baby (haven't seen her yet) makes me happy for them but also gives me this deep ache thinking what my year-old daughter would have been like. Even this far out random things hit me, for instance I pulled out my garden planner book (ok, I'm an OCD person, I get it from my mother, yes, I have a book where I sketched out what I'd eventually like our yard to look like and just do a bit at a time) and notated under the vegetable garden layouts from last year I found where I'd scribbled "Need to get a little outdoor tent or playpen to keep bugs and sun off Aeryn while we are out in garden - [son] will be fine I'm sure since he will be trying to 'help'." It's all the might have beens that hurt, I know it's probably the worst this first year but it's like there'll be this shadow over me always, wondering what would have been if...